NXNW:
Truly By Adem Tepedelen
Truly strange that a band containing founding members of the Screaming Trees
and Soundgarden has, until recently, existed in the shadows of the Seattle music
scene. There were fleeting glimpses of this virtually unknown band--two EPs
released on Sub Pop in 1991 and 1993, but a total of eight songs released over
the span of their six years together is not much. And their sporadic live shows
only added to the mystery of this remarkable trio who are now signed to Capitol
Records and poised to release their full-length debut, Fast Stories... From
Kid Coma.
Mark Pickerel (ex-Screaming Trees drummer) and his bandmates, guitarist/vocalist
Robert Roth (ex-Storybook Krooks) and bassist Hiro Yamamoto (ex-Soundgarden)
huddle around a table at Cafe Paradiso and attempt to unravel all the circumstances
that have created the enigma called Truly. The genesis of the band started simply
enough with Pickerel and Roth getting together with former SGM guitarist Chris
Quinn (who played bass) to "jam" on some of Roth's songs. However, the decision
to move Quinn over to guitar and invite Yamamoto to play bass was a difficult
one.
"I hesitated calling him because of the rumors of his adamant attitude about
never playing rock music again for the rest of his life," Pickerel begins, glancing
over at a grinning Yamamoto. "But I knew that I had left the Trees for the same
reasons he left Soundgarden and so I called and said, 'We'd like to have you
play with us, but understand that things are gonna be different.'--Ha! that
was a big lie wasn't it!?"
Yamamoto laughs and takes up the tale, "I stared playing with them and I hadn't
really been playing much at all, so I couldn't play. Over time I got into the
songs and started feeling like I was playing better and I felt like (the band)
would kind of be low-key."
Ah, yes, "low-key," the clever euphemism for not doing much. Not shooting
for the major label pie-in-the-sky, not playing live every weekend or constantly
touring. Low-key is what bands that just want to get together and play some
songs (without the pressure of "making it") are called. But Hiro was duped.
This band isn't low-key. "We never made a conscious effort to not work or not
be productive," Pickerel explains. In fact, they released their first EP, "Heart
and Lungs" (neither EP has a title, so they are referred to by the first song
title) for Sub Pop, and then individually made some decisions that would ultimately
shape the band's forward progress. Pickerel moved back to his hometown of Ellensburg
to open his own business (Rodeo Records), Yamamoto moved to Bellingham to get
his Master's degree at WWU, Roth stayed in Seattle and continued to write songs
and Quinn left the band altogether.
Eventually Sub Pop would release their second EP, "Leslie's Coughing Up Blood,"
which, like the first, they let go out of print very quickly. So, the band had
no real impetus to tour (since their music wasn't readily available) and the
members couldn't easily pull themselves away from their various commitments.
However, they never stopped getting together to play and to write songs and
eventually they completed an album's worth of material for Sub Pop which "got
scrapped."
"Let's put it this way," Roth states, "the business side of Truly has been
half-hearted, but the music has been full-on. What's kept us together--really,
honestly--is the music and playing what we're writing."
"There were times where we were very productive, but it just wasn't very...visible,"
Pickerel adds thoughtfully.
"I think a lot of people expected that when we got together we were gonna
be this super group and that we were gonna just try and go to the top,"
says Roth. "I think it's better that we just kind of kicked back in the basement
and created our sound and gestated like any normal band."
While I'd hesitate to call anything about this trio normal, certainly the
frequency of their live shows ("seasonal," according to the band) and the amount
of time they spent rehearsing and recording is definitely not normal.
Most bands work out their new songs live, to find out what works and what doesn't.
I call them on this. "That's true," concedes Roth, "it's definitely given us
a different approach. I think our next recordings are going to be different,
because we will have toured."
The imminent release of Fast Stories... From Kid Coma (which will be
released simultaneously in 18 countries at the end of June) is going to be a
huge step forward for Truly. It will be their real debut, and will no
doubt turn many heads. It is unexpectedly quite different from their first two
EPs. Even though "Leslie's Coughing Up Blood" has been included, it doesn't
seem to fit the feel of the rest of the record, and the difference between Kid
Coma and their first recording is like night and day. "The first two EPs
were basically songs that I had written entirely at home," Roth explains, "and
we went in and recorded as a band, whereas the stuff we're writing now was written
in practice and written with all of us there, while the ideas are coming out."
The Love Battery-ish poppy psychedelia they originally dabbled in, has grown
into a dark beast of a sound that brings together the grandiose, carnivalesque
aspects of The Doors with thick layers of all manner of drop-tuned guitars.
In fact, the opener "Blue Flame Ford" sports a tremolo-effected guitar that
is tuned so low it seems to punch you with a physical blow to the chest. It's
as nasty a guitar sound as you will hear on a major label release.
"I make up my own tunings," says Roth. "I have six or seven different tunings
I use, with a body of work in each tuning. With a [different] tuning it just
gives you a certain modality where you can exist in a certain musical universe."
These various different "homemade" tunings not only present a bit of a challenge
for Yamamoto, but have also influenced the way the band play together. "It involves
a lot more listening," says Yamamoto, "because I play a lot of standard tunings
when he's in these weird tunings, so my whole fingering is different than his.
A lot of times with the bass you can just look where [the guitarist] is doing
the barre chords, but I can't really do that. I have to just listen."
There is something to Fast Stories that reflects the tightness, the
oneness Truly have achieved from so many years of playing together within the
isolation of the studio or basement, but it's not easily defined or quantified.
Most of the words I find to describe this record (weird, disturbing, nightmarish,
hallucinogenically-inspired, ugly, bizarre, frightening) seem far too negative
and would leave the reader with the wrong impression. It is a very dark record
due mostly to the low tunings, but also because of some of the lyrical content.
If a bad acid trip could be somehow enjoyable, this record would be the soundtrack.
There are swirls of synthesizers, keyboard flourishes, gigantic slabs of guitar
crust, an active yet subtle rhythm section and amongst all the din is Roth's
melodic croon, which is frequently punctuated by guttural screams. The songs
are immaculately arranged (both individually and as a whole) with dynamics that
are explosive. There is a feeling that the band innately knows the perfect time
to unleash choruses or hold back just a bit, modulate up to a crescendo or bridge,
or just blow the whole fucking thing into oblivion.
It is fitting then that such a remarkable and well-crafted album should draw
this odd threesome out of the shadows they seem to have existed in for the first
six years of their existence. Early expectations and constant business frustrations
finally put aside, they can fully commit themselves to becoming a "real" band.
"Hiro's done with school and Mark has tons of employees at his store--" says
Roth before Hiro interrupts.
"We're a little freer than we've ever been."
"So," picking up his train of thought, Roth concludes "we actually consider
ourselves full-time musicians."
(The Rocket, June 14, 1995)