TLOBF Interview :: Trouble Books

This spring and summer, dream of sleepy morning cuddles soundtracked by the new EP by Trouble Books, whose United Colours Of Trouble Books album was one of TLOBF’s favourite lower-key releases of last year and who might (!) possibly be in the UK soon maybe. But also when you’re dreaming of them, make sure you’ve got a good enough stereo for the task (I’m imagining something powerful and old). So says lead band guy Keith, who I e-mailed some questions recently…

Outside of your music I don’t feel I know anything about Trouble Books. Who are you, and what do you both do?
I, Keith, am in charge of washing the dishes. Linda does pretty much all of the cooking. I’ve also recently been cleaning the leaves off the garden. Snow came really early this winter and we didn’t have time to rake up the leaves before they were buried.

How did this new EP come into being? Was it an offshoot of United Colours Of or did it come about of its own accord?
It came from new bulbs, not from replanted cuttings of the full-length. There were no outtakes or bloopers or anything. Two of the songs were written and recorded before “United Colors”, but didn’t turn out as good as they could’ve so we re-did them from scratch. The other three songs were written shortly after, so it’s sort of both a prequel and sequel…

How do you write your songs? What inspires you?
A lot of talking. Mike and I will talk about interesting recording techniques or production ideas, Jake will play me records he’s been digging and we’ll chat about things we like about the songs, Linda will say what she thinks a half-finished piece needs… there’s no “jamming” or anything.

Inspiration comes from any other art we hear, see, read, or eat. Shapes (mostly symmetrical, cubes and spheres) and colours (most often: green, blue, orange, brown…).

What are your hopes and dreams for the future of Trouble Books?
That people will listen to our music on a decent pair of headphones or stereo and not through their lousy laptop speakers or ear buds… I’m not good at mixing for the 21st century, so 50% of what’s going on in the songs is lost into a tinny tunnel to many people… oh well.

Apparently you might be coming to the UK soon. Is this true?
The “might” part is the most true. Sure, we’d love to come, but we have a hard time with the awkwardness and difficulties of setting up a tour. If someone wants to do that for us, and can make it affordable for us to come, cool. Seems like people might be interested, so I’ll keep one eye on the email hole.

What cool stuff is there in Akron other than you guys, if at all?
Linda says “blimps” and “New Body Type” (some friends’ band). There’s a small group of people who play in a bunch of different bands for each other. Bands share members, play shows for people in other bands at bars where those people work and houses where those people live… it’s a small tight-knit creative community, and we love our friends and neighbors to death. Gabe has a website, Actual Archives (www.actualarchives.com) where he posts free digital singles of various Akron area projects. There’s some great stuff there worth checking out if you’ve got a spare cyberstream or whatever.

Trouble Books on MySpace