T Magazine: My Town | Dean Wareham, Longtime New Yorker, on Why L.A. Is the Land of Milk and Honey

Written By Unknown on Kamis, 03 April 2014 | 17.35

For as long as indie rock has been a genre, Dean Wareham has been a part of it. Galaxie 500, the band the New Zealand-born singer and guitarist formed with a pair of Harvard classmates in the late '80s, informed a generation of shoegazers and remains a make-out-session staple today. Equally beloved is his '90s dream-pop band Luna, through which he met his wife, the singer and bassist Britta Phillips. Together, they've spent the last decade or so writing and touring as Dean & Britta. They've also been regular collaborators of the director Noah Baumbach, scoring "The Squid and the Whale" and playing the co-hosts of an awkward dinner party in last year's "Frances Ha."

But for all he has accomplished, Wareham had never made a solo record — until now. Last month, he released his self-titled debut, produced by Jim James of My Morning Jacket. The album's sound is "effulgent," as he cheekily puts it. "It's glowing. It's bright and sparkly." Last night, Wareham kicked off a global tour to support it. Though he calls the new songs "more rock and more male" than his work with his wife, Phillips will still play bass and keyboards on tour, and is serving as what Wareham calls his band's "musical director."

Last year, the longtime New Yorkers also moved from a loft in Brooklyn to a succulent-fringed Craftsman bungalow in the Hollywood Dell neighborhood of Los Angeles. The album was written before the move, but its mood fits right in with the sun-warmed, languorous feeling of Wareham's adopted hometown. "People are like, 'it's your California record,'" Wareham says. "I'm like, 'no.' But I guess some of the songs were written in anticipation." Right now, the couple only plans to stay out west until Wareham's 14-year-old son goes to college, but that could change. "I'm surprised by how much I like it here," Wareham says. Here, a few of the reasons why.

Hollywood Farmers Market
"We have an avocado tree in our backyard, but the squirrels get to them before we do. This is one of the only places we can walk to, and we go every Sunday. The produce is amazing. I buy the fruits, Britta buys the vegetables."
Ivar Avenue and Selma Avenue between Hollywood Boulevard and Sunset Boulevard; Sundays, 8 a.m. – 1 p.m.

Chichen Itza restaurant
"This place is in a kind of cheap mall downtown. Jonathan Gold wrote about it. It's Yucatan cuisine. I don't know how it's different from other Mexican food — I'm not expert enough. But it's great."
3655 South Grand Avenue; chichenitzarestaurant.com.

Vermont Canyon Tennis Courts
"It is much easier to exercise out here. And right over here in Griffith Park, it costs five dollars an hour to play tennis, whereas in New York, you've got to get a season pass, and it's a luxury. I go to the courts up Vermont, right by the little golf course. I took my son there three times a week last summer."
2715 Vermont Canyon Road; laparks.org.

Books on L.A.
"When I got here, the first thing my friend gave me was Reyner Banham's famous and controversial book, 'Los Angeles: The Architecture of Four Ecologies.' I also loved 'City of Nets,' by Otto Friedrich. It's a great look at Hollywood in the '40s, with a focus on Europeans like Thomas Mann and Stravinsky. Bertolt Brecht lived up Argyle Avenue, right over here. He was the most famous playwright in the world, but he was in Hollywood writing out of his native language, and he was broke."

Largo at the Coronet
"'City of Nets' was recommended to me by Flanny, the owner at Largo, where we've played. In fact, he sells copies at the concession stand there. He likes it because his new location (in the old Coronet Theater) is mentioned in the book; it is where Brecht and Charles Laughton staged 'Life of Galileo.' Brecht was my hero at age 17, and to perform on the very same stage was cool."
366 North La Cienega Boulevard; largo-la.com.

Cinefamily
"This is an old silent movie theater. They show movies that don't get a wide release. I went and saw 'Once Upon a Time in America,' the Sergio Leone three-hour epic. And a lot of comedy stuff, too. We've played there, and Britta did a reading there once."
611 North Fairfax Avenue; cinefamily.org.

Acting
"Noah has cast me in two more films. The first was another film that he and Greta Gerwig wrote together, which is still untitled. I play a pediatrician — really, I'm like a cranky neighbor who's come over to complain about the noise. And the next one is called 'While We're Young,' with Ben Stiller, Naomi Watts and Adam Driver. I play a shaman in an ayahuasca ceremony. I had, like, three days to prepare. I did research and I talked to people, but I did not partake. Yeah, acting. We're available!"

Interview has been edited and condensed.


Anda sedang membaca artikel tentang

T Magazine: My Town | Dean Wareham, Longtime New Yorker, on Why L.A. Is the Land of Milk and Honey

Dengan url

http://travelwisatawan.blogspot.com/2014/04/t-magazine-my-town-dean-wareham.html

Anda boleh menyebar luaskannya atau mengcopy paste-nya

T Magazine: My Town | Dean Wareham, Longtime New Yorker, on Why L.A. Is the Land of Milk and Honey

namun jangan lupa untuk meletakkan link

T Magazine: My Town | Dean Wareham, Longtime New Yorker, on Why L.A. Is the Land of Milk and Honey

sebagai sumbernya

0 komentar:

Posting Komentar

techieblogger.com Techie Blogger Techie Blogger