June 3rd, 2009
A Conversation With Dean Wareham (Part One)
Singer-guitarist Dean Wareham is the man behind the beloved, defunct bands Galaxie 500 and Luna, and current outfit Dean & Britta, which he shares with his wife, singer-bassist (and former Luna bassist) Britta Phillips. Wareham is also the author of Black Postcards, the entertaining, insightful, and revealing 2008 memoir of his two decades in indie-rock, which was just published in paperback. In it, Wareham details both the drudgery and joy of being in ever-touring rock bands with small-but-loyal followings; hilariously skewers a few former bandmates and associates; and writes candidly and movingly about the events that led up to both G500 and Luna’s breakups, as well as the painful disintegration of his marriage. At some point during Dean & Britta’s show tomorrow night at Johnny Brenda’s, Wareham plans to do a short reading from the book. I caught up with him over the phone from his home in New York City for a conversation about Black Postcards and more:
With the paperback coming out now, I was thinking about a parallel between that and the reissue of an album — you know, a remastered and expanded version or something. But it usually takes like 10 or 20 years for that to happen, so there’s a lot of time and distance and maybe you’re not as emotionally attached to the work. Whereas a paperback usually comes out less than a year after the initial hardcover release…so I guess you haven’t had much time to step away from the book and really reflect on it?
Well, I’ve had some time. When the book came out, I think I was kind of frightened, I didn’t know what to expect. It was odd just sending it out to the world for the first time and having it be reviewed. It was scary and much more personal than it was with a record because this is a memoir and it’s like I’m putting myself out there to be judged. You know, I think I have a new respect for what writers do, whether writing books or even writing reviews — it takes a certain amount of courage because you have to express yourself and put it out there and maybe say something that people are gonna get pissed off about. And no matter what you say, there’s someone that’s gonna hate it.
I guess that’s unavoidable with any art anyone puts out there.
Yeah, I guess that’s true, that’s true. It’s the same with records. People are gonna hate it, but I don’t really care so much anymore.
Yeah, I was going to ask if you’ve become acclimated to the idea of albums being reviewed and judged and all of that since you’ve been putting them out for so long now, and it’s not that big of a deal anymore, whereas with the book maybe you were freaking out, thinking about what people’s facial expressions might be reading certain parts of it and so on.
[Laughs] Yeah, and who’s gonna get mad at me. It’s hard writing about living people.
I guess the only thing that you can fall back on is the truth.
That’s true.
Tell me about that moment when you finally decided you were going to write it.
Well, I mean, so many people talk about writing a book. I think it actually happened when I got an e-mail out of the blue from Scott Moyers, who was the senior editor at Penguin, saying, “Have you ever thought about writing a book?” And I was thinking about it, and I had written a couple of chapters, and I was thinking about getting an agent and I was putting together a proposal. So I just sent him a couple of chapters and we had lunch the next week, and right there at the lunch he said, “Well, we can offer you a book deal right away.” They liked the pages, and so that’s the moment when I decided it was really gonna happen. All of a sudden there was a contract in place with deadlines and money and things like that.
Was it a dream of yours to write a book?
No. No. I would not say it was a dream of mine. But I mean, it occurred to me, I took notes, so …
Maybe subconsciously you were preparing for it…
Yeah.
I really enjoyed the content of the book, but I also was really drawn to your writing style — it’s direct, graceful, it doesn’t meander. Were you conscious of that style when you were in the process of writing?
Oh yeah, I was conscious of the rhythm of writing. I think rhythm is important in writing, just as it is in songs. You know, a few other critics have said that I have a flat, dull style of writing. It’s certainly not florid. Hopefully it’s funny.
Yeah, and it flowed nicely. Did the style change very much in the editing process, or did it come out that way from the start?
No, I think it was the way it was written. That’s one thing I learned, too – when you sit down and write and it comes out the first time, it sucks. And you have to go back and do it again and again and again and keep going over it. I would say that I’m mostly responsible –- I mean, my editor made a few suggestions. There was a copy editor. But really, they didn’t do as much as…I kinda thought I would hand in this big mess and they’d fix it all up and send it back to me, but it wasn’t like that at all. He’d say, “You need to fix the timeline here and make it make sense more.” And, “You’re leaving some things out” was also said. He did push me to go back and put in some of the personal stuff that I sort of glossed over.
Was it in any sense like a producer/musician relationship, where he got things out of you you didn’t expect? Obviously there are good and bad producers, and good and bad editors – it sounds like you had a good one that pushed you forward.
Yeah. He did push me in that way. But I guess editors today don’t sit and pore over every paragraph with you. It would come back with a note every 10 pages. I told the copy editor to be extra tough, and it came back with about two months of work for me to do. Fact checking…
As a first-time writer, it must have been fascinating to be in the midst of the process and see how it all works?
Yeah, that’s true. I had no idea how all that worked, all the legal stuff you have to do to it. The book had to be vetted by a lawyer – I was on the phone with him for about four hours [laughs].
Because of all the personal stuff?
Yeahhh. Any time you mention someone doing drugs, then you’re talking about them breaking the law, I guess, so it’s either you have to have their consent for it or it has to be very well known or you have to be able to prove it.
So before the book came out, people who you’d written about were contacted and they knew these things were going to be written about them?
Uhh, some people did, yeah.
Was that worrisome for you?
Yeah, sure, that was worrisome for me. A few things I went over with some people, but…. Like with [colorful Elektra Records VP of A&R] Terry Tolkin, I asked him permission to print this letter and he said “Yes, you can do whatever you want…,” and then when the book came out he was horrified.
He was?
Yeah, he was mad. He wrote me this letter that he was upset by it but then he calmed down after a while. You know, I think it’s just hard to read about yourself at all. And I dunno, I certainly didn’t paint him as a perfect character, but to me he’s one of the heroes of the book.
That’s how I felt — it was very complex portrayal, but also sympathetic, and I found him to be a pretty interesting, appealing character.
I think he came to see that. I guess at first he showed it to his mom and his grandmother. Why would you show it to your grandmother? I wouldn’t show it to my grandmother. Of course she’s gonna be horrified!
When you were writing, did you speak to other writers along the way? Did you seek out any advice from anyone?
No. I probably should have [laughs]. It was a pretty solitary effort. I showed it along the way to my editor and my agent and that was it. Not even really to Britta. Because certain people were calling and saying “What’s in it? What are you saying about me?” and my editor said “Do not show it to anybody. You don’t need to run things by anybody or get approval.” Because once you start trying to please everybody…
It’s over, really. There’s no point.
It is. And I think at a certain point I realized that several people are going to be upset by this and by that, and if I went back and took out every thing that was going to upset somebody, it would just be a puff-piece and not a very interesting book. And I think part of the larger point I was trying to make about being in a band is that it’s all about conflict. And so I wanted to go into some of that conflict.
Even though you had your notes and a chronological sort of narrative, did you ever have trouble figuring out how to proceed? Any writer’s block?
Not writer’s block so much as … the most difficult thing is to open the file and start working on it. And that could take, that often took all day. It would take until 4 p.m. to sit down and do it. There’s a million things you have to do, but once you open it you can go for six to eight hours.
I was gonna ask if you were a disciplined writer, like setting aside X amount of hours at a certain time of the day, or writing in one particular location or something.
No, I was not [laughs]. Towards the end I was more disciplined, I submerged myself in it, and I guess that’s what you have to do at some point.
You’re a Harvard-educated guy — did writing it in any sense take you back to being in school?
Yeah. Definitely. For one, it got me reading a lot more than I had in a while. You know, if you wanna make music you have to listen to music, and if you want to write, you have to read. And yeah, it got me using a part of my brain that I hadn’t used for a long time. I haven’t written anything since college, really. Maybe the occasional little essay or some liner notes. But I hadn’t had to express myself clearly.
When you were writing it, did you mess around with structural things, how to organize and present all of your thoughts, or did you just let it flow?
I just let it flow, and I think for a long time it was really a mess and I kept looking at it, like, this doesn’t add up to a book. But I kept working at it, and I would maybe throw out whole chapters, and finally one day I looked at it and it seemed to have a beginning, and a middle, and an end, and a nice arc to it.
I think so many people start writing books and never finish them because they’re not sure how or where it’s going to end up, and that can paralyze them.
I agree with that. As a writer I’m fascinated how things take shape and how you push yourself forward when you don’t know the end. I think no matter what, I mean, if you sit down to write, write something. Even if you’re not sure where it’s heading in the book. In some ways it’s the same with writing a song. It’s like a long jigsaw puzzle that doesn’t quite make sense and you keep moving things around here and there, and finally you look at it and it almost seems to make sense, some little story you’ve told.
That’s interesting that you kept notes and diaries at the start of your career.
Yeah, some years I had notes, others I didn’t have any, and those years I skipped over. Some people are like, “You didn’t write much about the early years of Luna….” Well, I didn’t have notes and my memory wasn’t good on it.
You really documented the Galaxie years in precise detail though. Why?
I don’t know. I guess back then I kept a journal. I was younger and maybe…I guess some of the time I was a little unhappier [laughs]. I think maybe you write notes when you’re unhappy, and when things are good and easy you don’t. Writing always skews toward the negative [laughs].
So the early Luna years, you were at your happiest?
Well, that’s one reason…I dunno if that’s true. I did say that. But maybe…I stopped writing a journal and along came the Internet age, and then we had a website and I started writing tour diaries for the website. And I would write these tour diaries but then I would leave all kinds of stuff out that wasn’t appropriate, but I would keep those notes separate, and when it came to doing the book I put certain details back in to tell the whole story.
So the day that you finally finished the book, turned it in, and you just had to wait for it to be published, what was the feeling? Were you proud, thrilled, anxious, relieved?
I was relieved to have it finished [laughs]. Because it was definitely the most work I’ve ever put into anything. It made me realize that none of these politicians write their books. You know? How could they? It’s very time consuming, there’s just no way. They’re busy all day doing fundraisers and things, there’s no time to write a book.
They’re all ghostwritten…
Yes. Maybe not Obama’s. Maybe he wrote his, I dunno.
I’m not sure if I have the totally correct impression of you, but from having interviewed you a few times over the years, and watching or reading other interviews with you, you seem like a fairly reticent guy, someone who doesn’t like to give up too much information, especially not about your personal life.
That’s true.
But in the book you’re very candid and open about your cheating, drugs, your marriage and your divorce, things about your son…did the thought of sharing those things with the public ever give you you pause?
Well, yeah, it gave me pause and I worried about that stuff. I thought about what my son would think and what my ex-wife would think, and so I … I tried to write carefully about that stuff. I mean, it wouldn’t be a good thing for him to read right now but hopefully…I dunno. I don’t think there’s anything in there that’s gonna make him hate me when he reads it. It was difficult writing about that stuff, and, you know, writing about it forced me to relive it. Writing about the divorce was not pleasant. But I’m glad I did it and now I can actually go back and think about all those horrible days that I talk about without getting upset anymore. That’s how writing a memoir is like therapy, except there’s no one else in the room.
[Look for part two of my conversation with Dean Wareham tomorrow...]
