Duncan Sheik – The Contemplative Pop Star

By Roger Kuhns
August 27,2001

Duncan Sheik, best known for his debut pop album hits ‘Barely Breathing’ and ‘She Runs Away’ is also recognized for his quality orchestrations and arrangements unusual to most pop music. Sheik was born in Montclaire, NJ, and grew up in Hilton Head, SC. He studied semiotics of modern culture and media as well as spending a lot of time in the schools recording studio. Sheik’s latest album, his third, is an acoustic project done in collaboration with New York playwright Steven Sater; and is rich with reflective moods and images of solitude.

I spoke with Duncan before his up-coming concert Thursday, August 30 at 8:00pm at the Door Community Auditorium. Duncan offers some of the best quality contemplative and introspective soft-pop music you will hear – this should be a very good concert.

RK: “How are you doing these days?”

DS: “Rolling along. I’m starting recording a new record, a pop record you could say. I’ve been heavily hibernating in the studio.”

RK: “For Phantom Moon you wrote music to Steven Sater’s lyrics; wrote play ‘Umbrage’; what was this experience like?”

DS: “Steve and I met at Soka Gakkai International – a Buddhist organization. A couple of things happened that lead to this collaboration. He had written the play ‘Umbrage’, and asked if I would write some music to his song lyrics in the play. Steve faxed me a bunch of lyrics and I responded to these because they were so different than pop song lyrics. He comes from Western literary tradition rather than Shakespeare or T.S. Elliot; he’s not trying to write hit songs, he’s trying to be poetic. I also wanted to make this record that was musically influenced by earlier traditions – chamber & folk music, to go ahead and make a totally acoustic record using a different lyrical approach.”

RK: “How has your new album ‘Phantom Moon’ (Nonesuch Records) been received?”

DS: “It has gotten great reviews in People, US, and the New York Times. Peoples views of it run the gamut,” Duncan laughs when I said I miss his lyrics. He says, “Yes – people like you are scandalized by the fact I didn’t do the lyrics, and some new fans that say I didn’t get my first two records like what they hear. My first two records were more energetic; Phantom Moon is subtle, quiet; so these various reactions are just something I expected. It’s a tricky one, I tell you. The difficult thing about a pop record is that you’re given guidelines: it has to have 3 choruses, and then it must be between 3 minutes fifteen seconds and three minutes forty-five seconds. After that they don’t care what you do.

RK: “When do you expect your new CD to come out?”

DS: “It’s a faster paced pop record. I think the project will be done fairly early, maybe spring 2002. I’m about half way through about now. I’m very excited about it. The closer to the end I get, though, the longer it takes, so I’m building the framework now.”

RK: “A lot of your songs are introspective, questioning; do you feel you’ve had a difficult life or are particularly aware of life’s travails to write the songs you do?”

DS: “I wouldn’t say that I’ve had a tough life by any stretch of the imagination. I feel fortunate about being able to make the music I want to make and getting away with it. The kind of darkness or the critical aspect of ‘Humming’ (Atlantic Records) came after the fact of two years on the road touring, you know, buses, planes, trains, autos – doing a lot of reading and thinking. The experiences of promoting my first album were really something; there is so much illusion in my environment (touring and pop music) that I wanted to clear away. This was a process of coming to grips with all the inauthenticity I saw that I was in. Like in ‘Varying Degrees of Con-Artistry’ and ‘Nothing special’ (Humming), I sing about the general and then to a more specific critique of the music business and being a celebrity. Those things and events were foremost in my mind and came about at that time. I also wanted to make a record that was about other things than romance, yeah, after two years on the road singing all the songs from the first album, I got kind of tired of that.”

RK: “Your early influences, you’ve said before, were people like Nick Drake and David Sylvian, Mark Hollis of Talk Talk, and bands like the Smiths and Blue Nile. Who is influencing you now?”

DS: “Yeah, early on my biggest influences were kind of somewhat obscure artists from England, decidedly not pop. Jeff Buckley, Radio Head, Massive Attack, and obviously Nick Drake from the 70s folk. But I can’t really say there is too much modern music that I’m blown away by at this moment. Some bands I like and put on in my house. I go to other places for inspiration. But these days 20th century classical and Indian music is influencing me somewhat. Even as I make this pop record now, a lot of what I do is touched by these other kinds of music.

RK: “Has Buddhism influenced your songs, and how you see life?”

DS: “I think my Buddhist practice has a profound influence on my life and encompasses my creative projects. I try to make sure that the Buddhism is more or less implicit in the music rather than explicit. You can kind of smell it when people do that for the right reasons or the wrong reasons. I’m friendly with “Jars of Clay” (who Duncan toured with after his first album), but I can’t be that obvious about it.”

RK: “The reason I ask is because of your ‘Humming’ CD, the hum seems to have many meanings, is that what you were after?”

DS: “Yeah, actually the main reference is apart of a little poem somebody wrote me. And humming is kind of like the background field of potential energy that’s going through the whole universe. On one level it’s incredibly pervasive and profound everywhere, and it’s also what you do internally to yourself, a small and specific sound you can make – the microcosmic and macrocosmic.”

RK: “Many of your arrangements are orchestrated with precision, almost delicate and fluid, they come across as acoustically pleasing. How do you first hear them in your head?”

DS: “Simon Hale, the British arranger, does all string and wood arrangements on my records. Hopefully on this new one too, but they’ll be slightly less orchestrations than on Phantom Moon (Nonesuch Records). We talk about the kind of basic instrumentation that I’m hearing and that I would like to hear, certainly there’s an initial conversation about what to use, whether it is with woodwinds or quartet or chamber sound or a bit more breath. We talk about that stuff. I often have specific harmonic and melodic ideas I run past him and that will find it’s way into the arrangement, but he’s a singularly talented musician, going to London to work on those parts of my albums has almost been the most joyful part of the projects.”

RK: “What is your song writing process? Lyrics then music, both, or the other way around?”

DS: “I actually am always a music first person. Lyrics are usually inspired by the music or some event that has happened to me or occurs to me, and then it is grafted onto the music. I privilege the music over the lyrics. I’m enjoying this now (lyrics) it’s been three yrs since I’ve written lyrics.

RK: “Do you write other things besides songs – short stories, keep a journal, etc.?”

DS: “I attempt to, and probably purchased about 25 blank books and keep saying I’ll start doing this, but I just fill them up with to-do lists.”

RK: “How did you connect to get that first hit?”

DS: “After College I traveled across country to LA and within six months had a record deal – it was very premature, I was not ready to make a record. I got a publishing deal with BMG, they were supportive, and some money to record demos. Those became the basis for my Atlantic record. Three years after I came to LA an executive heard me, but initially it was a smaller label. When they (Atlantic) heard my demos they bought me off the first label. You always need to find a way. A real foolproof way to do it is play your stuff by hook or by crook and build up a grass roots following. If I were to do this over I’d play a lot more shows before I made a record. For me that was a real rude awakening - having to tour so soon. I wasn’t ready for it.”

RK: “You live in New York now, do you think that affects your style and subject matter of your songs?”

DS: “Yeah, I think it does. I’m a pretty big P.J. Harvey record fan and you can really hear New York in his record. I think in this new record of mine you’ll hear New York as well. It’s inevitable your environment will influence what you do. I’m fortunate I have this coterie of musicians around me to help take music to next level. Being surrounded by so much creative energy, so many creative people really feeds that creativity in me.”

RK: “Is your music evolving? How do you see it having changed since your first album?”

DS: “Well, I think part of this process is realizing the craft of it. There is art, that’s one aspect, there’s the soul and spirit you’re putting into it. But really important, perhaps most important is the craft; how you make your record, the creation of these sonic worlds you want your listener to hear. For the first album I was at Rupert Hines (producer) chateau in France and we made the record with 3 A-DATs (digital audio tapes) and a Mackie (mixing) board and rented microphones, and the keyboards and guitars I brought along. For my second record I had gotten ProTools (program) and started to familiar myself with hard disc recording. Now I use logic audio as my front end, which is still ProTools, then manipulated it in that environment (of computers). Now I’ve been using this program for five years, and feel comfortable and creative in this environment. I can record drums or loud guitars here at my house and not bother the neighbors. The evolution (in my music) is being able to do a lot more on my own. This allows a more intense process of R&D; it really fleshes things out before the expensive process with recording studios is started. I’m excited with the new record because things are happening early before making the record. I’m using things done in ‘Demos’ for the album.”

RK: “We look forward to your Door County performance. Who will be accompanying you for your performance at the Door Auditorium?”

DS: “Gerry Leonard, who has played guitar on my albums will be joining me. Maybe we can have a glass of wine after the show”

Discography:
Duncan Sheik (1996; Atlantic Records) produced by Rupert Hine
Includes hits: ‘Barely Breathing’ and ‘She Runs Away’.
Humming (1999; Atlantic Records) Co-produced by R. Hine & D. Sheik
Phantom Moon (2001; Nonesuch Records) Associate Producer: Tommy Krasker