From: Ben Gibbard
To: Mark Kozelek
One thing people don't seem to get about you is that you're really, really funny. You have one of the most biting and dry senses of humor of anyone I know. (Your rant a few years ago about how Bon Iver "stole" all your fans is still one of the funniest things I've ever heard.) And yet it seems there are times that people think you're being serious on stage, hence the "incidents" over the past few months. Why do you think this is?
-Ben
From: Mark Kozelek
To: Ben Gibbard
To be honest, in the moment, when I make jokes, people seem to respond well. If you're there, you get the context of where I'm coming from. I truly believe that 95% of my audience is with me from the beginning to the end of my shows, because I don't recall a show in recent years where I've seen anyone leave, and my shows are two and a half hours long! I think people choose to be offended by things as a way of bonding, as a hobby. They embed some piece of information into their brain without thinking it through, because it's easier. "Mark Kozelek is an a**hole." It's lowest common denominator stuff. Things get taken out of context. The bummer is that the banter ends up eclipsing the music. People are more excited to read about me knocking “hillbillies” or the band The War on Drugs than they are to hear about the music.
You're actually very funny onstage too, and I don't think you get enough credit for it! When I saw you at the Greek, you had a great bit on the hot dog smell that had me laughing, because that smell was getting to me too! What about you? Have you ever said anything from the stage that got taken out of context, that made the press? What's the most awkward thing that's happened to you in regard to this kind of thing?
-Mark
From: Ben Gibbard
To: Mark Kozelek
I don't think I've ever said anything on stage that's blown up the Internet or anything. I did learn the hard way that people in Boston have literally no sense of humor about their sports teams, though. We played a show in Boston in 2008 where I decided in the moment to do a bit about those green Red Sox hats (the ones with the shamrocks on them). As a baseball fan, one of my biggest pet peeves is sports gear in colors other than those of your team. You wanna support your team, wear the right f**ing colors!!! Those pink hats are the most offensive to me aesthetically, but the green ones aren't far off. I'm onstage alone about to play “I Will Follow You Into the Dark” (just me and a guitar), and I launch into this bit about how "it's cool that Red Sox fans are so supportive of their team, but do you really need to wear those green caps? It's like, we're already IN Boston. We GET it!" People were not amused. In fact, the booing was so vitriolic, I thought the show might be over. Thankfully I was able to wiggle out of it, backpedal, and get on with the song. Awkwardly, of course.
Boston, man, they just don't play over there. There's a particular aggressiveness on the East Coast that I've just never been down with. I'm way too much of a Northwesterner to live over there.
You're originally from the Midwest, right? What drew you out West all those years ago? Why not New York or Boston?
-Ben
From: Mark Kozelek
To: Ben Gibbard
Nothing you said has blown up on the Internet—yet! Your time will come! But that's a funny story. I can't win, even when I'm being nice! I had a really nice time playing Detroit a few weeks ago. I told the audience how much I loved their town, told them how great they were. I said I was having such a good time, "that I was thinking about buying a place in Detroit, all cash, with the bag of money I had backstage!" Some guy yelled, "You're not in Detroit!" I said, "f** you!" (Technically I was in Ferndale.) I was having a good time that night, but East Coast and Midwest cities never really appealed to me, because they all remind me of Cleveland, not far from where I grew up. They all kind of run together, and I feel like people don't really get me on the East Coast. I play a show, walk offstage, and BAM, everyone I know is banging on the backstage door. I just played two f**ing hours, so give me ten minutes to chill before you come barging into my space. I remember Ivo from 4AD telling me that he never liked coming backstage after people's concerts because he felt like he was walking in on people who just had s**. That's really how it is. I don't know about you, but I need a little chill time after a show. We played a show recently in the Midwest, and a promoter came backstage and kept talking, hovering around. I said, "Man, please give us a minute."
I always dreamed of California because it was far from home. I sensed the dead-end of where I was, even though I'm sentimental about Ohio. I used to fall asleep to Johnny Carson as a kid, dreamed of California (no snow), and eventually visited a relative out here in the Bay Area. As soon as my foot hit Market Street, I knew I'd spend a lot of time here. I looked around and saw people of all ethnic backgrounds, ate some Filipino food, and I was sold. Within three years, Red House Painters signed to 4AD, so good things were happening right away.
But the city is changing a lot. My view looks right out onto Tiburon, where Robin Williams k**ed himself, and all of these 25-year-old Silicon Valley kids are buying up all the space. This past Sunday night, I ate my last meal at a Chinese restaurant called U-Lee, where I've been eating for 26 years. They closed down because the rent got too high. I knew the twin waitresses when they were 16 years old and in high school. Now they are in their 40s, have kids. Many of my friends have left San Francisco, so sticking around at 47 is starting to feel strange, but I still love it. My girlfriend is here, and I still have a few close friends who are around.
You lived in Los Angeles for a while. I remember seeing you in SF once, maybe four years ago or so, and you were telling me how much you enjoyed living there, but you ended up back in Seattle. In the long run, did you not feel much of a connection with LA? I had a good time down there during the making of Almost Famous—I lived there for about a year in 1999—but I was in this weird bubble that wasn't reality. When the movie ended, some girl I knew drove me back up to San Francisco, I walked into my apartment, and I was more at peace. I saw all of my old friends here, and it just felt right.
So, you're a lifer up there in the Northwest? Where else do you like spending time? I like New Orleans a lot, because the food just k**s me and I can't get enough of it. Is there a second-favorite city for you? Do you think of living somewhere else at all?
-Mark
From: Ben Gibbard
To: Mark Kozelek
There were some things I loved about living in LA (wonderful friends, the New Beverly Cinema, and amazing Mexican food, to name a few), but I could never make it home. It never felt right to me. This probably explains my enthusiasm when I was telling you how much I loved it—I was trying to sell it to myself! Since then I've realized why I could never fully embrace the city (outside of my obvious fallout within it). For me, life in Los Angeles was a zero-sum experience. For every positive thing I could find, there was a flagrant negative balancing it out—perennial sunshine/cancerous air pollution, interesting creative people/rampant narcissism, and on and on. That's not to say I think LA is a horrible place, just that I couldn't stay somewhere that didn't put me in the black regarding my quality of life. I don't want to live a zero-sum lifestyle.
To be honest, by the time I had moved to LA I was pretty burned out on Seattle. It had become too small of a town, and I very much needed some time away to appreciate how wonderful it truly is. I now look back at my time in LA and wonder how I could have ever strayed so far from who I was and where I belonged. The rain is in my blood, I suppose. I'm a Cascadian man to the core.
I feel your pain regarding the gentrification of San Francisco. I've always loved it there, but I see more and more of what you're talking about every time I visit. Here in Seattle, we are seeing a lot of the same shifts that have made SF a playground for the nouveau riche. With all due respect to my second-favorite city, it really scares the sh** out of me that we might become like you guys. Unfortunately, it feels somewhat inevitable.
I emailed you separately from The Thread to tell you I wouldn't be able to respond until later because today was busy. By "busy" I meant I ran, had band practice for three hours, did some errands, and yet still was home by 3 p.m. with all my tasks completed. Hardly a busy day by normal standards! I'm often sheepish with my working friends about how little I usually do over the course of a normal day while at home. I feel like the stereotype of a lazy rock musician.
What's a typical day at home like for you?
-Ben
From: Mark Kozelek
To: Ben Gibbard
When I lived in LA, I was in a pretty co*ky phase—32 years old, the only single guy on the Almost Famous set—but at the same time, I felt an inferiority complex the whole time. It was strange, being around 20-year-olds who owned their own homes or drove into the movie set with a different car every month. During my time there, like you, I was trying to sell myself on it, but it wasn't me. I did come out of it with a few great things, though—solid friends in Cameron Crowe and his a**istant Andy Fischer, and who knew that Patrick Fugit, who was 15 at the time, would turn out to be one of my biggest fans and a great friend? Jason Lee and I are also still in touch. I went to his wedding a few years back, and that was a lot of fun, but he still owes me money on the Trinidad/De La Hoya fight. It was a controversial win for Trinidad, and Jason never paid up!
I didn't run today—I stopped that at about 28 years old, when my right knee started to tighten up—but I did my usual walk to the Marina and back from Nob Hill. No matter what's going on, I try to make time for that walk. I spent a half-hour or so on the phone with my travel agent, booking flights to Austin, Chicago, Winnipeg, Reykjavik, and Stockholm, and then I got burned out and told her let's finish booking the rest of 2014 tomorrow. I got back from the walk and wrote a short stream-of-consciousness article for The Talkhouse magazine, then did an interview for a book about Jason Molina that got me pretty choked up. I had dinner in the Mission district, and now I'm here emailing you. My girlfriend and I tried to watch a documentary last night—one about Robert De Niro's father, who was an artist—but I fell asleep. I couldn't tell if his paintings were great, or if Robert being his son manipulated me into thinking they might be great. I may try to watch it again. I don't know. My girlfriend is in my bed, asleep, and we're cat-sitting her friend's cat, which has been nice. Tomorrow and the next day I'll be in the studio, editing some music that Steve Shelley and I recorded a few months ago. It's 1:06 a.m. here. I'm going to try to get some sleep. Have a good night, and we'll be in touch again soon!
-Mark