Chris Schlarb’s Rainstorm in Curved Air

PHOTO by ADRIANA SCHLARB

Chris Schlarb, guitarist, filmmaker, label curator and now after a first solo album that took five years to dot dozens of postal collaborators into an ambitious and considered psychological set-piece: “Composer,” he says, “or that’s how I’m thinking of myself.” Twilight & Ghost Stories (just out on Sufjan Stevens’ Asthmatic Kitty) rates indie marquee for appearances by Stevens himself (piano) and Black/Pink Mountain/Tops’ Stephen McBean (murmurs) (who by the way met and befriended Schlarb at a show at Koo’s) but also includes contributions from sidemen to Philip Glass (percussionist Mick Rossi) and Joni Mitchell (Dave Easley) and locals like Create (!)’s Orlando Greenhill and sound-artist Glenn Bach.

But it’s no patch-job or disorganized orchestra, despite the colossal roster—none of whom ever heard anything from the piece until Schlarb finished this summer. Instead, Twilight—as promised by the title—blooms and blurs like a dream about to be interrupted: Field recordings (Schlarb’s wife as a little girl in San Pedro, Schlarb’s son’s prenatal heartbeat, that rain against the windows) slide ideas of waking life into a dissolute symphony written at a time when Schlarb was so detached and distracted he couldn’t even remember when to sleep. He started by recording a rainstorm and assembled everything to fit.

Is the rain that starts the album from that first recording?
That’s the very first thing—I was in the middle of a really kind of gnarly separation from my ex-wife and kid and I’d also just quit a job I had, so I was totally rudderless. All the things we rely on to say, ‘This is daytime, this is lunchtime, this is nighttime’—they were gone, and on top of that was this giant rainstorm, which never happens in Long Beach! It was totally disorienting—I was awake in places when I would have normally been asleep. I had and still have a piano my ex-wife’s family had given me, so I set up a mic toward the north window and a mic toward the south window, and I just recorded the rain for 39 minutes. And as soon as I recorded, I sat down and was thinking—‘I could totally compose a piece of music…’ I went to my piano and started playing—the first opening section is all the first stuff I played, and after that I started asking for submissions to be sent. I just kept thinking of the word ‘wraith.’ I was floating—nobody knew who I was or where I was—and I kind of started getting in touch with all these musicians I admired so in some ways, I wouldn’t have to explain my situation to them. I could just be a stranger—‘Hey, would you like to collaborate on this?’ I didn’t have to say, ‘I’m going through a divorce, my kids aren’t here, I’m really bummed.’ I’d say, ‘Do you have scraps or segments or things that would never have a place on your proper projects? Send them to me—here’s my address—and I’ll see you in a couple of years.’ That’s literally how half these things were conducted.

I bet you were getting great mail.
You know how it is to get stuff in the mail sometimes—it’s like, ‘Ah, I exist!’ It’s not overtly spiritual—but it was people having faith in me, and participating in something they had no impetus to do. I was getting such awesome mail. One day I got something from Parker Paul, who I think is a brilliant singer/songwriter in a kind of Randy Newman vein, and the same day I got something from Bhob Rainey the saxophonist—they couldn’t be more different, but it was two packages from two different people in totally different parts of the country.

Did you know any of your collaborators before the project?
Some people like Orlando—it was like, ‘Hey, Orlando, come over and play on this!’ I didn’t know Sufjan that well—I love old Fragile and Close to the Edge-era Yes, and we rapped about that a few times! Mick Rossi with Philip Glass—I just sent him an email, saying ‘I love your record—I wanted to tell you—and would you be into sending me little things?’ And he sent me two CDs—‘Take whatever you want!’

And then they never heard what you’d done until you finished?
Exactly. There were two kind of reveals. Partly I wanted to see what people would think—the public, or people who like the music I’ve done—and I wanted to see what the individual artists would think. The feedback was just overwhelming—‘This is really amazing and moving and emotional…’—and all of a sudden they’re kind of getting the backstory. I never wanted to talk about that stuff at the time, and I’m not stoked to talk about it now, but it is part of the story—to remove that would do a disservice to the composition in a way.

What other music were you listening to as you composed Twilight & Ghost Stories?
I listen to so many types of things, but I always come back to the same musicians—Joni Mitchell, Steely Dan, the Police—if I’m at home, I’ll put on the Isley Brothers. You can’t sit around listening to Albert Ayler all day and have a smile on your face. People are so hardcore—I went and played Kansas City, and there was this crew of dirty-looking kids like, ‘Merzbow, man!’ But what do you put on after that? Twilight was almost an attempt to make something really easy to listen to—but also totally experimental. I thought it would have a more polarizing effect.

You’re disappointed people aren’t more angry?
A little bit! I thought it would have a more extreme reaction: ‘This record is total garbage!’ or ‘This is the best thing since Disintegration Loops!’

What’s the best way to listen to this album?
The idea for the listening event came from people who had listened to the record—either on a long car trip or on a long walk, which started me thinking. That’s probably the way for people to interact with it. You have to kind of surrender! Lots of people are saying it’s ambient music, and in a way it is, but technically it’s totally not. Ambient connotes that you put it on in the background—this will fuck you up if you put it on in the background! But a tired or even semi-conscious state is a good way to interact with it.

So you recommend people totally exhaust themselves before listening.
Try to bench three or four hundred pounds for an hour, then come have some wine and lay down and listen to it.

LISTENING PARTY FOR CHRIS SCHLARB’S TWILIGHT & GHOST STORIES IN QUADRAPHONIC SOUND WITH LIVE SET BY LANGUIS {open} | 2226 E FOURTH ST | LONG BEACH 90814 | SAT 8PM | FREE WITH REFRESHMENTS | ALL AGES | THESTORYOFOPEN.COM AND CHRISSCHLARB.COM

Tags: ASTHMATIC KITTY, CHRIS SCHLARB, Long Beach