{"id":3213,"date":"2011-08-09T02:30:07","date_gmt":"2011-08-09T09:30:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/?p=3213"},"modified":"2011-08-09T02:31:41","modified_gmt":"2011-08-09T09:31:41","slug":"liz-phair","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/2011\/08\/liz-phair\/","title":{"rendered":"LIZ PHAIR"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/h1>\n

LIZ PHAIR<\/h1>\n

One of rock\u2019s most daring artists once again surprises her audience<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Liz Phair has become accustomed to ruffling feathers. Her now-classic 1993 debut, Exile in Guyville<\/em>, exposed the boys\u2019-club nature of indie rock with its frank explorations of femininity. Ten years later she infuriated her loyal alt-rock fans by issuing a self-titled album of slick, catchy pop songs. Over the last several years she has confounded expectations by becoming an award-winning composer of scores for television shows like 90210<\/em> and Swingtown<\/em>. And in July she bewildered observers by releasing\u2014without warning or explanation\u2014her first album of new material in five years, Funstyle<\/em>, directly through her official website after parting with Dave Matthews\u2019\u00a0ATO Records.<\/p>\n

Critics and fans spent the summer arguing about the merits of Funstyle<\/em>, a flip, whip-smart and often self-referential set that draws upon a dizzying array of styles from somber balladry to Indian-flavored rap.\u00a0 And now that it\u2019s just been released on CD, the arguments will doubtless renew apace. \u201cI\u2019m very proud of it, and I\u2019m glad to see it getting its due,\u201d says Phair. \u201cFor better or worse, I won\u2019t look back and feel that I caved to pressure. I did what my inner voice was telling me to do.\u201d The new Funstyle<\/em> CD release pairs the original album with a bonus disc comprising the first legitimate release of the Chicago native\u2019s much-bootlegged early demos, dubbed Girlysound<\/em>. We caught up with Phair en route<\/em> to a show in Vancouver, B.C., to discuss her rich history and unpredictable present.<\/p>\n

When did you start the process of recording Funstyle<\/em>?<\/strong><\/p>\n

About two years ago. Lately in my career I\u2019ve taken to recording all the time, and by the time I put the album together I just pick which songs I think work together as a piece. I like to group things. Some people don\u2019t care so much about that anymore\u2014they just want to have the single or whatever it is they\u2019re going for. But I think when you group things they stick around longer.<\/p>\n

So what binds these songs together?<\/strong><\/p>\n

These songs have a joie de vivre<\/em>, a sass, a going-for-the-moment production style about them. They\u2019re all inspired and came together swiftly. The other songs, the ones that didn\u2019t make this cut, were a little more self-conscious or constructed.<\/p>\n

Is the diversity by design? <\/strong><\/p>\n

Not really. I\u2019m a longtime omnivore. I like a lot of different sounds when I\u2019m listening to music at home. I have stuff on \u201cshuffle\u201d constantly. That\u2019s satisfying to me, and I think that\u2019s reflected in my output. When people ask, \u201cWhat kind of music do you like?\u201d what they\u2019re really trying to get me to do is to identify what scene I\u2019m a part of. They think that I like this kind of music or that kind of music. As a creator, it\u2019s a little different for me. The part I\u2019m identifying with is the lyrics and the melody, and I\u2019m much more free than a lot of artists in terms of how to\u00a0produce something.<\/p>\n

Why release it this way?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I had to go rogue and put it out there fast, before anybody could talk me out of it. These songs almost never came to see the light of day. They were part of a group of recordings that had been confounding, and even upsetting, to the people I was working with [at ATO]. I was surprised by that, and I put it away for a while. I was about to move on and record something that everybody wanted\u2014something more sensible and mature, I guess. But I had this strong passionate reaction against that at the 11th hour. I was just like, \u201cNo<\/em>! No. You tell me the guillotine is coming down on my head, but this is what I feel passionately about. This is the stuff that speaks to me.\u201d So there was no other way. Sometimes you\u2019ve just got\u00a0to break the rules.<\/p>\n

Why include the early demos?<\/strong><\/p>\n

A bunch of reviewers picked up on [the similarity of Funstyle<\/em> to those tracks] early on. It hadn\u2019t been in my mind, but once I read that I thought it was brilliant. That stuff has never been released. It\u2019s been on websites, but it\u2019s never been put together formally. There are a lot of people who don\u2019t obsess over my career enough to even know about it. I wanted to show those people that this has always been a part of my style\u2014playfulness, mash-ups, irreverence. The two discs make nice bookends for one another.<\/p>\n

Can you relate to those early songs?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I feel right at home in them. I feel like the same person. Some part of me thinks it was really cute what I was doing, and some part of me thinks, \u201cWow, I wish I could do that again.\u201d I have a mixture of feelings about it, but they\u2019re all good feelings.<\/p>\n

Those tapes are very raw. Did you ever consider re-recording them? <\/strong><\/p>\n

No. I play them live in a more polished way\u2014we add the band to them, and it\u2019s fun to hear them come to life like that. But no, they are what they are. I love things being what they are. That\u2019s what Funstyle<\/em> is about. I played it for my friend Pete Yorn, and he was like, \u201cSo these are demos, right?\u201d I had to say, \u201cUh, no, this is the real thing.\u201d (laughs<\/em>) Sometimes you just know when the song has been realized the way you heard it in your head. That may\u00a0not be as polished as some people would like it to be. But I\u2019m more comfortable exposing my flaws and foibles, I think, than other people\u00a0might be. Some things are beautiful\u00a0when they\u2019re worked on and worked\u00a0over\u2014in fact, some things require that. But\u00a0these days my taste runs toward the\u00a0wild, frothy, on-the-fly, catch-the-moment\u00a0sort of thing.<\/p>\n

How have you evolved as a writer? <\/strong><\/p>\n

I truthfully don\u2019t have any way to formulate that, so I leave it to you guys. If I was that in touch with my writing, I don\u2019t think I could write from the heart. I\u2019d be censoring myself too quickly. I couldn\u2019t come up with anything new if I thought like that.<\/p>\n

What is your method like now?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I just wrote my first new song on guitar in almost eight months, because I\u2019m out on the road and the guitar is in my hand again. Then I\u2019ll stay up really late at night finishing something. I\u2019m very loose like that. If I\u2019m in the studio for any purpose I immediately get creative and want to write something. But I don\u2019t have a schedule. I do not require myself to write six songs per month or something. I\u2019m not that formalized.<\/p>\n

Do you have a goal at this point? <\/strong><\/p>\n

God, there\u2019s a million things I haven\u2019t done that I want to do. I\u2019m always up for adventure, and I\u2019m always up for learning new things. Those two things are like a drug to me. I love being in musical environments that I\u2019ve never been a part of before. I\u2019ve been very lucky that way, because it keeps you working and expanding your repertoire. It also makes me fall flat on my face every once in a while, but those things are what I\u2019m in it for. That\u2019s\u00a0my junkie\u2019s high.<\/p>\n

\u2013Chris Neal<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

LIZ PHAIR One of rock\u2019s most daring artists once again surprises her audience Liz Phair has become accustomed to ruffling feathers. Her now-classic 1993 debut, Exile in Guyville, exposed the boys\u2019-club nature of indie rock with its frank explorations of femininity. Ten years later she infuriated her loyal alt-rock fans by issuing a self-titled album […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7],"tags":[2330,1175,970],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3213"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3213"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3213\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3218,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3213\/revisions\/3218"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}