Pat Mastelotto [Interview]
Pat Mastelotto is a busy guy. His CV is a mile long, including his current position as King Crimson’s drumming lynchpin; one third of acclaimed virtuoso trio Stick Men (alongside Tony Levin and Markus Reuter); and a huge range of additional projects including KoMaRa (whose self-titled album was reviewed on TMMP here), and O.R.k. (whose album Inflamed Rides received the TMMP treatment here). This is an epic-length interview Pat Mastelotto treated with the same generous attitude as anything with which he becomes involved.
Whether you’re a fan of King Crimson, Stick Men, KoMaRa, O.R.k., the man himself, or any of his other innumerable projects, you’ll find a ton of fascinating info here. Read on…
You have a new project, KoMaRa, with a self-titled debut album coming out on June 30th. How’re you feeling about it?
I feel really good! I like this record a lot.
How did you first become aware of David Kollar and Paolo Raineri?
Well, first let me correct our press release: I did not meet David through Facebook. David and I were connected through my pal Lorenzo Feliciati, my Italian bass buddy from The Naked Truth. Who by the way just released his new record KOI that myself and Steve Jansen play drums on, and Lorenzo introduced me to David via email.
David wrote of doing something together – some gigs he was planning in [the] USA. I wasn’t available to do any of [the] times he was asking about due to previous commitments, but I invited David to an upcoming Crimson ProjeKct gig in Prague [during] March 2014. Just before the show he sent word backstage, so I went out and had a quick chat, and he passed me some CDs.
What qualities/character traits made you realise there was collaborative potential between the three of you?
Well, I liked that this instrumentation provides a different environmental context to drum with and David is very proactive, and I like that (most of the time), and he was constantly emailing me. I remember early on telling David “…this really will cost you too much to bring me over for one gig,” and he said “We don’t care! We are young and stupid and want to work. Let’s make this happen!”
I like that, musically, these two appeared to be an open canvas, that it was not prog, not jazz, not rock, fusion, folk or world, blah blah blah. But we could potentially pull from all those genres and more. I enjoyed the way David uses his pedals to get glitch effects in real time and the way Paolo follows Nordic jazzers with the more electronic ambient un-tethered styles I love. For decades my favorite trumpet players have been John Hassle and Nils Petter Molvær and I find Paolo to be cut from that same cloth.
Plus Paolo vocalizing is really cool too; he is so subtle. It took me a few gigs to even figure out which sounds were coming from him. So I always had a good feeling for the music we could create, but wasn’t sure the logistics wouldn’t be insanely crazy. I guess really it was just intuition and blind faith to go for it.
How would you describe the KoMaRa creative process? How did the tracks on the album come into existence?
Well, really it started on stage, improvising, and then we took that same energy right into the studio.
Let me give you some background. Once we found an open week where our calendars jived, David arranged a six-day tour in Slovakia and Czech Republic. While in the van on the way to gig number four, we learned the sales for gig five were low.
So we offered to let the club off the hook and cancel if we could find a studio. As we drove the back roads making mad calls and texting, the connections commenced and we found Faust studio in Prague (since gig six was in Prague, this was perfect). We found out later that a French band had the studio on lockout for several months, but moved to accommodate us! We even used some of their gear. Thinking of it now, I regret we didn’t thank them on the CD credits! Good guys. They helped us lug our gear through the rain and down several flights (Faust studio is in a basement) and loaned us more gear to make our session easier.
Since David, Paolo, and I had never rehearsed together, our week tour was based on improvisations – what I might prefer to call spontaneous composition. And being professionals, we had all come to the party with some prepared ideas – for instance, some chunks of 37 Forms are from something I built for the short-lived KC7. And this was the same approach we took in our studio session.
It really helped that we were blessed to have a great engineer/sound man, Bruno Germano, traveling with us. Bruno is a Steve Albini disciple and carries a wonderful assortment of killer mics and really knows how to place them to get a great drum sound. I hope I’ll get to work with Bruno again someday.
After setting up and getting tones with Bruno it was getting late – so we turned down the lights, hit record, and had a 40-minute improvisation. Took a short break for beer and coffee and did another 45 minutes. Just following the muse and playing off each other’s ideas.
Then we split from the studio to check into the hotel, so we could rise early and get back to the studio for one final morning jam, again about 45 minutes. Then we had to hastily tear down, load out, pack and get to our Prague gig, load in , sound check, grab a bite and do our final show together. That and all the shows were recorded (so we could learn and grow). Much of that is available free on our KoMaRa web page.
About three weeks later, when I finally got home from my IB gig in Sweden immediately following that week with KoMaRa, I made fixes, dozens of demo mixes and overdubs to send the guys around Christmas holidays. Meanwhile David and Paolo were doing similar [things] and we had also started sending a few new song ideas, like Dirty & 2CFAC.
Around then I got hold of Bill Munyon and Adrian Benavides to see if they might have time to help. Bill was swamped with other work and moving his family but still cleaned some sonics and tightened the arrangement on 2CFAC and …Silt. Adrian stopped by my place; we talked through some of my edits and I passed him 50-plus gigabytes of raw and slightly tweaked data and basically said “…surprise me”.
I was originally thinking to pace this record like Masque or Paul’s Boutique with almost no breaks, but then David & Paolo suggested using a “lonely trumpet” as part of the narrative of the record. So while we worked in large chunks, we were also carving out sections and trying different running orders for small chunks to learn what might hang together as a “song”.
Once home we also all passed files – those are the songs Dirty Smelly, 2CFAC, and She Sat In Black Silt. Plus the dialogue I did at my place with Munyon. But much of the rest of the record comes from those three long improvisations from Prague [which] supplied only the source material, the basic fire, that was later cut, pasted, sliced and spiced into what you hear on the record.
This was some fucking amazing work by Adrian Benavides. Adrian did the bulk of it and really tore into it as the tracks progressed through his hands. And hats off to Adrian and Bill being super cool in following David and Paolo’s wishes – really not an easy task going though mile-long email threads and multiple languages! And as you might imagine, there were times [when] the whole process started to come unglued and collapse, due to typos and miscommunications. I really can’t say enough about the great work Adrian did – credit to Adrian for pulling in a lot of the heavier, more industrial vibe the record attained. He did a lot of re-amping and processing. You should check out his other work both as engineer/mixer and as artist. This kid is mucho talented.
The album is based on an unwritten detective story. Can you offer some plot details as they relate to the album tracks?
Well I can, but I won’t. I prefer folks are left to rumble in their own imagination.
Adam Jones of Tool designed the album artwork. How did he become involved?
This was happening around the Xmas holidays so I’m a bit foggy; besides the Xmas cheer I had some surgery and was drugged. I’m not 100% sure how it got going; [it] might have started a few months before that when Adam came to KC shows in LA.
He might have mentioned doing some art for one of my projects, like the upcoming Tuner record called FACE. Then, boom, Adam sent me two very different images, a painting and an orange CG head. I shared them both with Markus (my Tuner/Stick Men buddy buddy), and Markus really liked [the] painting for FACE.
So I asked Adam if I could use the other image for this other new project I was working on at that very moment. I sent Adam a rough chunk of KoMaRa music, and he replied with a thumbs-up emoji and that was that. For weeks, months. Then a second brownish creature showed up in a text. Then about a week before our deadline, an updated version appeared in a text with Adam apologising to me for taking so long by explaining he really wanted to do something special.
The third demo he sent was the red face (the version we used for first promo), and I loved it. Even knowing it wasn’t his final. Then a few days later he sent his final work, the super high-res gray creature which I also loved but the red face was still haunting me. So I texted Adam, “I just really love that red guy and could we use it?” He wrote back that unfortunately it was just an iPhone screenshot and would be too pixellated if blown up to cover size – but Adam’s so cool he went back and found a slightly higher-res version of the red guy. And that is what became the front cover.
The super high-res grey creature is inside the gatefold. This is going down on Friday when our files are supposed to be [going] to the European pressing plant the following Monday!! So ASAP I got hold of my Canadian buddy Denis Rodier who draws the Superman and Batman comics and has done lots of other records with me – and he jumped right on getting the layout and design put together. Back and forth all night, all weekend, and then we sent to the label early Monday morning.
Will you be touring this album? If so, are there any special plans for the live shows?
I would love to! But for me, 2015 was already full. The only time we could make it work this year is the first week of July, and we were fortunate enough to get on the magical Pohoda festival.
That week will slot right into the week in between Crimson’s drummer rehearsal and full band rehearsal near London. We will make the most of it with three gigs, cramming in some promo as well.
How do you see this project evolving in the future?
Actually, there’s lots more material to be mined from the Faust sessions. And I hope we start passing files as soon as next week when I get home, so we can get more new material started. We’ve already started something new we might call the Three Month Pressing Plant Blues.
As you can imagine, being a new band with no manager or agent, it’s tough to get bookings – but we are working on it.
Beyond this album release, what do you have planned for the remainder of 2015?
I’m in South America now with Stick Men (Tony Levin, Markus Reuter, and me). Writing and recording for our next Stick Men record has already begun and we hope to finish recording in January 2016.
I’ll get home in about a week, and I’ll use the first week to prepare Crimson needs and get that KC gear shipped off by mid-June. Then I’ll use the following week to prepare for those KoMaRa gigs.
Then, there’s O.R.k.
O.R.k. is a new project driven by LEF, Colin Edwin, and Carmelo Pipitone. LEF invited me into this project early last summer – but much like KoMaRa I had to say “Sorry, no can do”. I’m too busy with Crimson and Stick Men and other commitments to take on another outside project, and also warned them I’ll not have time to tour or support their record. But he insisted I was the guy they wanted – so they waited and waited for months till I got home at Christmas 2014, and even then I was recording in between the KoMaRa editing and recording, the new stuff for Stick Men, and about a dozen other outside sessions!
I think the tunes are fucking great! It’s a real treat to work with such a strong singer as LEF, and the guitar parts are super fun to play with. It really does have a band feel, and is being presented as such. The record will come out later this summer, around the same time as KoMaRa [check out TMMP’s review of O.R.k.’s album Inflamed Rides here].
Also coming out in July is another really cool record with the Variety Of Loud. The record is based on live recordings from our Scandinavian tour in Febuary 2013 [more info available here; video here]. This is the Variety Of Loud lineup:
Samuel Hällkvist – Guitars, Devices, MIDI Programming;
Pat Mastelotto – Traps & Buttons;
Qarin Wikström – Voice & Keys;
Guy Pratt – Bass;
Stefan Pasborg – Drums;
[With] special guests:
Richard Barbieri – Keyboards, Synthesizers, Programming;
Mocca 木歌 – Voice;
Yazz Ahmed – Trumpet;
Denys Baptiste – Sax;
Yukiko Taniguchi – Voice.
And to my surprise this just came from Tim Bowness – the Great Electric Teenage Dream album [title track video here].
About six weeks ago, Stick Men did a short tour in Japan with King Crimson alumni David Cross joining us on violin, so now we have a brand record called Midori [available for pre-order here] also hitting the shelves in Japan at almost the exact same time. For the rest of the world it’s a download only.
But most of all, there is the beast of all beasts – King Crimson. Alive and well and very active – a seven-man band in Go-Mode.
The drummers (Gavin Harrison, Bill Rieflin, and myself) have already had drummer rehearsals back in March, and will do more at the end of June right before the KoMaRa European gigs. Then right back for KC full band rehearsals [and] home for a few days before a short run of Stick Men dates in the USA.
Then right to the Three Of A Perfect Pair camp in upstate NY. This is a beautiful thing; Adrian Belew, Tony Levin, and I have done three and we’ve become such a family with the campers. We hang and jam and interact, and midweek we will bring in Markus Reuter, Julie Slick, and Tobias Ralph, have an open rehearsal, and do a kickass show for the public at the historic Bearsville theatre in Woodstock NY. Campers get in free of course. This year we hope to bring (some) campers on stage to strut their stuff. You should check it.
Then [I] fly to UK the next day to start the final weeks of King Crimson rehearsals that lead directly to the UK tour, followed by five shows in continental Europe (three in Paris and two in Holland) that might be the last ever KC shows in Europe:
King Crimson – Aug. 31 – Aylesbury, Waterside Theatre
King Crimson – Sep. 01 – Aylesbury, Waterside Theatre
King Crimson – Sep. 03 – Cardiff, St. David’s Hall
King Crimson – Sep. 05 – Brighton, Dome Concert Hall
King Crimson – Sep. 07 – London, Hackney Empire
King Crimson – Sep. 08 – London, Hackney Empire
King Crimson – Sep. 11 – Manchester, The Lowry
King Crimson – Sep. 12 – Manchester, The Lowry
King Crimson – Sep. 14 – Birmingham, Symphony Hall
King Crimson – Sep. 15 – Birmingham, Symphony Hall
King Crimson – Sep. 17 – Edinburgh, Usher Hall
King Crimson – Sep. 18 – Edinburgh, Usher Hall
King Crimson – Sep. 20 – Paris, Olympia
King Crimson – Sep. 21 – Paris, Olympia
King Crimson – Sep. 22 – Paris, Olympia
King Crimson – Sep. 24 – Utrecht, Tivoliredenburg
King Crimson – Sep. 25 – Utrecht, Tivoliredenburg
The day after that ends in Holland, Tony Levin and I hop to Italy to start a three week European Stick Men tour with Markus:
Stick Men – Sept 29 – Verona (Italy), Il Giardino
Stick Men – Sept 30 – Verona (Italy), Il Giardino
Stick Men – Oct 1 – Sofia (Bulgaria), Club Music Jam
Stick Men – Oct 2 – Delemont (Switzerland), Il Centre Culturelle Regional
Stick Men – Oct 3 – Sala (Sweden), Rockland
Stick Men – Oct 5 – Oslo (Norway), Buckley’s
Stick Men – Oct 6 – Malmo (Sweden), Moriska Pavijongen
Stick Men – Oct 7 – Göteborg (Sweden), Nefertiti
Stick Men – Oct 9 – Bergen (Norway), Sardinen USF
Stick Men – Oct 9 – Bergen (Norway), Sardinen USF
Stick Men – Oct 12 – Prague (Czech Republic), Lucerna Bar
Stick Men – Oct 13 – Reichenbach (Germany), Bergkeller
Stick Men – Oct 15 – Bonn (Germany), Harmonie
Stick Men – Oct 16 – Zoetermeer (Netherlands), Cultuurpodium Boerderij
Stick Men – Oct 17 – Muenster (Germany), Hot Jazz Club
Stick Men – Oct 18 – Hertogenbosh (Netherlands), W2 Poppodium
Stick Men – Oct 20 – Verviers (Belgium), Spirit of 66
Stick Men – Oct 21 – Karlsruhe (Germany), Substage
Stick Men – Oct 22 – Reutingen (Germany), Kulturzentrum FranzK
Home for 5 days and then off to Canada, etc. where King Crimson will continue another leg of touring through December:
King Crimson – Fri 13 Nov – Quebec, QC, Palais Montcalm
King Crimson – Sat 14 Nov – Quebec, QC, Palais Montcalm
King Crimson – Mon 16 Nov – Montreal, ON, Theatre St. Denis
King Crimson – Tue 17 Nov – Montreal, ON, Theatre St. Denis
King Crimson – Thu 19 Nov – Toronto, ON, Queen Elizabeth Theatre
King Crimson – Fri 20 Nov – Toronto, ON, Queen Elizabeth Theatre
King Crimson – Tue 24 Nov – Calgary, AB, Jack Singer Concert Hall
King Crimson – Thu 26 Nov – Vancouver, BC, Vogue Theatre
King Crimson – Fri 27 Nov – Vancouver, BC, Vogue Theatre
King Crimson – Sun 29 Nov, Victoria, BC, Royal Theatre
When it rains, it pours! And I am a lucky guy who loves the rain.
Links
Pat Mastelotto official website.
King Crimson official website.
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