With the release of their fourth album, "Avatar" (see accompanying review), Comets on Fire has taken yet another step forward on the path to widespread recognition. Their brilliant third album, "Blue Cathedral," showed signs of an expanding sound, and the new album is a fuller realization of that push for diversity. We recently spoke to lead singer and guitarist Ethan Miller about the joys of recording, the beauty of live Dylan and the Dead, and the "psychedelic" label.
"Avatar" seems to be a little bit of a tighter album, and the sound varies quite a bit. What sound were you going for with this album?
I don't think we were really going for a direct sound of any kind. Comets has always been its own kind of lumbering artistic monster for us, and it just sort of turns out how it does, you know? With five guys all trying to get their input in and have a democratic, equal input on the artistic creation of the thing, it just kind of comes out how it does. We may have, at certain moments on the record, said "Oh, we're gonna make the wildest, craziest thing happen right here," and then it's all said and done, and you finish mixing it, and you listen to it and say, "Oh, that part's super ethereal and pretty sounding; that's not at all what we were trying to do."
There seems to be somewhat of a theme holding together "Avatar." Do you have any goals of making a full-out concept album?
No, we haven't had the itch to make a proper concept album based on one particular thing. Usually, when people do concept albums, I think that's something that works a little better for a band that has a main leader and songwriter, like Pete Townshend for "Tommy," or Roger Waters for "The Wall," or something like that. It would be pretty tough to make a concept album that was really trying on work on that kind of narrative movement and have five guys all trying to contribute democratically and equally. (Laughs). That would be pretty chaotic.
Did you do any digital recording with this album, or was it still all done the old-fashioned way?
Still doing it the old-fashioned way. The one thing we did on this album that we've done very little of in the past is we got all the tracks down to tape and then we would use the computer to do take after take really quickly. So, that's the only reason we began to incorporate the better aspects of the digital stuff. But in the end, everything went back to tape, off of digital. For a rock band, it still just sounds really great for drums and bass and those kinds of things. You really still can't beat it.
Your live shows are a completely different experience. Do you prefer playing live, and do you ever feel constricted by the recording process?
Personally, I love being in the studio. I'd like to live the rest of my life in the studio, making records. I love toying with all that stuff, and I love it all coming together and experimenting with different sounds and the construction of songs in a weird, sterile atmosphere like that. But we try to make playing live a wholly separate thing from the records, just for that reason-so that each entity can be something special. My most disappointing experiences with going to see bands were when I loved their records and they recreate, perfectly, the album onstage. You're just like, "Well, I get to see them standing there and do it. I guess that's cool." And the best experiences are when they deliver the essence of the songs, but a whole lot more and in a different light. Or with mid-period Dylan, or the Grateful Dead-you know, bands that totally rearranged their songs live, instead of just trying to spit back a mirror image of what was on the album. So, we strive for that as well.
Speaking of playing live, how was doing All Tomorrow's Parties (the beloved music festival in East Sussex, England, that is curated by a different musician or artist each time)?
It was fun. That's the second one that we've done, and both have just been amazing. All the bands are sort of camping out-well, we've got little apartments-but everybody's just in this one place, hanging out for three days. Even with most normal festivals, people just ride in, play that night, and then move on to the next gig. But I feel like people really stick around at ATP. You get a lot of good days, sitting on a picnic bench or in the grass or at the ocean, drinking wine, rapping out with five dudes or five gals from five other bands, just talking dirty band shit or whatever, and that's pretty fun, especially for us, because we're not, collectively, the most social group. Unfortunately, or fortunately, there's not a whole lot to do but watch music and just get totally wasted. (Laughs) Sometimes it's a little murky as to what happened when and to whom and what.
I want to ask you about the whole "psychedelic" label. Any press you see for Comets on Fire always describes you as being "psychedelic." Do you embrace that label or do you feel that it distracts from the music?
It doesn't really matter. The boring reality is that with any band's ego, they like to think that they're above categorization, that they're so original. And, of course, in our heart of hearts, we're like, "We're not f---in' psychedelic! We're our own thing!" But then if some old guy working in a 7-11 is like (in quivering old man voice), "What kind of music do you play in your band?" I'm just like (in stoner voice), "Psychedelic rock!" It's all about how much time you have to explain yourself and how interested someone is to hear your BS line about what you think you are. And for the press, a lot of them may have 40 words to work with in a review, or may feel like more people are gonna look at it if they say "psychedelic." Maybe some people are stoked on that, and they're like, "I like psychedelic music, I want to get this." I'm sure a lot of hip-hop groups don't want to be called hip-hop, but I'm like "You made a hip-hop record. That's hip-hop." It's all in the eye of the beholder.
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