Andrew Patrick of The Carolyn (continued)

Songwriting

Your lyrics feel very literary to me. What kind of stuff do you read that you think influences you to write lyrics the way you do?

I love this question and I hate the fact that I don’t have some cool answer for it.

I’m not well-read. What’s something cool? Bukowski or something, some troubled man reading that, I don’t know. I don’t read anything that cool. I read biographical works that I find to be really interesting, obviously like Laura’s book; [NOFX’s] Hepatitis Bathtub was awesome.

I think it’s very random what I gravitate toward. I don’t know if it has a bearing on my writing specifically. I don’t know if I honestly can answer just because I gravitate much more towards film.

That media is much more inspiring to me. I read weird shit and read political stuff and stuff that doesn’t really have a lot of bearing on this.

That is so interesting to me. I’ve never really talked to many people that have my reading habits like that. An autobiography is way more interesting than a high-brow novel. I would rather read about somebody’s life or nonfiction. I read almost no fiction at all, because it’s just like, I would rather be making stuff than witnessing someone else making shit up. 

Exactly. Exactly. And there’s some fictional works that I just like understanding perspectives that are oh, I read this when I was a kid.

I was really, really inspired by Laura’s book. Yeah, that was huge. And Against Me, I love them. They were one of my favorites for years. The end of the book where she talks about giving Heather that skull when they officially separate – I was like, “this is fucking GNARLY“.

That was gut-wrenching. It’s one of my favorite books ever. 

Transgender Dysphoria Blues is one of my favorite records of all time. And when she was talking about being on the hormone therapy for about a year and she said something in the book like, “that record almost made me fucking kill myself because like I was in such a hormone haze of like depression and psychosis”.

I used to think with art, you go, “I can take this suffering that I’m going through and put it into my art”. And I kind of grew out of that, I think. But then you hear about somebody going through something that is so difficult and they make this incredible artifact using that strong negative emotion.

How did you manage to pull together the energy to make this amazing thing when you were going through this depression and horrible emotions? Like that’s super-superhuman. “Should I go to bed? I don’t want to make anything”. 

I definitely feel that on a very, very deep level. And that’s what I do half the time.

I don’t know. Just for us specifically, I know there’s kind of a lot to unpack with this question, but yeah. [This new record] almost felt like this may be the last release we’ll ever have as a band. And it very well could be, you know? And so it was, and it wasn’t this whole sentiment of, “this is our last shot”.

It wasn’t, “this is it, we gotta give it all we got”. It was more, “if I have anything left to say, what is it?” You know what I mean? So thinking about that in 2020 was not on the table.

But even now, things feel very precarious, just as precarious as we were two years ago. And that’s sort of what this is. This album is anyway, not relevant to the original question, but relevant. 

Part of the reason that I interview people to begin with is because I’m curious about them. It’s important and people should know. Like I want to know what your deal is, you know? 

And it’s something that you just said about “okay, if you have something to say, now is the time, because there’s not a guarantee you’re going to get to do this again”.

It makes it stronger because you’re leaving it all on the field. You’re just like, “I’m going for broke with this. I’m going as far as I possibly fucking can”. And it’s just a matter of, like you said, I don’t know if I’ll get to be this again.

So that’s how I’m approaching Fest. I’m going to write my best jokes. I am going to go all out, try and make it as good as I possibly can, because I don’t know if I’m going to get to do this again. You know, you have to do your absolute best. So what you said is resonant to me.  

And as far as song writing, do you write lyrics first, like a poem and then build music around it? Or do you stumble on a melody first and then find words to fit the music part?  

I’m definitely in the latter camp. I think the whole “lyrics first” thing is you’re either really smart? Or you don’t know how to fucking write songs. (laughs)

I just come from like the perspective of, your melody is king and at the end of the day, no matter what the fuck you’re talking about, whether it’s dropping acid and getting busted or the manufacture of consent or whatever fucking intellectual thing you want to talk about.

Like dude, the whole point of your song is to sound cool. You’re trying to sound good. I have to enjoy listening. I don’t care if you’re talking about some really heady socio-political, whatever-the-fuck; it’s got to sound cool. I’ve got to walk away feeling something.

And for me personally, if I’m sitting down with legal paper first and writing out my ideas, that is going to take precedence over how it sounds. Is it cool? So I’ll literally pick up a guitar and write bullshit about, like, cheese that’s expired in my fridge. Humming that verbatim, like, “cheese in the fridge”.

Okay. What is that? Words that aren’t that ridiculous. And they’ll kinda sound like them phonetically. It’ll be about something else. And that’ll take me down the rabbit hole and say, “okay, what can I say with this song? What does this permit me to say?” And maybe that’s an ass-backwards way to do it to some people, but yeah, the whole point is to sound cool.

Don’t fucking write your lyrics first. You’re going to have too much bullshit there and you’re not interesting. 

It can be as technically amazing as you want. But if it’s not a cool piece, who cares?

I had the privilege to go to a MoMA, right before the pandemic. And it was the best part of my trip, but there was a room where someone fucking took a little dot of red paint and put it on a wall.

That was their art. And they literally had this paragraph explanation about why that was relevant, what that meant. I’m like, “that’s fucking lame and that’s a cop-out!” 

The meaning behind it doesn’t matter. Like this is a photo of a severed head or whatever, and it looks cool. This made me feel something I’ll never see anywhere else. 

I went to MoMA for the first time in October. And it reminded me of being in film school because I would say I hated 89% of it. This doesn’t make me feel anything except annoyed. It feels like they’re bullshitting me. 

But the stuff that I liked, I really, really liked. I was that way you were. 

Some of the stuff that I had only ever seen in the textbooks too, but then I saw all the Basquiat stuff.

I’ve only ever been lectured about this kind of stuff, but seeing it in person was a whole different thing. Super cool experience. 

So this is the last question: I’m not a super disciplined writer. If I think of an idea, I just grab my phone and take a voice memo or I’ll tap out something in my notes app.

I have to go to the computer immediately. If I want to catch it, it’s not like I can plan something and I’m going to sit down and write at the same time every single day, like some writers do.

How do people do that and not want to stop writing? But I’m curious if you have a routine when you’re writing a song or if it’s more like you just snatch an idea out of the air and you’re just,  “I’m just going to like hum something into my voice memos and just roll with it.”

You would not believe how integral the voice memo app is to this band. And I don’t think we’re alone in that. I think so many bands now, that’s literally how they trade ideas and you’re able to remember shit that they previously wouldn’t have been able to prior to smartphones.

I saw an interview with Skiba years ago. And he said talent, it’s got nothing to fucking do with being at a band. It literally is like you, you have the shine or what, you’re like a conduit for something else. And I know that sounds super pretentious, but sometimes something will just throw itself at you and you just run with it.

And that’s the whole thing for me. I think Oli is a better songwriter. He’s a smarter dude when it comes to this stuff. I’m very like a linear guy when it comes to this – it often starts with a riff and I’m like, “okay, I really believe in this one thing”. And I’m going to write the verse next. Now I’m going to write the pre-chorus next. I’m going to read the chorus next, where so many people out there will advise you to write, you know, your chorus first, that’s your strongest part of the song, etc. They have this really rigid formula. I’m really not that way.

If I find my nugget, my gem, I don’t let go of it. And I just let that take me to wherever. I’m not disciplined enough to do any of that other fucking shit. 

I mean, I relate to that so much, but the way that you phrased that really hit me because there are so many things in my life that somebody will just give me an idea, “oh, you should do that”. 

I interviewed a musician friend a couple of years ago just for fun and recently he was like, “you’re always upping like small bands on IG, like Fest bands – why don’t you interview them? Why don’t you just combine these two things?”

You can just get an idea out of the air, or from someone else, and act on it.

Yeah. Just do things. I feel like that’s a Buddhist principle. And if it’s not, I’m going to say is it is now. (laughs) 

Don’t worry about how something turned out in the past. Just worry about writing. And worry about how you’re acting right now.

You can’t control what’s gonna happen in the future. You can only control yourself. Just worry about right now. 

Go see The Carolyn’s set at Fest 20 on Friday, 10/28! Check out their Bandcamp to preview some singles and preorder their new record The Rhythm of My Own Decay, which drops on 6/10/2022. While you’re there, check out the 2019 album This Will Begin To Make Things Right that we discussed at length here. Follow The Carolyn on Instagram for news on upcoming shows and new music.