A Conversation With Neil Strauss, New York Times bestselling author, 2011

Almost two years ago, I traveled from Brisbane to Sydney to meet Neil Strauss – my favourite writer [pictured right] – for a face-to-face interview. It was a life-changing experience, and that’s no exaggeration: being in his presence solidified my decision to seriously pursue journalism. (Up until that point, I’d only dabbled; the interview was ostensibly for FourThousand.com.au, a Brisbane-focused online publication). That meeting, and our resultant conversation, is documented in full here.

This time around, when Neil’s new book Everyone Loves You When You’re Dead – a collection of enlightening and revealing moments taken from his 3000+ interviews with cultural figures for Rolling Stone and The New York Times – appeared on Text Publishing’s Australian release schedule, I was in the position to get paid to interview my favourite writer, rather than spending a few hundred dollars on travel for the same opportunity. Which is nice.

I interviewed Neil over the phone from his home in California for The Courier-Mail in early March 2011, before the book was released. I published a 800 word article here, which summarised our 45 minute conversation.

Our full interview transcript is included below.

Beware: throughout our interview, there are many references to the content of …When You’re Dead, so if you haven’t read it yet, you might want to avoid reading this interview. Maybe not.

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Firstly, I want to talk about the final chapter of the book, and the epilogue. I thought it was a very touching note to end on; it wrapped everything up nicely. It made me wonder; was that section about [American rock and folk music critic] Paul Nelson always going to close the book? [Note: Nelson died in 2006 due to apparent starvation. Strauss wrote a feature for Rolling Stone about his death, called "The Man Who Disappeared"; in When You're Dead, he says it was the hardest article he's ever had to write.]

No. I don’t think any book is ever planned. It always sort of just happens. I guess I knew I wanted the last section to be about family and mortality, and I felt I put so much heart and time into the Paul Nelson piece, it seems like a fitting epilogue for the book. And it rolled so nicely into the actual epilogue. I knew that each section was going to have a theme, and the last section was really going to look at mortality around different angles, in a parallex way. That got more appropriate there. It just sort of landed there.

When I’m writing, I never think in advance. I just keep hammering and hammering. They’re like puzzles. You’re putting everything together and you keep rearranging until you feel that it’s right.

Something that Paul’s ex-wife said made me think of you, Neil. She said, “I found out more about him by reading what he wrote.” I wondered if you’d ever heard the same thing from those close to you.

[laughs] You know what? That’s such a good comment. I’ve never heard that, but I know it’s 100% true. One hundred per cent true.There are things that I can’t tell people face-to-face, whether they’re just friends of mine, or people I love who are close to my life, yet for some reason I’m not afraid to write about them, even though I know they’ll see ‘em.

Even the stuff in The Game, I’ve never told people because I was worried they would judge me. The stuff in Rules Of The Game, in that first story about that really, really old woman. My friends would have just ripped… it would have been publicly humiliating. But I guess I feel if I can write it I can really explain it fully, all the dimensions to it and I can make sure it’s said right, and comes out right.

That way I can say it the best way I can possibly say it. It’s so true. It’s interesting. It might be something… I just interviewed Howard Stern for Rolling Stone, and I realised what we have in common. It’s hard sometimes to communicate the truth, as a guy like me, because it’s hard to deal with peoples’ emotions. If you say something that affects someone you have to deal with their emotional reaction to it. And maybe in a book, as horrible as this sounds, no-one is talking back to you, to that idea. No-one is saying that it’s wrong or that it hurts them, or is an unhealthy way to think, or it’s a judgmental thing to say, or whatever. It’s a semi-one-way conversation. I’m speaking to a bunch of people, but they’re sort of a faceless, invisible mob.

I see what you mean. Most journalists I know admit to feeling guilty for drilling into peoples’ minds to make their stories public. I’d like to know your take on that.

I never feel guilty, because I never try to hurt anybody with a story. I’ve never been a gossip reporter. I’ve never sat outside somebody’s house chasing them. Everything I’ve ever written, at least in journalism, is in the context of, you know, “I’m here to write a story, and anything you say or do can end up in that story”. So they’re making the choices. I’ve never tried to assassinate anyone. I’m always trying to show them as they are.

Sometimes I feel guilty in the sense of after we did this interview; say I spent a long time with this musician, and I’m leaving with four hours of recordings of them spilling their soul to me, and all of a sudden it’s like, “thank you very much, good-bye”, and I’m just walking away with their soul on a tape, to some degree. They have nothing. That part always feels strange to me, like having sex with someone, then pulling out and running away.

The fact that you’re working with ‘household names’ most of the time, does that increase the guilt, knowing that you’re exposing them even further?

No. I would feel that with anyone. If I’d just interviewed a guy off the street for four hours, or for a day or a week, about their inner most thoughts and fears; their life, their insecurities, and their hopes and dreams and ambitions, and then I just walked away… I’d still feel horrible, because they have nothing. I’ve got this tape recorder that has everything. It’s a feeling of: I’ve taken something and I’ve walked away with it, and what do they have? Nothing.

Even though that’s not how it works – obviously they have the promotion and the press and whatever the article is [about] – but it’s still a way where they’re bereft, and here I am with everything. You try and shape it as honestly as you can, but there’s also a trust element, where you could shape it any way you want.

Speaking broadly, have you thought much about why people are so interested to read about the lives of famous people?

I don’t believe that. I didn’t put the most famous people I interviewed in the book. A lot of the people I interviewed, whose heart and fame I adore, whether it’s Stevie Wonder, Iggy Pop… who I didn’t put in the book, because the interviews weren’t revelatory. I think if anything, what makes it look unique is: there are a lot of people who spend their lives interviewing famous people, but just as interesting as Lady Gaga and Justin Timberlake and Bruce Springsteen are Von Lmo, and Patrick Miller, and Lucia Pamela, who probably 99.9% of readers never heard of. And yet they’re going to find those just as interesting as the big stars.

I just think people are interesting if you get them at the right moment, you know? [laughs] I do think that on some level, celebrities are being used to sell the book, and that’s a lot of what I’ve written about, but to me the Ernie K-Doe experience – the 50s R&B star who tried to have me arrested, or again, Patrick Miller who’s smoking crack and doing heroin in his basement and fighting off hallucinations – they’re even more interesting than reading about… for example, Led Zeppelin just being assholes. [laughs]

To talk about the book in broader terms; this book is not directly about you, it’s about revealing other people. It’s been a while since you’ve done a project like that.

Right. But I think in a lot of ways the book is about me. I really made a conscious effort to keep myself out of it but I think between the lines, the book really is an element of my… I think each book is little elements of my autobiography. Whether it’s The Game, which covers a couple of years; Emergency covers a couple years. This, to me, is like the prequel in some ways, [laughs] because this is all I did for 20 years. This is my life for that time, and I think if you look at the pieces, you can see my own evolution as a person. Whether it’s Led Zeppelin making fun of me [for being inexperienced], to learning The Game and trying to seduce people into these interviews, to much later, meeting Lady Gaga and Chuck Berry and giving them life advice. I can see my own evolution in the book. It’s just not explicit.

When you began putting this book together, at what point did you decide to do that concept of the threaded narratives, or ‘open loops’?

I think what I did was, I broke down all those interviews to those little clips, and each clip was a standalone clip. Then I collected the most interesting [clips]. Some people were interesting for only one clip, for one little vignette. Other people maybe had three or four vignettes in which they were interesting. Then I sort of sequenced them together, so that everything matched together. The vignettes were really standalone stories about an idea, so I thought that it’d be nice where, “Hey, we get this idea, now here’s a couple ideas from someone else, now let’s return to a new idea for that person we just met”.

I kind of saw each piece as almost a standalone piece. Even when they continue from scene one to scene two to scene three, sometimes the story continues. Sometimes they’re just completely separate ideas. Other times, which I kind of like, you see artists at different times in their career. Maybe a couple years later, they feel bad about what they said earlier.

It’s interesting that a lot of the segues between the vignettes are artists mentioning other artists. That shows the breadth of the 20 years that you’ve spent doing this.

Yeah, it’s really funny. I’d probably say, with one or two notable exceptions, almost every artist someone mentions is interviewed elsewhere in the book, so it’s like the book itself; it’s kind of a closed loop. It is funny, there really were points where Trent Reznor mentions Beck, Gwen Stefani, Marilyn Manson and Oasis and I’ve got all four of those people interviewed elsewhere in the book. It’s like: which one do I put next?

I think there’s one section where all the artists are always talking about each other, Billy Corgan, Marilyn Manson, I think Courtney Love, Dave Navarro, And they’re all kind of referencing each other.

You state in the intro that “you can tell a lot about a person in a minute, if you pick the right minute”. Was that always the premise of the book?

No, the original idea was because Emergency – as you know from when we talked – Emergency was so much work. I basically had to learn how to rebuild the entirety of civilisation all by myself, you know? [laughs] It was so intense, so much work, I thought I’d give myself a break and do an anthology because anyone who’s been writing articles and features for 20 years feels like, “why not collect my favourite pieces and put them in a book?”

I started collecting [my] pieces and reading them, but… I like telling stories. There were no through lines. I bought a bunch of anthologies from writers I liked. Half of them I didn’t finish, because I got bored. With the other half, after I was done, I was bored of the writer, and bored of the voice, because it’s not a book if it’s just articles bound together.

Although it literally is my dream project, as for over 10 years I’d been collecting all my favourite articles in a file to put into an essay book. Then I realised it doesn’t work. Every book one does, or every film, or every record should be good enough that if anybody starts with any single one, they’ll then want to read the rest of what you’ve done. I felt if somebody read [a straight anthology] first, and it was the first book of mine [that they’d read], they might not be be intrigued enough to want to read the others.

I wrestled with it for a while. I thought I’d write a story about being a down-and-out writer in New York, and merge some of the articles that happened during that time, and tried a couple of other formats. Gradually I realised that essentially, these articles were moments when you saw the real person behind the mask.

I started collecting those. That two month quickie book became fuckin’ two years of intense work. Unlike Emergency, which was fun, I got to go live off in the wild and learn how to pick locks and go to junkyards and hotwire cars. The Game was fun because I got to run around the world and meet women. This time, I was stuck in a room with my own past, sorting through thousands of pages of transcriptions.

The way I think of it, this book is the journalistic opposite of taking the easy way out. Like you said, rather than putting together your best, or favourite published work, you’ve really gone through and mined your past for the best material.

Yeah, and it’s funny because I even had most of the interviews re-transcribed. I had somebody go back to the tapes. I said, “I want every time someone coughs, every time they paused, every time there’s an interruption, I want you to write it out like it’s a play and tell me everything going on”. Even though that’s time consuming and expensive and laborious, I was pretty adamant about getting everything from those tapes and looking for those little moments.

I was going to ask: how much of this book existed on your hard drive already?

I think only about 10% were on the hard drive as they were.  A lot were already transcribed, but just not well enough. Sometimes, for example, if it’s someone transcribing something, they might not take the part where the guy just asked me as an off-hand thing, “Hey, do you know now to make beans?” The truth is; the guy who’s talking about his album and why he wrote songs, it’s really more revealing to me that he asks the journalist “How do you make beans?,” because he’s trying to cook for his son. That tells me more about the person than some long story about his album. I tried to get most of them transcribed, and the only ones that didn’t were when I couldn’t find the original tapes. I literally called people who transcribed tapes 10 years ago, and had them find the tapes and bring them back to me.

Was this the first time in your career that you’d really sat down and gone through all your old stuff?

For sure. Absolutely.

What were some of the personal highlights when you were going through that material?

To me, the highlight for sure was finding all these all pitch letters I’d written to people, trying to write articles for different magazines, different newspapers; finding letters I’d written to my family about how excited I was that this article was out, because you forget how much you struggled sometimes. You forget how excited you are at those first-floor victories. That was kinda moving. It’s really easy to forget the past, because we get so caught up in the present. It was cool to see that. Everyone has a passion and a dream, and it was cool to see that I somehow was lucky enough to live that passionate dream, and even overshot, somewhat, my goal. My only goal was to write a weekly column for Village Voice. I did that by the time I was 22, so everything since then has been gravy.

That’s awesome. Let’s talk about interviewing. What is an interview to you, now? Has it changed since you started doing interviews back then?

No. I think I’m better at it. The interview’s still the same thing. An interview is still me trying to get as close to someone I can and write an article that somehow captures who they are, and that says something new about the person that hasn’t been written before. It’s always been the same thing, and I’ve always been really hard on myself about them. They’re never easy, and they need a lot of preparation.

What makes a good interview?

In the end, it’s about how you write it. I could say to me there are three kinds of good interviews. I’m just thinking of this out loud as we’re talking. One is where someone really examines themselves in a very honest way and is really emotionally vulnerable, and open, and honest with you. Another kind of good interview is where crazy shit happens, like the first time I’m going to interview Motley Crue, and the police are literally arresting Nikki and Tommy, and in the meantime Vince Neil is blow-drying his hair the whole time. That’s a great interview. They haven’t said a word, and it’s already the fucking best interview ever. The third kind is where the subject sucks, where they’ve got fucking nothing to say. They’re really closed off, not giving you anything, and then that’s an opportunity for me to be a creative writer. [laughs] One thing is the material. The other thing is what you make of it.

I saw a recent press interview for this book, with Cleveland.com, where you told them that when you do an interview you’re petrified with fear and you’re stressed out. I’m surprised that you still feel this way, after doing it for over 20 years.

For sure, man. My last interview was with Howard Stern… I’m definitely doing fewer and fewer [interviews] over time. I really only want to do one or two a year. But yeah, of course [I’m stressed], because you have to somehow go in, you have a limited amount of time with someone, and you have to walk away and leave with something they’ve never told to anyone else before, or at least any other writer before. That’s a lot of pressure. You’re not in control of it, they’re in control of it.

My last interview with Howard Stern, who spills his whole life on the radio every day. How do you get that guy to say something new? There’s a burden. I think the better you get at something, the more intimidating it gets. For example, the better I got at pickup during The Game, the harder the approach was because my expectations and everyone else’s expectations were so high of me. To make the parallel, when I approached a girl in the past, if I didn’t get slapped or laughed at, it was a success. In other words, if some crazy wild adventure didn’t happen with this woman, then I failed.

It’s the same with an interview. In the past, just to get the interview was enough. I succeeded by getting to be in the same room as this great artist who I looked up to. Now it’s not enough. I’ve got to get the best interview this person has ever given in their life. So the better you get at something, the harder and more intimidating it gets. I’m sure that’s true for you. When we had that interview before, I would say the success was fucking even getting it [in the first place].

Definitely. I know what you mean. You said when we first met that your goal was to get the best possible material out of someone, and like you said; if it’s someone who speaks for a living it’s hard to find some new truth in that. But it’s still the goal. It’s my goal every time, regardless whether it’s a 15 minute phoner or a couple of days with someone, you still want to get the best. You want to be the best. It’s your standards you’ve got to live up to and you want to put them as high as you can.

Yeah. And as an interviewer, you’re not in control of that. If you’re just writing an article you can make it the best if it’s all up to you, and how well you write, but in an interview you’re not in control of that. I agree.

Is it a matter of the bigger the star you interview the more nervous you are beforehand, or is it similar across the board?

I think it all depends on the situation. I’m more nervous if the star has only given us one hour in a room together. Unless I’m going to be going on tour with them for a week because I know I’ll get time to get what I need. I guess it’s not how famous they are, it’s how short of a time I have to get to connect with them.

When we first met, I think the first thing you told me when you walked over and looked at my sheet of paper, was: “Ready for all 15 questions,” and then you said what you do to prepare for an interview is brainwash yourself with the person’s career and write down every single question that comes to mind. Now besides those two elements, researching and writing down questions, is there something more? Is there a routine to preparing for interviews beyond just research?

I think it’s kind of what I said before, that brainwashing which is reading all the books, reading every article about them, reading any books if they’ve written any, listening to every album, watching every movie they’re in, and then as I’m doing these things writing down every question that I can possibly ever thing of. Then studying those questions and arranging those questions in a sequence I kind of want to ask them, and then studying those questions like I’m preparing for an exam, where I don’t know what the questions are going to be on the test. [laughs] There’s a lot of big interviews I turned down, because I really didn’t want to get that deep. I wasn’t that interested enough in the artist to get that deep in their life, and their work.

When you’re meeting face-to-face with your subjects, do you pick clothes to make you appear a certain way?

No, in fact I’ll usually dress more down than I would if I was going out myself because I want them to know they’re they star, I’m not trying to say… I think if someone walked into the interview saying “hey, we’re equals! Hey, look at me, I’m one of you too!” the star’s already like “no you’re not.” [laughs] So if anything, I try to play myself down. Even the Howard Stern interview I did today ended up on the air and it’s on TV and you see it, I’m dressed in a sweatshirt and jeans. I really try to be like, “you’re the star. I’m not going to be so embarrassing you can’t be seen with me, but I’m not going to be dressed like I think I’m a star too”. I think that’s the wrong attitude to go into an interview with. In fact, going into any situation whether it’s pickup, survival, or an interview trying to impress someone is the exact wrong attitude to have.

The way you say that makes me think that you’ve made that mistake in the past and you learned not to act that way. Is that correct?

No, I never did because when I started out, I really was super, super humbled by these amazing people I got to be in the same room with. And I really was kind of young and innocent. I did it before, but it wasn’t a mistake, when I did that Ludicris interview. There was an idea that we had the ‘Ho’lympics’, a contest where it was me against Ludicris doing all these crazy things, like the one-hand bra unhooking contest. I brought one of my peacocking outfits from The Game, like this snakeskin suit. It was funny. He loved it. He thought it was fucking hilarious. It hasn’t been a mistake when I’ve done it in the past and I think it’s less about dress and more about attitude. But I know my place, I know the role. They’re the star and I’m the person who’s translating that message to the world.

Out of interest, Neil, do you have a musical background?

No, I can play a little bit of music and I’ve even been in bands and stuff, but my goal was never to be a musician. If anything, if I was to end up anywhere in the musical side of things it would have been as a producer, because I think in a way it’s similar to being a critic. There’s a sense of saying “what can we do?”. It’s being a critic, but earlier on in the process, where you can actually have some effect on the music.

True, I see that. The reason I asked is: that bit of musical knowledge that you have beyond being a critic – you actually know how to play some music – do you think that’s been advantageous for you to help relate to musicians?

Not always. Sometimes it’s been fun, because I did piece on this band Sebadoh, and we went and recorded a punk rock single together. There were a lot of cool things that didn’t make it in the book, but I had to select what was most interesting. But [musical knowledge] has helped in a couple of cases. I also find that musical dialogue won’t be interesting to the general audience of Rolling Stone or The New York Times. If I wrote for Musician or Guitar World it would, but I think that would have hurt the interviews. Because maybe [the interview subject and I] would have bonded over it, but it’s not going to create any kind of dialogue that’s going to be appropriate for that kind of article.

I think there might be an element, too, of if you cover musicians, then I think you need to come in as a journalist, and not as a fellow musician. To me, the best asset one has in an interview is curiosity. It’s better than an outfit; better than musical knowledge. And even having brushed up and having prepared, I think genuine, sincere curiosity is the best tool you have.

I find that simply listening and responding to a person is just as important as background research. A good example of that in the book – of you just listening and going with the flow – is when you tell Britney Spears that you know exactly what she’s talking about, even though you have no idea.

[laughs] Yeah, exactly. I think there are a lot of points in a lot of interviews where you’re saying ‘yes’. We’re agreeing just so you don’t stop the roll they’re on. I think there’s definitely some crazy things I’ve fucking agreed with in interviews. I think it’s important not to judge the person in an interview, and not to judge whether they’re right or wrong, or if it makes sense. The job is to let them speak. Often, some of them I don’t even know… it isn’t until I look at the transcripts that I know what someone was really saying, or trying to say, because I can slow it down.

To talk about some more specific sections of the book, my favourite band of all time is Led Zeppelin, so I thoroughly enjoyed that section. [Neil interviewed Jimmy Page and Robert Plant for The New York Times. It was their first interview together since Zeppelin broke up 14 years earlier.]

That’s awesome.

I want to know what was going through your mind when you discovered that you hadn’t recorded those first 40 minutes of your interview.

One, was that I was so fucking mad at myself. There are two interviews… I also love Ray Davies of The Kinks, and I missed that interview, too. I was just furious. After that, I started bringing two tape recorders to every interview and I’d have them recorded on two audio recorders just in case one failed, or goes wrong. I was thinking: “how do I re-ask these same questions and get those answers without them catching on?”

The other funny thing about that interview was that I was so young, and they were these icons. I think I’d read [Zeppelin biography] Hammer of the Gods and was obsessed about their… I was a guy who’d maybe slept with one or two women my whole life, so I think I was more obsessed with their sex life than their music. [laughs] And I wanted to know the story. I think at one point Jimmy Page asked me, “Do you have any questions that don’t involve sex?” [laughs] To me, they were legends not just for their music, but the lifestyle around it.

That bit about how you missed the first 40 minutes, it’s funny because it’s such a rookie error, and yet it was one of your first assignments for The New York Times.

Yeah! And that happens. Sometimes it’s unavoidable. There are so many things that could go wrong, especially with cassette decks. You can plug the microphone in the headphone jack, the batteries can die in the middle of the interview and you don’t notice it. The pause button can be on, and you’re recording. I think every one of these errors has happened to me, and that’s my biggest paranoia. I’m almost OCD about checking to make sure that it’s recording. Especially now, I get really paranoid with digital recorders because after you stop it, it has to store the information after you stop it, and what if it doesn’t store… I get so paranoid, man, because you can’t recreate what just happened.

That’s true. But you’ve got to have faith in technology, Neil.

You can have faith in technology, but if it goes wrong… like, you don’t know what’s left on your computer if it shuts down, and you lose your work.

I see where you’re coming from. I’ll remain blissfully naïve until that happens to me.

You can have faith in technology, and technology has things that are operated on electricity. Batteries can die. You can be working there and the power can go; anything can happen, especially when one has more faith in technology than one has in one’s self. One can rely on one’s self, you can’t rely on technology.

Some of my favourite parts in the book were when you revealed part of yourself, like right near the start when you’re talking with Madonna about drugs. You said that you didn’t like pills because “it’s a control thing”, and by making a statement and not asking a question, you encouraged her to go off on her little tangent about how she feels about that, which is an interesting tactic.

I do find that… I put those parts in this book less, but I’ll tell you something interesting, which is that as I was compiling the book, I was going back through a lot of parts in the book. You have to give a little to get something, so the parts of Madonna in the book – I saved these. I’ve got about 100 pages of it, I kind of collected my own personal biography through these interviews with these artists because at some point I’m telling them about my life. I’m telling Bruce Springsteen about how I got a job at The New York Times. I’m telling Lady Gaga about how I came to write The Game. I’m telling Tom Cruise about, I think about The Game also. I’m talking to Christine Aguilera about my childhood. I collected those parts of the interviews because I thought it would be fun if I ever do a straight-up biography, to mix in those interviews.

I was impressed by a few sections where you revealed your ability to form a bond with some of your subjects, like Shawn [Crahan] from Slipknot, and Chuck Berry.

Going back to what you were saying before, I do think I was very conscious to leave myself out of this as much as possible because I felt like you can see the book is showing who these other people are, and the less I’m in it, the better. In all my books, even though I might be a central character in The Game and Emergency, I still tried to put myself in as little, only in there as much as necessary to understand the subject being written about. I’m not in The Game and Emergency, I’m not giving my whole biography. I think I did the same thing in here, I just tried to give myself as little as possible, as was necessary to get to know the subject. But you like when those special bonds happen, you were saying?

Yeah, it’s cool, because the only time that most fans see these musicians is when they’re performing on stage, or in a music video, or they’re being interviewed on TV. But when you break outside of that… like how Shawn from Slipknot took the second cup from the top of a cup pyramid; this tiny little detail tells you a lot about a person.

Yeah, and I loved that. That’s one of my favourite things about this [book] is when you come back and check in with someone later and see how they’ve grown, how they’ve changed, how maybe they take back what they said then, whether they’re sober or whether they’re on drugs. Whether they’re talking rehab speak – it’s a really cool barometer of watching someone grow in these little snapshots. They tell you about your own life too, because you can see how you’ve changed in those interviews as well.

But my favourite time to talk to artists is when they’re in the creative process, versus when they’re in the promotional process. I love talking to them when they’re in the midst of creation because then they’re really wrestling, they’re really raw. When you get them in the promotion process, they’re closed.

I think an example in the book was Trent Reznor; you made that comment about how he was unpacking some games consoles; which would be upsetting to his listeners, because he’s obviously procrastinating, and not creating music.

Yeah. And I loved that interview, because it was so honest.

The idea of revealing a bit of yourself to the reader, there was a bit more of that when you asked Brian Wilson whether he’s a nervous person. Then you went on to state that having a very domineering, critical father can make people nervous and hesitant later in life, which I believe is a reflection of your own life.

It wasn’t that case, I think it was just from observation. I do have critical parents, probably more so on my mother’s side, but I think that was more like a general observation from a number of interviews, [as opposed to] saying that about myself. Though of course in interviews, I will often talk about myself. Again, I think if someone tries to suck all the information out, you’re kind of an asshole if you’re out to do that. There should be reciprocity. But I definitely wasn’t referring to myself in that case. Though now that you mention it, I definitely grew up in a household where nothing was ever good enough, and that definitely probably did contribute to the hesitancy and lack of confidence later in life, for sure.

After The Game came out and you started to get noticed, were there many instances during interviews of your reputation preceding you? Were some of your subjects were already aware of your work, even beyond music journalism?

Yeah, and it usually helped if they were aware of my work. I think it’s definitely true, versus some random name coming in to interview them, or a guy whose stories they’ve read in Rolling Stone. If they’ve sat there with a book, and read a book. It definitely helped.

Are you concerned that journalists like myself are going to read the book and steal your best material?

No, because that material is already out there. I mean, to me it’s like if somebody steals it… I’m scared until it’s out, like before I put the book out, I’m scared someone else is going to do an anthology like this, when it hasn’t been done before, and some other journalist is going to think about creating something like this. But once it’s out, I look forward to people… let’s not say stealing, but being inspired by it. [laughs] I think that’s the most awesome thing ever. If someone likes it enough to do something similar or use that material in their own way, that’s cool. Otherwise you’d never do anything, because otherwise you’d just be frozen.

There were two questions you asked in the book that totally blew me away, because I would never even considered asking them. Do you want to know what they are?

Yeah, go ahead. Wait, I know your first one’s going to be: “could you made the best album ever, then bury it and never listen to it, but still be content?”

Yeah, that’s one.

And is the other one about “what’s more important, music or children”?

No.

I liked that one. “What’s the thing you felt you’ve given to the world most, music or children? What’s benefitted the world more?”

The other one was what you asked [the rapper] The Game – “what was the first money you ever made?” It’s such a simple question, but his answer reveals so much about him.

Oh yeah, “the first money I made wasn’t made, it was stolen”. [laughs] I don’t have stock questions I ask everybody. I really should have a list of questions I ask everybody, but I don’t.  I usually ask that if I’m curious about it for that particular person. There are a couple that have been themes in my life because I’m always curious about family, and curious about artistic stuff.

So, my last question: have you sent this book out to any of the people who you interviewed?

Umm… no. [laughs]

Are you intending to?

No, I’m not planning to. I’ll just think I’ll let them find it. I don’t know why. It seems to me something where… for some reason, it seems boastful to send it to them. I don’t know why. I probably should. I think that would be a good idea to do. Even, like, Russell Brand, who I’m friends with, he told me I was in his book, and I didn’t tell him he was in my book. So I should probably do that.

Totally. Alright Neil, I’ll leave it there.

I look forward to catching up with you at a more calm point, and seeing you when I’m in Australia.

For sure man. Thanks for your time.

Thanks man. It’s been fun watching your evolution. Bye Andrew.

++

For more Neil Strauss, visit his website or follow him or Twitter.

The Courier-Mail author profile: Neil Strauss – ‘Everyone Loves You When You’re Dead’, 2011

An author profile for The Courier-Mail. This isn’t available on their website (at time of publishing), so you can either click the below image to view a bigger version, or read the full article underneath.

Neil Strauss: Choosing the right minute

To American writer Neil Strauss, the traditional format of the cultural journalism anthology was tired and predictable.

After his 2009 book, Emergency – wherein Strauss switched into survivalist mode and learned a raft of new skills so he’d be prepared in the event of an apocalyptic catastrophe – the accomplished Rolling Stone and The New York Times writer thought he’d give himself a break.

“I thought I’d do an anthology,” he says, “because anyone who’s been writing articles and feature stories for 20 years feels like, ‘why not collect my favourite pieces and put them in a book?’”.

The problem with this formulaic approach became evident once Strauss started sifting through thousands of published interviews with some of the world’s most famous musicians and actors.

“I like telling stories,” he explains – as evidenced in Emergency, and in the 2005 bestselling exposé of the then-hidden pick-up artist community, The Game – but in this instance, “there were no through lines”.

He spent some time with anthologies by some of his favourite writers.

“Half of them I didn’t finish, because I got bored. With the other half, after I was done, I was bored of the writer, and bored of the voice, because it’s not a book if it’s just articles bound together, he says.

Eventually, Strauss realised that his best published work simply showed moments where readers were allowed to see “the real person behind the mask”.

So he began collecting those moments. The final product is a 500-plus-page tome named Everyone Loves You When You’re Dead, which features 228 such moments.

In the book’s preamble, Strauss writes that you can learn a lot about a person or a situation in a minute – but only if you choose the right minute.

Strauss is known for his ability to get closer to his interview subjects than most writers.

Some of the book’s best moments are when he’s far from the regular interview locales, like hotel rooms or cafes.

Instead, far more revelatory material is gained when he’s lying in bed interviewing Jewel, or driving with Snoop Dogg to pick up diapers for his kid, or being flown in a private jet by licensed pilot and jazz saxophonist Kenny G, or riding motorcycles and going to the Church of Scientology with Tom Cruise and his mother.

Reporting from these extraordinary situations comes at a cost, though. For Strauss – who says he only does one or two interviews per year, now – these outlandish experiences have raised the journalistic bar considerably.

“In the past, I succeeded by getting to be in the same room as this great artist who I looked up to,” he says.

“Now it’s not enough. I’ve got to get the best interview this person has ever given in their life. You have to somehow go in, with a limited amount of time with someone, and you have to walk away and leave with something they’ve never told to any other writer before. That’s a lot of pressure. The better you get at something, the harder and more intimidating it gets.”

Does he ever feel guilty for relentlessly extracting information from his subjects? “Sometimes I feel guilty. Say I’m leaving with four hours of recordings of one person spilling their soul to me, and all of a sudden it’s like, ‘thank you very much, goodbye’. I’m walking away with their soul on a tape, to some degree. They have nothing. That part always feels strange to me. It’s like having sex with someone, then running away.”

Aspiring and existing journalists will be pleased to learn that Strauss is human after all, though. He doesn’t shy away from including one of his most embarrassing moments in the book.

Forty minutes into an interview with Jimmy Page and Robert Plant – guitarist and singer for legendary British rockers Led Zeppelin – Strauss realised that he’d plugged his microphone into the headphone jack. The result: blank tape.

To make matters worse, it was the pair’s first in-depth interview together since Zeppelin broke up fourteen years earlier, and it was one of Strauss’ first assignments for The New York Times.

When he later attempted to surreptitiously backtrack over some of his questions, Page and Plant gleefully discovered his mistake.

Strauss can laugh about it now, but at the time, he was  ”so mad” at himself.

“After that, I started bringing two recorders to every interview, just in case one failed, or something went wrong.”

Everyone Loves You When You’re Dead is out now in Australia via Text Publishing. For more Neil Strauss, visit his website or follow him or Twitter.

Bonus material: for the full transcript of my 45 minute interview with Neil Strauss in early March 2011, click here.

 

Mess+Noise story: Lofly Hangar: 2007-2010

A feature for Mess+Noise about a much-loved Brisbane venue.

Lofly Hangar: 2007-2010

ANDREW MCMILLEN laments the loss of short-lived Brisbane venue Lofly Hangar, which shut its doors in late 2010.

Nestled under a party goods store on Musgrave Road in Red Hill, the Lofly Hangar always seemed an unlikely meeting place for Brisbane’s independent music community. Located far from the dedicated entertainment precinct in Fortitude Valley – where the majority of the city’s live music venues are based – Red Hill is very much a residential area. Yet since it first opened its doors to the public in 2007, the Hangar built a reputation for delivering quality music to curious listeners in an intimate setting.

From the beginning, $10 got you inside – a cost which was maintained through until the final show in December 2010, except for the occasional special event – and since it was classed as a private residence, there was no liquor licensing regulations involved. You’d bring your own booze, and since the main area was adorned with couches, it didn’t feel dissimilar from your living room. Such was the charm of the Hangar: interesting people and new sounds, experienced in comfort. Upon entering, you’d be almost guaranteed to have a great – and cheap – night out.

The line-ups were curated by the Lofly brains trust – Phil Laidlaw, Andrew White, Greg Cooper, Chris Perren, and Joel Edmondson – and even if you’d never heard of the bands playing, the sounds emanating from the adjoining band room were almost always diverse and intriguing. The stage, however, was non-existent. The bands played on the floor, set up in front of a wall of old televisions. The venue’s PA wasn’t amazing, but it got the job done. An unspoken, Meredith-like “no dickheads” policy seemed to be in play throughout its existence. To visit the Hangar was to be among open-minded music fans. It was a beautiful thing.

The final Hangar was held on December 11, 2010; coincidentally, it was the 100th public show held at the venue. A few weeks beforehand, three Hangar co-organisers – Laidlaw, White, and Cooper, each musicians themselves with aheadphonehome, Restream, and Toy Balloon, respectively – reflected on their time at the forefront of the Brisbane independent music scene.

Genesis

Andrew White: We got a warehouse and leased it to practise and record in, and have parties with our friends’ bands. Then we started having more people coming. The idea came about to have it as a regular thing, every month. We were interested in putting on music that we liked. Having the parties has been a way of paying the bills. It was never a profit thing; it was just something that we wanted to keep going.

Phil Laidlaw: At the time [2007], there were around three or four venues [in Brisbane] – The Troubadour, Ric’s, The Zoo. So we’d approach people asking them to play, and they’d respond with, “What are you talking about?” The model of warehouse party shows wasn’t happening. There wasn’t a lot of faith in it. It was very difficult to get bands that we thought were good bands to play. But the culture of the space evolved from the parties we were having. There was no need for security, because we knew everyone here.

For the full article, visit Mess+Noise. For more on Lofly, visit their website.

With this story, I tried something I’d never done before: I went for an ‘oral history’ angle. I chatted with Andrew, Phil and Greg for over an hour on the evening of the last Hangar nights, and shaped the best / most relevant bits of that conversation into a narrative structure. I think it turned out OK.

Mess+Noise album review: The Key Of Sea

An ‘on rotation’ album review for Mess+Noise. Excerpt below.

Various Artists – The Key Of Sea

A new compilation sticks up the middle finger at the oft-repeated “stop the boats” refrain, writes ANDREW MCMILLEN.

This is more than a collection of songs. It’s a middle-finger to the unending dialogue surrounding the hideously offensive phrase “stop the boats”.

That dog whistle sounded long and loud across the land earlier this year, as politicians and their supporters attempted to shield racist ideals under the guise of protecting national interests in an election year. The Key Of Sea is the compassionate antidote to narrow-minded xenophobia. All proceeds from the sale of the album – which pairs well-known Australian artists with refugee musicians – go to the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre, the Human Rights Arts and Film Festival, and Refugees Survivors and Ex Detainees. Its co-founders encourage listeners to “think deep, dig deep, and enjoy a unique musical journey”. It’s an apt disclaimer.

These 11 narratives are drawn from disparate inspirations. Knowing each song’s genesis only adds to their impact. Urthboy’s collaboration with Group 120, ‘Letters From Jamshed’, has its roots in the MC’s sister trading mail with an asylum seeker named Jamshed, who was being held in the Nairu detention centre. Featuring lyrics taken from Jamshed’s correspondence, the song’s chorus – set among hip-hop beats, a circular nylon-string guitar riff, and Group 120′s choir of sighs – presents the question that lies at the heart of the asylum seeker debate: “Do you mind, if you and I/We share the sky?”. Alongside Blue King Brown and Diafrix’s ‘Streets Are Getting Hot’, it’s the album’s most upbeat track, and among the most memorable.

For the full review, visit Mess+Noise. For more on The Key Of Sea, visit their website, or watch the project documentary embedded below.

Elsewhere: a story for Rolling Stone about The Cat Empire’s involvement with The Key Of Sea

Brisbane City Council LIVE story: Penelope Bell

Each quarter, the Brisbane City Council pulish LIVE, a free pocket guide to arts, culture and entertainment events that take place throughout the city.

I was contracted to edit the copy for the 64-page July-September 2010 issue of LIVE, as well as writing a profile of Penelope Bell, an emerging Brisbane fashion designer who was one of the recipients of a $20,000 Lord Mayor’s Young And Emerging Artists Fellowship.

Click the below image for a closer look at the Penelope Bell profile, or read the article text underneath.

In Focus: Lord Mayor’s Young and Emerging Artists Fellowship
by Andrew McMillen

The seed of inspiration was planted when Penelope Bell witnessed Elizabeth Harrison, CEO of New York-based luxury brand agency Harrison and Shriftman, speak at the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Festival in August last year.

Not long after this experience Bell discovered the Lord Mayor’s Young and Emerging Artists Fellowship, a grant for creatives under 30 years looking to develop their careers through international training, development and mentorship programs. In her application, she described an internship with Harrison’s agency as her dream role.

Earlier this year, dream became reality for the 25-year old Toowong resident, who, like the three other fellowship recipients, will benefit greatly from the opportunity to gain professional experience within her chosen field. In September, Bell will travel to New York to participate in a three month internship with Harrison and Shriftman.

The young designer completed an Advanced Diploma in Textiles, Clothing and Footwear in 2006 before starting the Penelope Bell fashion label; boutiques across the city have routinely sold out of Bell’s bespoke designs;

Bell’s drive and dedication to the Brisbane creative industries impressed the fellowship’s judges. The majority of her $20,000 award will be put toward flights, rent and living expenses for her three month internship. Upon returning to Brisbane, Bell aims to put these newfound branding and marketing techniques into practice by overhauling her label’s luxury product line and broadening her market scope to encompass international buyers.

“The fellowship’s not just for me,” Bell says, “It’ll ultimately benefit other local designers because I’m hoping to help build up the fashion industry here in Brisbane by passing on what I learn and experience as a result of the fellowship.”

The Lord Mayor’s Young and Emerging Artists Fellowship isn’t just awarded to fashion designers, though. Bell’s fellow 2010 fellowship recipients include Sally Golding of West End, a moving image artist and curator undertaking mentorships in London and the Netherlands; Clare McFadden of Bardon, a community cultural producer who’ll travel to Italy to learn international best practices for engaging children in the arts; and Sherwood resident Jillian McKeague, an arts curator and producer who will undertake a 21-week mentorship at the London International Festival of Theatre.

The Lord Mayor’s Young and Emerging Artists Fellowship focuses on supporting Brisbane’s young artists and artsworkers to realise their dreams and their full potential.

To view the LIVE program online, visit the Brisbane City Council website. According to BCC, LIVE is an “innovative, socially inclusive and diverse program of arts and cultural events that includes music, festivals, cultural activities and community projects”. You can pick up a copy from culturally-relevant stores throughout Brisbane.

Mess+Noise story: ‘Hundreds Protest To ‘Reclaim’ Brisbane’s Nightlife’

On March 11, concerned members of Brisbane’s music community turned out in force to protest a proposed 2am shutdown on all live music venues and nightclubs. I reported for Mess+Noise.

Melbourne had its march for the ages last month, though it was too late to save The Tote. Yesterday, it was Brisbane’s turn to take to the streets in response to proposed legislation that threatens to undermine its vibrant nightlife and culture.

While the Victorian SLAM rally was triggered by a “senseless and arbitrary” liquor licensing regime that tarred all live music venues with the same high-risk brush, the situation up north is a little different. The Anna Bligh-led Labor Government and Police Department Union last year launched an inquiry to curb alcohol-fuelled violence across the state. A proposed response is to close licensed venues at 2am, and enforce a “lockout” at 12am, thereby overruling the existing 3am lockout.

Ahead of the inquiry’s findings – to be released on March 18 – concerned punters gathered outside Queensland Parliament House, a kilometre south of the CBD and located on the edge of the Botanic Gardens. Pitched as a peaceful, strictly drug- and alcohol-free protest named “Reclaim The Nightlife”, the organisers’ expectations for 2000 attendees seemed ambitious as the clock struck 4pm.

Full story (and more photos) at Mess+Noise, published March 12 2010; above photo by Elleni Toumpas.

This was the first organised protest I’d attended. It wasn’t a particularly well-organised or memorable occasion. On the ground, I made the decision to report purely on the proceedings, instead of conducting interviews and collaborating those results into my story. I probably wouldn’t use that same approach on similar events in the future, but for this time, at least, I felt it was worthwhile.

The Australian Review story: ‘Lonesome Highway’

This is my first feature for national broadsheet newspaper The Weekend Australian‘s ‘Review’ arts and culture lift-out. Entitled ‘Lonesome Highway’, it’s 2,000 words on the challenges faced by Australian country musicians. [Click the image for a readable version.]

This is by far the biggest story of my career; you can read about how it happened here. Full story text included below.

Lonesome Highway

Once a year country music gets its moment in the sun, then it all goes cold again. Andrew McMillen reports on a neglected genre

The country music scene appears on the radar of most Australians only each January, at Tamworth Country Music Festival time. Television shows brief clips of guitar-slinging performers; newspapers run wide shots of cowboy hat-wearing, denim-clad fans lining the main street and, if we’re lucky, which we mostly are, we’ll be shown “the weirdest busker on Peel Street”, says singer-songwriter Felicity Urquhart with a sigh, referring to the many performers who line Tamworth’s main drag and vie for the attention of visiting news crews keen to shoot and run.

Golden Guitar winners rate a mention in the mainstream media and then country music is put back in its box.

As singer-songwriter Adam Harvey puts it, “people tend to dismiss country music without giving it a go. They think we still sing about the one where ‘my wife left me and my dog died’, or if you play it backwards, it’s where ‘my dog left me and my wife died,’ ” he says with a laugh.

The problems are many: image, airplay opportunities, marketing, media attention, even differences in the sector about what country music should be in a wider music world dominated by glossy pop singers who flaunt skin and layer digitally enhanced vocals over processed beats .

As Harvey suggests, not everyone even knows what country music is.

The Australian’s music writer, Iain Shedden, puts it this way. “Country music, since it was first called that in the 1940s, has evolved and fractured into hundreds of sub-genres, from alt country to cowpunk to pop country crossover, so it’s impossible to attribute one strict formula to all of it.

“In Australia, however, it’s a little easier to define. Stretching back to the pioneering output of Tex Morton and then Slim Dusty, songs have simple folk structures, generally led by acoustic guitar, but accompanied by other instruments also used in the folk tradition, such as mandolin, banjo, harmonica. Most often the songs are in waltz or 4/4 time,” he says.

“The connection to the land is probably Australian country’s strongest lyrical characteristic, with John Williamson one of the leading exponents of that form. Lyrics often have a narrative, although at the pop end of country (taking Taylor Swift from the US as an example), they can be more abstract (or banal) with no ties to rural life at all.”

Amiable superstar Troy Cassar-Daley calls country “the story of everyday people. Vocally, it’s sincere; instrumentally, it’s proud to wear sounds like banjos and fiddles in the mix. Other music steers clear of those because they don’t want to be labelled, but we proudly use instrumentation that has the feel of the hills that cover this great land,” he says. “Lyrically, it’s pure home-town pride. And you know you’re listening to country – not pop or rock – when you hear songs for the common man. There’s a lot of people living, loving and dying in Australia, and this music is about them.”

Following this creed, Cassar-Daley won six Golden Guitars this year, including album of the year for I Love This Place, taking his career tally to 20.

“Afterwards I got a text from Keith Urban asking, ‘Can you just leave some for someone else?’,” he says, laughing.

Cassar-Daley was a popular winner, but there were questions elsewhere when writer-photographer John Elliott, a festival veteran, gave a lecture titled Let’s Get Real: The Need for Authenticity in Australian Country Music. “Great country music tells stories about our country; about who we are and where we come from. I think a lot of younger artists have lost this focus,” Elliott argued.

He also said performers needed to have an appreciation of what had come before. “Without that respect it becomes very bad pop music,” Elliott said. “And it has to have more of a connection to the country than wearing a hat, having a twangy guitar and getting your clip played on the Country Music Channel.”

Dusty’s widow Joy McKean, who celebrated her 80th birthday with a concert on January 21 at Tamworth’s Capitol Theatre, agreed. McKean is a songwriter who managed her husband’s career for more than 50 years. “As yet, no one has crystallised what it means to be country like Slim did. He was the point of reference for country music, and I don’t think we have that now. A lot of people are paying lip-service to country music for their own means, without having a genuine feeling for the music.”

The variety of music styles being presented in Tamworth this year gave some force to this argument, although Dusty’s daughter Anne Kirkpatrick, while warning today’s performers not to get “too wound up in the image to the exclusion of the heart and soul”, acknowledged the stature of Urquhart and Cassar-Daley in the business.

But no matter how good the country artist, there is still the matter of getting them heard. Aneta Butcher, who manages Australian country music at the nation’s largest independent record company, Sydney-based Shock Records, says: “I don’t know if we’re ever going to get mainstream radio to pick up what we market as country music. If we’re taking a country act to radio, we generally have to provide a pop mix of their single and hope for the best.”

In the US – where Urban is a huge star – there is a vast network of country radio stations, something Australia lacks. Urquhart, who won female artist of the year last month, has been sitting in as host of ABC radio’s Saturday Night Country program while regular host John Nutting is on leave, and says that in the absence of other outlets, “all we can do is try our best to promote, expand and educate the listeners of our ABC program … I truly believe there’s something in country music for every Australian.”

Scott Lamond, who was raised in Bundaberg on a healthy diet of Dusty and Williamson, has reported on country music events for the ABC for the past five years. “I know ABC radio takes country music seriously, but generally speaking there are limited broadcasting opportunities for country artists outside of community radio,” he says. “I spoke with [2010 Golden Guitar winner for group of the year] Jetty Road, who mentioned that there’s around 70 commercial stations in Canada playing country music 24/7. Australia just doesn’t have that; the platforms on offer to artists who want to share their music are limited.”

Harvey has tackled the issue of attracting attention by inviting performers from outside the country realm – including pop singer Guy Sebastian – to sing on his 2009 release Duets. Sebastian headlined a show at this year’s Tamworth festival, which was one of the first to sell out. The presence of such an unashamedly un-country artist was the talk of Tamworth, but as Harvey sees it, there has always been a diverse array of acts on display at the festival, where this year an estimated 2500 acts played across 10 days.

“The old guard tend to forget that the traditional Tamworth crowd’s getting older,” he says. “I understand we’ve got to respect our heritage, but we’ve also got to make sure we’re encouraging a steady influx of young performers. And if we’ve got to drag a few people with us to move the industry forward, we’ll do what we have to.”

Harvey’s willingness to test boundaries, is, he says, just “a bit of common sense. I’m aware of how important it is that we plan a long-term future for our industry.” Performers needed to remember “that we’re product who’re expected to sell records”.

Twelve-time Golden Guitar winner Graeme Connors says the country industry is in something of a trough.

“From my perspective, the music business cannot function without artists who are creating interesting, challenging, and diverse works … The business has this constant demand for large-selling records, and not every artist can do that with every release.” A powerful, individual voice is what’s missing, Connors says.

“That void will be filled in time, if only because the human spirit is incapable of staying in a lull. In the interim, there’ll likely be someone at the young end of the spectrum who’ll find a voice that reminds us just how good music can be.”

This year’s anointed up-and-comer is Luke Austen, winner of the 31st annual Star Maker talent quest. It’s a title previously held by Urban and Lee Kernaghan. Austen, 28, isn’t exactly a neophyte, having spent four years on the road with lauded bush balladeer Brian Young and six years as bassist for Cassar-Daley. He also co-wrote a song on Cassar-Daley’s I Love This Place.

“We prefer to select a winner who’s already working professionally in the industry, because they get it,” quest co-ordinator Cheryl Byrnes says.

A cautionary note is struck, nevertheless, by Geoffrey Walden, founder of the Gympie-based Australian Institute of Country Music. He contends that the Tamworth talent quest programs tend to build artists who don’t appeal to the younger demographic of potential fans. “It’s about marketability from the perspective of what the industry sees as the future of country music. They’re generally after someone who’s marketable and who’ll appeal to a wide audience, but not necessarily a young audience.”

Austen is acutely aware of the expectation thrust on him. “There hasn’t been a major star in a long time, but I’d like to put that pressure on myself because I feel that I’ll perform better. It inspires me to dig in and really make it work. I’ve won the respect of my peers, and now I just have to concentrate on backing it up with good product.”

Nick Erby is a Tamworth local who has attended all 38 country music festivals. “Competitively, contemporary Australian country music is the best you’ll find anywhere. We’re not backwards, we’re just underexposed,” he says.

Erby has a long history of broadcasting country music on radio, but now works online. He points out that terrestrial licenses for Australian radio are restricted and finite, but thousands of stations exist online, each broadcasting to niche audiences. “Online technology is shaking up the radio industry. Once the cost of access drops, the option will become more attractive to a wide array of listeners.”

He sees this as a potential answer to the lack of exposure for country music: his Country Music Radio online simulcast of this year’s awards overloaded his US-based server. “You watch,” he predicts. “In the next two years, the awards will be streamed via live video.”

Industry insiders also point to the success of the 20-year-old Swift, whose career and style could entice young Australian performers and fans. Swift’s second album, 2008′s Fearless, has sold more than seven million copies in the US. Butcher voices a hope shared widely: “Swift appeals to younger girls, who might be influenced to give country music a try,” she says.

Traditionalists may squirm, but this could be the future. As Urquhart says when despairing of the limited view of country music held by the media at large: “What about our shining lights and our new discoveries? There’s so much more to country music than footage of a hay bale and a guy with a chook on his head.”

And even someone as successful as Cassar-Daley half-jokes as he helps out with phone numbers: “Good luck with the story, mate. Keep it positive. We need it.”

This story originally appeared in The Australian’s ‘Review’ lift-out on February 6 2010. A link to the story on The Australian’s website is here.

A Conversation With Neil Strauss, New York Times Bestselling Author, 2009

It’s June 23, 2009. Minutes away from meeting Neil Strauss, I catch myself being self-conscious. I realise that when I sit, my jeans reveal my red-and-white striped socks above my white basketball shoes, which were hastily pulled on before a flight from Brisbane to Sydney earlier that day. Shit. What will Neil think?

I can see him in the opposite corner of the Sofitel Hotel’s lobby, closing an interview with another young, starry-eyed guy, and chatting with his publicist. I change sitting positions a couple times to try and find the optimum spot that’ll make me look relaxed and in control. I want to exhibit both of these traits before Strauss, one of my favourite writers, because I want this to be perfect.

As I walk toward them, the publicist turns and says, “you must be Andrew”. We shake hands, and Neil offers his. “Hey Andrew, what’s up man?” he asks warmly. They’re finalising his plans for tonight; an opportunity to watch a taping of The Chaser’s War On Everything seems to be on the cards. Neil turns to the otherwise empty lobby antechamber and asks me to pick a comfortable seat for our interview. I select a window seat, and run my eyes across the page of questions written in my notebook.

I don’t admit that I was self-consciously readying myself just moments earlier. I don’t describe to him the trepidation I feel as a fan almost half his age, speaking to my favourite writer. The one who wholly shared his personal demons and sexual exploits in the 2005 book The Game: Penetrating The Secret Society Of Pick-Up Artists; an autobiographical account of the two years that Strauss spent investigating the lives of men devoted to improving themselves by attracting women.

As I ponder, Neil bounds over and sneaks a look at the page.

Neil: Ready for all fifteen questions!

Andrew: I think fifteen’s a good number. Or is it too many, or too few?

Here’s what I do. I write out like a hundred questions, even though I rarely get to ask them all. I write them out, while researching and studying them beforehand, and then just have a conversation. And if the conversation stalls, I turn to a prepared question.

But that’s just the way I do it. I don’t know if it’s the best way; no-one ever told me!

So I really enjoyed Emergency [his 2009 book on survivalist preparedness]. What did you set out to achieve with the book?

The main thing was to write an interesting, hopefully somewhat humourous story. But what I set out to achieve is always different to what I achieve. I originally set out to write a book that would influence the (2008) American election, so that a Bush-like type of person didn’t win the election. So the original goal was to look at the country and ask, “Why isn’t anybody having a revolution?” That’s even almost how I pitched it. And they let me do the book like that in the first place – “okay, go do your fun little pet project, and then give us a real book” – and then it just turned into this whole other thing about self-sufficiency and learning to be independent of the system.

Did you come across that accidently?

My favourite composer is John Cage, and his credo is “be open to whatever comes next”, and I think that’s it. You start with one idea in mind, but you have to be willing to go further. Like when I did the Marilyn Manson article for Rolling Stone, I planned to tear him apart, because I didn’t like him. And when I met him, I liked him, and it turned out to be a positive article. The first book I wrote was with him, and if I hadn’t challenged my preconception, maybe I wouldn’t have started my career writing books.

So the original thing was to activate and politicise apathetic Americans, but then I realised that the whole idea of voting for a person is a pretty pathetic way of empowerment. One person isn’t really doing that fucking much. It’s like that lyric – “meet the old boss; same as the new boss” [The Who's 'Won't Get Fooled Again'], you know. And even though there are major differences, I realised that it’s more about one’s own self, and not entrusting your safety to someone else. To become self-sufficient, and not depend on the system so much. The way you leave home when you’re a child, and eventually have to leave your parents and become an adult, in the same way you have to eventually step outside the normal political system.

Was one of your goals to encourage others to become self-sufficient, as opposed to living a life of convenience, which you describe at the beginning of the book?

Yeah. It’s also to wake up from some of the delusions you were taught as a child, from the history books and in class. And to do whatever it takes to give yourself peace of mind. The other thing is to – rather than having these anxieties and fears – take them to the extreme and get rid of them. In that way, one of my aims for the book was basically generational Prozac (laughs).

The economy’s falling apart around you; people are freaking out over these pandemics; terrorism alerts are always in a shade of orange or red.. so, you know, learning what this stuff is and what it means, and how to protect yourself. That was my Prozac for this generation’s panic attack.

How soon did you finish the book before it was published? There’s some stuff near the end that’s pretty recent.

I literally finished it in February, and it came out in March. That’s the cool thing about publishing, and why I love writing versus movies or TV, because you can literally get it from your pen to the reader so soon. And I’m lucky enough that my publisher’s pretty cool, and they can turn it around (quickly). I think if it came out now, it’d be a slightly different time.

I’m really interested with what you’re doing with your publishing company, Igniter.

Thanks for asking about that! I’m fucking stoked that you asked me about that.

How did that idea come about with [fellow Rolling Stone writer] Anthony Bozza?

We were on Tommy Lee’s tour bus. He’d just written the Tommy Lee book, and I’d written the Mötley Crüe book [The Dirt: Confessions Of The World's Most Notorious Rock Band]. And we started talking, and exchanging notes, and found that the same people had been approaching us about books. We both got approached by Slash to do a book, and Axl Rose. Over the course of that night, three different people approached both of us about writing their books. And we were like, “fuck, this is weird!” Every now and then, there’d be a good one that we didn’t have time to do.

So when someone came to us with a good book that they wanted written, we’d pass them onto agents and publishers and it’d never get made. It couldn’t get through the (publishers’) doors. So we just thought “fuck it, let’s put these books out ourselves.”

Why do you think that they couldn’t get published? What was stopping these projects – the idea of working with unknown, unpublished authors?

Yeah, unknown authors, and that most people don’t trust their taste. The phenomenon of social proof – no one thinks something is good, unless other people tell them it’s good beforehand.

I was going to ask you about social proof, because you’re now, what, a six times New York Times bestselling author? That’s a pretty massive social proof there.

Yeah, exactly.

So with you and Anthony behind Igniter, do you think that your names will hold sway in the publishing community?

That’s our hope, that we can get people to read good books. And also, we don’t want to deal with agents. If an agent has a book, he’s already shopping it to every publisher. We want to go find raw talent. I’ll give you an example: in our first book, which is out this fall…

Is that the book on the mafia guy?

No, the first one is on Bozo The Clown.

Ah, I know you’re a big fan of his.

Exactly. So you’re on my mailing list, I take it, since you knew about the mobster book?

Yeah.

When I did the writing contest, for the mobster book, there were three guys who got through to the final. The mobster chose a different guy to the winner of the public vote, who was Ian Kelk. He’s an unemployed computer programmer. So Ian didn’t get to do the mobster book, but I said to him “listen, I’m going to find writing work for you.” And so a few weeks ago, Amber Smith [pictured left], who’s this gorgeous supermodel – she’s been on the cover of Vogue, Playboy, FHM, and also now has a reality show – she wanted to do a book. Her story is insane: she’s a supermodel, but she’s only been in two relationships for like three months each, and afterwards she stalked the guys for like ten years. It’s awesome – she’s one of the most beautiful women in the world, yet she stalks guys and they run away from her! (laughs)

So I called up Ian, and said “why don’t you phone her, see if you guys get along, then come down and work on her book.” So this guy who applied for my writing contest – an unemployed computer programmer – is now hanging out with, and writing a book for a supermodel. That’s the kind of stuff that we like making happen.

So Igniter’s goal is to get unknown writers published?

It’s just to get good books published. It could be a known or an unknown writer, it just has to be good. But I’m more excited about someone, maybe, who.. like when I wrote for the New York Times, there were certain bands that I was one of the first to write about, like Elliott Smith, or Built To Spill, or Ryan Adams. There were artists I’d find and write about, and then the world would embrace that person, and I could be like “cool, I hope I helped in some way”.

That’s the kind of feeling (of talent discovery) that we’re looking to replicate with Igniter.

It’s interesting how certain writers can hold that kind of control, or influence, over popular culture.

In my case, The New York Times was a good platform because it reaches a billion people. And they’ll let you do.. do you know who Robert Randolph is?

No.

In other words, I could say to my editors, “man, there’s this guy who performs pedal steel music in churches, it’s an old church tradition, and people just fucking dance on the rafters and it gets crazy.” I did a story on him, and now he’s huge. He plays at Bonnaroo and all those kinds of festivals. And they put it on the front page of the Arts section, so it was cool to have a platform like that for people be able to listen to.

As well artists you liked, were you pressured by the Times to write about artists that you didn’t like?

All the time, but I could choose how I wrote about them. For example, I had to write about [the saxophonist] Kenny G [pictured right]. I thought, “well, I could write the normal fucking shit about Kenny G – he’s too easy to make fun of”. But then I found out that he was a pilot. So I thought, “why don’t I have Kenny G pick me up in a plane, then we’ll go fly somewhere, then have dinner together, and we’ll talk.”

So I did that and I realised that I’d developed a respect for Kenny G, because he’s a guy who plays what he feels. And what he feels just happens to be very simple, and sweet. He’s just a simple, sweet guy playing simple sweet music, and he’s playing what he feels. He’s not like, you know, [jazz musician] Sun Ra. I have respect for Kenny G’s integrity, and I’m glad that I met him, because it would have been too easy to make fun of him.

You seem to have preconceptions of artists and people before you meet them. Have you tried to stop having those preconceptions?

I think it’s okay to have preconceptions, but you have to be willing to discard them in the face of the truth. I only think they’re bad when you stick to them, regardless; that’s just dogmatic thinking. It’s impossible to learn if you don’t listen.

What preconceptions do you think that people have of you, based on your experiences in The Game?

Generally when I walk into an interview, they definitely expect to see some arrogant fuck. You know, some arrogant, shallow fuck. And that’s fine, because people who think that generally haven’t read the book. They think it’s some lad’s manual, and that there’s a guy out there acting like that guy from Magnolia, screaming “respect the cock!” at guys. It’s fine for people to have preconceptions about me, because I usually am not like the preconception, and they’re thrown off.

I lent The Game to a bunch of my friends, and the ones who read it loved it. But the ones who didn’t pick it up had that preconception of it being a guide for guys to get laid. They find something morally wrong in the idea of a book teaching something that should be inherently known.

It’s the weirdest book, because the people who’ve read it know what it is, but those who haven’t don’t get it. I think the book is like that – you expect it to be one thing, but it turns out as something else. Like how it begins with the greatest pickup artist in the world about to kill himself. And while reading, you think “okay, maybe this isn’t going to be like what I had in mind”. And I think with all my books, I try to give the audience what they wouldn’t expect. Like with the Jenna Jameson book [How to Make Love Like a Porn Star: A Cautionary Tale], you know it’s going to deal with sex and porn, so I started it off somewhere really dark.

When did you realise that you had a book on your hands with Emergency?

It was originally just going to be a story about getting the St Kitts passport, and that was it. The original pitch was just ‘escaping America’ (laughs). And then I went to Tom Brown’s Tracker School, and I called my editor and said “listen man, I need like, another year!” I realised that I had so much to learn; I had to learn how to be human all over again. And he was cool enough to be okay with it. I still remember that cell phone call to my editor from Tracker School.

I guess that’s before you dropped your Blackberry in the water?

Exactly! (laughs)

You mentioned your parents throughout the book, and that they’d always lived a ‘life of convenience’ in the city. Have their views changed since they read the book?

It’s funny, because I went to visit them, and I was doing a radio interview from the back of their car, and the interviewer asked what my parents feel about the book. I was like, “I don’t know, ask them!”. And they said, on air, that they wished they got the St Kitts passport with me, now.

It’s funny, that always happens with everything I do. When I’m doing it, all my friends and family make fun of me, but once it’s done, they’re like “oh, I should have done that”. Whether it’s The Game, and learning to be more attractive to women, or Emergency, and the need to be safe and self-sufficient.

What do your parents think of your evolution as a writer, from starting with places like Ear and Village Voice, to writing New York Times bestsellers?

Man, you want to know something hilarious? My next book’s probably going to be an anthology of articles I’ve written for Rolling Stone and stuff, and my parents just sent me a book proposal letter I wrote when I was eleven years old. It’s the fucking funniest thing!

In it, I’m like: “Dear publisher, this is my book. Please send a printed copy, and all money to..”, and I gave my address. And the grammar is really good, it’s just weird to read that I was sending out book proposals at age eleven.

What was the book proposal?

It was a series of fictional mystery novels. “The Smith Mysteries“.

Did you end up writing them?

I wrote the first book, and I think my parents attached it to the letter they sent. I can’t wait to read it again, it’ll be fucking weird.

Dude, eleven?!

Yeah, I know. But my parents were always against me becoming a writer; they actually cut me off when I was writing for Ear Magazine and stuff. I had to support myself, because they really wanted me to study business, and do what they felt was safe. Ironic how business is the least safe thing to do right now! It’s much safer to be writing.

But eventually, once I was at The New York Times.. they were always a little hard [on me], but I think it drove me to excel more. Like when the Marilyn Manson book [The Long Hard Road Out Of Hell] reached the New York Times Bestseller list, they told me, “well, it’s awesome that you’ve been on the list for one week, but it doesn’t really count unless it’s for two weeks”.

Damn, they’ve got high standards!

Yeah, and that’s why in Rules Of The Game, the book is dedicated to “Your parents. You may be upset with them for what’s wrong with you, but don’t forget to give them credit for what’s right”. So I can’t really blame them for shit, because I feel that I’m happy with stuff I’ve done, and I feel that they gave me everything I needed to succeed.

How do you feel that the experiences in The Game and Emergency have shaped how you view yourself?

They’re completely different. With The Game – even separate from the book – I always think about how if I’d never come across this underground group of guys, I always would have lived my life in the dark, and died never having emerged from my little shell. Like, there are good things and bad things about The Game, and I thought I’d neither attack nor defend it, but when I do interviews, I will defend guys’ right to learn it. The right that guys should be able to learn those skills if they want to. Because I think “fuck, if I’d never learned it, I would have just lived my life with blinders on”, not knowing who I could be, or the experiences I could have.

Even if the book never came out, I’m so grateful for those experiences. It’s just weird, I was just a completely different person [beforehand], and I just wasn’t me. I was just so intimidated, and shy about everything.

But after going through your experiences and sharing them, you’ve allowed how many thousand people to improve themselves?

Yeah, it’s pretty fucking weird. Because I didn’t know that the book would have that effect, and I think if I was trying for that effect, I probably wouldn’t have had it, because I would have tried too hard.

You share a lot of yourself and your experiences through your writing. Did that come easily, or did you hesitate?

No, I had to do it. When I did those books with celebrities, I had a rule, which is you have to tell the whole truth; you can’t hold anything back. You’d have to be willing to make yourself look bad, if that’s how it happened. I hold myself to the same standards I held those other people to. I couldn’t be hypocritical about it.

With The Game, many times I considered doing it under another name. My alias was ‘Chris Powles’. I used ‘Style’ online, but if I needed to use my real name, most of the time I was ‘Chris’. I thought I’d write the book under that person’s name, and pretend it was another book I had ghost written for somebody else, like what I’ve done using my real name in the past. I thought many times about not doing it, and then I thought, “If you’re not willing to put your name on what you did, then why did you do it?”

You mentioned at the start of Emergency that when you were researching those crazy groups around the the year 2000 that you were a bad reporter because you got nervous talking with people. That’s not still the case, is it?

I still feel like a horrible reporter. My last two interviews were with Jay Leno and [comedy film director] Judd Apatow for Rolling Stone. I still feel like, “Oh shit, I didn’t ask the hard questions.” I still leave every interview feeling like I didn’t get all the stuff.

If I do an article for Rolling Stone, I feel like it’s got to be the best article and that I’ve got to get the most out of the person. I always just leave feeling I should have asked them harder questions, or been tougher, or I don’t know what. But then I listen to the interview afterward, and I actually end up getting good stuff, so I don’t know.

Even after your hundred questions, you still feel like your hundred and first would have been the best.

Yeah, exactly, like I missed something or I didn’t explore something with them or didn’t dig in deep enough or didn’t have enough rapport with them, or whatever.

How do you prepare for an interview?

I just make myself an expert on them. I brainwash myself. If it’s music or movies, I listen to every album, watch every movie, read every interview, and write down every possible question I could ever think of. So I brainwash myself with their lives. (laughs)

How does that compare to being interviewed? Do you prepare for things like this?

Talking about a book is different than writing it, so before each book comes out I’ll think about how would I describe this thing I went through and summarize it. Sometimes, I come to realizations I didn’t have in the book. People ask me about The Game and Emergency. I don’t friggin’ know. I just wrote this book and that book. If I think about them, it’s “Well, both books are really about fear.” The Game is about fear of approaching women, getting rejected, social humiliation, let’s say. Emergency is about fear of dying. Both are about ways to conquer your fear through knowledge and experience.

So you’ve been a journalist, biographer, and an autobiographer. Which do you prefer?

I think I just like writing, whatever it is. I love storytelling; anything that is storytelling, I love.

You’re pretty good at storytelling. Your writing style in The Game is so good. It’s one of my favorite books, just because of how you wrote it. The Style Diaries, at the end of Rules Of The Game, some of those stories are really different to the style of The Game, as well.

I’m curious; how do you feel they’re different? You’re probably right, whatever you’re going to say.

The Style Diaries were more personal, more focused in each vignette, and in how those stories fit into the whole picture of ‘the game’. The one where you were climbing up the back of your apartment building; that one was pretty crazy.

I think it’s funny; I like the writing in The Style Diaries better. I think The Game is a better book. I think I like the writing in The Style Diaries better because it’s like you said; it’s more focused and on the subject. That some of my favorite stuff that I’ve written, all those little vignettes. Also, it was just exploring the idea of relationships, which doesn’t get to be explored in The Game.

One of the main arguments against the concept of pick-up artists that you raised in The Game was “what do you do after the orgasm?”.

Exactly.

So in The Style Diaries, you explored that a little bit.

Exactly. I think I also want to expand on that writing. I’ve had some even crazier experiences than what I described in The Style Diaries; insane shit. I was thinking of just putting it all out as a little secret book. I might do that.  (laughs)

I read in another interview that you were a bit of a workaholic when you first started writing.

Yeah.

But I’ve seen you tweet about procrastinating by watching YouTube and stuff. How do you deal with procrastination or maintaining productivity, when you’re on deadline?

The best thing for procrastination is a hard deadline looming over your head, like your editor is saying, “If this doesn’t come in now…”

[American actor and 30 Seconds To Mars singer/guitarist] Jared Leto [pictured below right] told me that he had a thirteen day deadline for the band’s next album. If it wasn’t done, they were going to fine him $2 million. That’s a good way to not procrastinate, to have a hard deadline with consequences. I find that’s the only way to get shit done.

I’m a workaholic but I’m also a lazy workaholic. I fucking work really hard, but at the same time, if I don’t have to work I can be at the beach.

It’s hard; I was much the same with university, and now with writing assignments. It all comes together right near the end; for better or worse, and I often think it’s for worse. You think you could do it better if you plan the whole way along, rather than cramming it all in.

Exactly. What I’ll do is wait until the night before it’s due and fucking really transcribe it and then, “Fuck, I gotta…” But something I noticed when I started working at the New York Times, when I had a weekly column: it went from ‘finish your work the night before’ to writing it on the due day. Sometimes I find I do my best stuff under pressure.

Do you have any interview transcribing tips?

Yeah – outsource it. (laughs)

For real. Even if I couldn’t afford it.. I just have to have someone else transcribe it. Sometimes it’s good to listen to because then you relive the conversation, but sometimes I find it easier if if I can fucking find someone I could pay a little bit to do it. Even when I didn’t have the money, I was like, fuck – it just makes my life easier.

Do you have any advice for people who want to start becoming contributing writers to Rolling Stone or New York Times; those big-name publications?

I think they need to be willing to write wherever, for no compensation. I never applied for Rolling Stone; I never applied for The New York Times. They just saw my writing in little shitty magazines and were like, “Why don’t you write for us?”

I think you could be the greatest writer in the world, but unless someone can see your writing, no one is going to know. Just get your stuff seen. I would take every opportunity. I did a weekly column in the paper called the New York Press. I got paid $75 a column but it would take me all week to research and write it.

It was a free weekly paper, and because of that, everyone in New York would read it on the subway, and that’s how it came to the attention of The New York Times. When the job opened up at The Times, someone recommended that I apply for it. I didn’t even apply for it. I thought, “I’m not good enough; I just write for this little paper,” and then one day they called me and said, “We like your stuff.”

I think you should not be precious about shit. My advice would be that paragraph in The Game, about not waiting for opportunities to come to you, but meeting them halfway and putting in the work.

Have you read the book Outliers, by Malcolm Gladwell [pictured below left]?

Yeah.

I think that 10,000 hours concept is pretty interesting [where Gladwell suggests that expertise is built after spending approximately 10,000 hours working toward a skill or pursuit]. The first stuff I wrote fucking sucks, you know? (laughs)

If I look at the first articles I wrote for Ear Magazine, you’d never know I could be a decent writer.

I guess you’ve got to start somewhere. How did you get the start with Ear, did you apply for that?

Yeah, it was an internship. I was in my college dorm room and a guy had gone to New York and applied for an internship at this magazine. He was rejected because he was too well-dressed. I thought, “That sounds perfect for me!” and I just wanted to be in New York. I didn’t really think about writing. I got the internship. It’s good to have an internship somewhere small, because after a while they’ll let you write for them and take on other responsibilities.

I’ve read that you kind of fell into writing; you didn’t set out to be a writer.

Now I don’t know. Now my parents sent me that thing from when I was eleven years old. Maybe, I don’t know; it’s confusing. I feel as a kid you want to do everything. You want to be a writer, you want to be an astronaut, you want to be a farmer, and you want to be a movie star.

I take it that your journalistic urges haven’t been quelled, because you’re still contributing to Rolling Stone.

Absolutely.

Do you read newspapers?

I still read The New York Times, not just because I work for them, but I do feel like that’s the closest you get to the full story.

How do you feel about newspaper readerships declining?

It’s fucking weird, especially the idea that a lot of these papers folded and going online. I just feel like online is a place for information, not writing. You don’t necessarily go online to read good writing. I still like the printed word.

That’s one of the theories behind the decline though, that people are becoming less attached to good writing, and strong reporting. They want instant facts, which is what the web is for.

You know what I think is interesting though? I think Twitter and all that are making people better writers. Twitter is what I had to do my whole life, where you need to get a certain word count. On Twitter, everyone is becoming their own editors. “How can I express this idea in..” How many characters is it?

140.

“How can I express this idea in 140 characters?” You have to slim it down, change your words, cut out things, so it’s making everybody an editor of themselves. I think that’s the closest that the mass population has come to being writers. Do you know what I mean? It’s pretty cool.

You started a book club with Emergency after it came out. How did that go? I knew you were trying to organize some teleconferences or something, to get everyone together.

It went so well that I had another book club that I killed and made this one my main book club, because I got really good people on it. We read Emergency, and then we finished that. I thought, “I like this group; let’s do another book,” so we read a book called The Rise And Fall Of The Great Powers, which I mentioned in Emergency. We all read that and it went great, but I think we’re going to do one more book and then I’ll close it down. It’s kind of fun and it motivates me to finish reading some books too. It worked out pretty awesomely.

What are your reading interests? I assume you read widely in music and culture.

I mostly read fiction, almost 90%, because I feel it’s good writing and I want to be influenced by stylists. I also think you learn more about life from fiction than nonfiction because people feel with nonfiction, “This is useful,” but to me fiction is metaphors for real life and the brain works better through metaphor. I feel like I learn more through fiction. I love it.

Can you recommend any good fiction books that have come out recently, or even historically, old things?

Some of my favorites are Ask The Dust, by John Fante. It’s a story about a struggling writer in Los Angeles; it was written maybe seventy years ago, but it could’ve been written now and it’s fucking hilarious, especially as a writer. You would love it. He has a picture of his editor on his wall that he worships and it’s a total AFC story too. He has a crush on a waitress, and he totally blows it with her. There’s a horrible movie adaptation, but the book is great.

The Painted Bird by Jerzy Kosinski is a brutal book about a kid wandering through the villages during World War II, in Poland. I like Life Is Elsewhere by Milan Kundera, which is about life choices; doing what you’re born to do, versus doing what society and family pressures you to do. I like Mishima Haruki Murakami, Gabriel García Márquez; Jim Carroll’s The Basketball Diaries is awesome.

I don’t know; I really love fiction, which is ironic because what I do is so different from what I love.

That’s really surprising to me.

It’s weird to me, too, because my goal is always to be.. there’s this bookstore called St. Marks, in New York. Behind the desk, they have a counter of their most stolen books. There’s [Charles] Bukowski, and William S. Burroughs, and my goal was to be on that list of their most stolen books. One day I saw The Game there and I was like, “Yes!”

I went to another bookstore once and they said their most stolen books were the Bible and The Game. I don’t know if that means people thought The Game was the Bible and stole it, and I also thought it was kind of fucked up; how could you live with yourself if you stole the Bible? The book’s about ethics, yet people still steal it. It’s so weird.

When you’re writing, actually sitting down, and writing a book, do you shut yourself away from the world?

Yeah, for sure. I have to. It involves an intense amount of focus; a lot of it is organisation, and how you organize 500 type-written pages. How do you organise that? It’s like there is a string unspooling in your head and you need to focus to make it snap taught, if that makes sense.

There’s a little place I go to on the beach in southern California, a little shack on the water where I go and get focused.

Not St. Kitts?

Yeah, I go to St. Kitts [pictured right] a lot to write, too.

What ever happened to Spencer [the character from Emergency]? Do you still see him?

Yeah, I just saw him in St. Kitts. He bought a couple of Segways for his house and so we were riding those around. Now he has all his money out of U.S. dollars. He has a lot of money in Australian dollars. He wanted currencies that were backed by something stable. I think the Australian dollar is on the gold standard?

Gold standard?

I think it’s backed by gold, versus the U.S. currency which isn’t backed. Canadian currency is kind of backed – he studied it and he felt he wanted a currency backed by something solid, versus a free floating currency, if that makes any sense.

I’m still friends with Spencer, and the same with the guys in all the books; Mystery and Spencer and the Manson guys. Everybody I’ve written with and about.

I never watched [the VH1 reality TV series] The Pick-up Artist. How did that fare, ratings-wise? Did that get a good response?

I think it did really well. It did well enough for a second season. They represent it pretty well. There’s a lot of empathy for the guys trying to learn it. As far as reality goes, I thought it was portrayed in the best possible light,as far as the TV medium goes.

I watched the videos that you did for Rules of the Game.

Those are my favorites! (laughs)

I like David Faustino in those.

Yeah, he’s fucking hilarious, isn’t he? He’s so fucking funny. I really think he’s a comic genius. Those are really eye-opening. To me, the video where he goes blindfolded – no, with his hands tied behind his back, and gagged, and has to meet women and get phone numbers. He has a hat on and no one can recognise him. The fact that he got four out of five phone numbers, while fucking gagged and blindfolded; it kind of means most of this stuff guys are worried about are just their own limiting beliefs.

Yeah. You mentioned your next book project earlier – I didn’t catch the name.

It’s just an anthology of stuff I’ve written for The New York Times and Rolling Stone. I’m probably going to do something to make it more interesting, like weave together funny, early writing days stories.

Like maybe your first book proposal?

Exactly, the book first book proposal, and I got cut off by my parents when I was trying to write, and dealing with all that stuff.

Stylelife [Neil's "online academy for attraction"] is still going on, while you’re doing your book tours abroad. Who takes care of that?

I really like the Stylelife guys. I don’t know if you know the guys, but they’re really sweet. Gypsy, Bolshevik, Bravo.. they do a really good job running it and they’re good-hearted guys. They do it. I feel bad because I haven’t been around enough; I’ve been traveling too much.

They just put together an anthology of our newsletters. I couldn’t believe that it sold out really fucking quickly.

The other good thing is the teleconferences we did with most of the guys in The Game. We did a seminar, and those guys are all pretty good. I know I spent most of the time talking but when I saw The Sneak do his thing, I was like, “Fuck!” I like those guys. It’s fun; I’m proud of them.

Well, I’m out of questions. How did I do?

You did awesome. I was just thinking as we were talking. The TV interviewers, they generally haven’t read the book and they just want some entertaining shit about “five tips for our viewers”. This is more fun for me because you know – I can talk about Igniter, and talk about the stuff that I’m passionate about right now. It was great. I enjoyed it. I thought you definitely cover your stuff pretty well.

Cool. I’m still pretty new to this.

I knew when I saw you that it’d be a cool interview. Plus you just had a regular conversation, which is better than just going one-by-one through the questions. I thought it was interesting. I like these interviews the most, because it’s someone who knows the work versus somebody who is like, “Here’s the world’s greatest pick-up artist; let’s get some tips and say “this wouldn’t work on me!”

To back up their bias.

Exactly.

I knew when I saw that interview list, I knew you and the guy I talked to before, I knew you guys would be good.

Who was the last guy?

I think he writes for a student newspaper, at the university of whatever it is. I knew you guys would be guys who follow this shit.

Cool.

Are you going to stick around for the book signing thing on Wednesday?

No, I’m flying back in about two hours.

Are you serious man? You just came down today to hit and run?

Yeah.

Did you fund it yourself?

Yeah.

That’s cool man, thank you.

Thanks for having me, man.

That’s really cool. I did the same thing. With Emergency, I spent more money on the book than I made from the book. I’ll do whatever it takes for the stories, even when I was a kid; I flew to Europe to cover a festival when I was a sophomore in college, just because I would do anything for a story. That’s awesome.

What are your interests? What do you want to do?

Writing, but I kind of want to pursue your style of writing, like the interviews written in feature style; the kind of thing that you do for Rolling Stone. I’m not sure if I have a book in me, yet.

Even though I did that book proposal [as a kid], I never thought seriously about writing a book. Even when I did the Marilyn Manson book, I wasn’t ready to write my own book yet. It just happened. You know when it’s right.

I think that ten thousand hours thing is true, too. You pay your dues writing for websites and writing for magazines, and then when you get that opportunity for your book, your reflexes are there.

I’m writing for four publications at the moment.

That’s awesome.

The bylines are gradually getting bigger and bigger, and they’re paying more and more.

That’s cool. That’s exactly what I did. Are you out of school?

Yeah, I just finished last week. I studied Communication, which is half journalism, half media studies. It was a lame course, man.

They’re all lame.

It was a waste of my three years. Well, no; I was at college two years, like residential college on campus, and that was great, making friends and stuff. In terms of the educational content…

It doesn’t matter what you major in. Unless you’re going pre-med or pre-law. Just because I majored in psychology doesn’t mean anything; I learned so much more about psychology from living and writing The Game.

I think it’s important just to get real life experiences. I think because I took those internships in college, instead of writing in college, I learned more from the people I was around – like from that kid in the dorm room who said he didn’t do that internship – than I did from any economics class I took.

So you write mostly for websites?

Half websites, half print.

Cool man, what kind of print?

Street press, which is a free newspaper you pick up off sidewalk, like music newspapers.

Cool, it’s like me with the New York Press! (laughs)

As well as a weekly publication for the  music industry , which is really aimed at the major labels [The Music Network]. I’ve been writing a column about digital music and the changes that are happening in the industry.

That’s cool.

I have to be careful with what I say, though, because they’re so major label-centric and I can’t really be attacking their methods, or how they’re still tied to the old way of thinking when distributing music and stuff.

It’s so weird; I remember I worked for The New York Times when I first heard about ‘the World Wide Web’, but I never knew what it was. I heard The Rolling Stones were doing a promotional thing where they were doing something on the World Wide Web, broadcasting a concert. I didn’t know what it was. I just knew what the internet was. I didn’t know what the World Wide Web was. To me, the internet was all the news groups you had.

I remember someone said, “It’s the backbone of the internet,” and I still had no fucking idea what the World Wide Web was. Everything was dialup. Then I remember writing about the first music download, which was the quality of an AM radio in a bad car, and it took like two hours to download. Then I remember going to these conferences every three years, and someone saying that one day it will be “all you can eat”.

I think that’s the future; it’s the all you can eat services. Like the subscription model with [online music service] Rhapsody. I have [the multi-room music system] Sonos. Do you know what that is?

Yeah.

It’s fucking life-changing. It’s changed my entire musical life. When I come home, the first thing I do is “Where’s Sonos?” It’s like a pet. I pick it up and I’m like, “Okay, shit, I went out and I talked to that guy on the street and he told me about a fucking Sleepy Jackson album [pictured right]” or whatever, so I put it in and I hear it right away. It’s fucking great. Then someone comes over, like some club girl, and she wants to hear Lil Wayne, and I’m like, “Okay cool, here’s Lil Wayne.” If you’re talking on the phone and someone recommends a song, you can hear it right away.

I got it for my parents for one of their birthdays. They love it. I think it’s game-changing, even though it’s just hooked up to Rhapsody. The whole idea that it’s your home stereo component and it’s all you can eat.. I love it, and it’s also the price of one CD a month. Napster is now like $5 a month. It’s fucking insane. 80% of what you’re going to want to hear is going to be on that.

That’s the challenge for new artists though, because there is so much music out there. How do you get heard? How do you differentiate your product from everything else that’s going around?

I think it’s always true that gatekeepers emerge. In other words, the internet happened, and there was so much shit out there; then search engines come up as the portals. I think gatekeepers always impose themselves. I keep a running list of everything that people recommend to go ahead and listen to.

I have a physical recommendation for you.

Oh, cool.

It’s a Brisbane electronic artist. He does pop songs with an electronic edge. [Yeah, I pimped Hunz to Neil Strauss.]

Cool, like The Notwist and The Postal Service kind of stuff?

He’s influenced by Radiohead and Boards Of Canada.

I love both of those. This sounds great. Is there anything else I should listen to?

There’s a band called The Middle East. They’re indie folk from North Queensland, way up north. They’re really unique and powerful.

Cool, I’ll see if I can get that. What kind of music are they?

Indie folk.

Cool. It’s kind of old, but have you heard the Yeasayer record? It’s about a year old, but it’s awesome. It takes a couple of listens to get into it, but I’ve been listening to that a lot lately. There’s also a group called Margot & the Nuclear So and So’s, do you know them?

I’ve heard of them.

It’s about a year old, but I like that too. Then there is a band I liked, called The Felice Brothers. Their first album was amazing; their next album wasn’t as good.

Do you still find that face-to-face recommendations are your strongest musical markers?

Definitely. When I was in Australia last with Mystery, I bought a bunch of CDs and did an article on the top ten favorite Australian CDs back then. It’s cool to see that sometimes they end up getting to the States. I think that was maybe five years ago. I think it was when The Sleepy Jackson and Architecture In Helsinki were first getting popular. I always take recommendations because even if one in twenty is good, it’s worth it.

Shit man, I can’t believe you just came down for the day. That’s crazy.

Totally worth it. I really appreciate it.

Cool man. It was cool meeting.

Can I be cheesy and ask for a photo?

For The Record: An Album Retrospective Part 5

In the final piece of a five-part puzzle, Andrew McMillen examines the digitally-inspired shift in consumer habits away from the long-established album format. After speaking to passionate Australian artists like Hungry Kids Of Hungary, Urthboy and Eleventh He Reaches London last week, Andrew verbally prods two innovative Brisbane-based acts who have turned the album-release expectation on its head.

Were this album-centric article series an actual album, we’d have since bypassed the hit singles, the forgettable middle filler, and the surprising experimental freak-outs. This’d be track twelve; the last gasp that’s strategically-placed to reward the attentive hard-core of fans. Luckily, reader, track twelve is this metaphorical album’s hidden gem: it describes two Queensland acts who’re subverting the traditional cycle in favour of a flexibility that benefits both artist and fan. Press play and get comfortable, won’t you?

Brisbane natives Drawn From Bees [pictured right] are riding a healthy buzz following their recent national tour and more than a few nods of approval from Triple J. The art-rock four-piece have self-imposed an interesting alternative release strategy: a new record every six months. Explains bassist Stew Riddle: “Over a few drinks after our first rehearsal last year, we decided to use the fact that we’re a band of four songwriters to our advantage, and aim for a prolific introduction to the band. We felt that it would be interesting to break from the new-band cycle of ‘release an EP, tour for 6-12 months, release another EP’, and instead try to put something out every six months.” But the Bees are in a unique situation that encourages frequent releases; Riddle admits: “Dan, our singer, is also a producer, so we can afford to record very cheaply. If we had to hire studio and producer time, it might be a very different story.”

Two EPs into their two-year experiment, Riddle contemplates the band’s feeling toward the album format: “I tend not to think about what we’re doing in terms of working towards an album, as to me, the length is largely irrelevant. I feel that each record needs to make a statement, and to be a snapshot of where the band is at that particular time. Our third release is looking to be an 8 or 9 track record that has a more melancholy flavour. Is it an album or an EP? We don’t know, so we’ll just call it a record and let other people decide!”

When asked where he thinks the album format belongs in the future of music, Riddle is sceptical. “It’s a hard one to judge. It seems that while the physical single is dead, the digital single is now king. No one buys albums anymore, but if you look on my friends’ mp3 player, they tend to collect not just full records, but full catalogues of acts that they love. I think that the album will live on. Certainly, at least in the sense of releasing bodies of music that make various statements at different points in an act’s career. Does it mean that the length of an album will remain between 30 and 70 minutes? Maybe not. Musicians aren’t constrained by the format anymore; vinyl and plastic don’t dictate the length.” With a fourth release due around Christmas to bring the four-EP commitment to a close, what’s next for Drawn From Bees? “We’ll probably do an album. Or a greatest hits box collection, who knows?” laughs Riddle.

From a regular-release ideal to a staggered album: meet Brisbane indie rock band 26 [pictured below left], who’re midway through an ambitious project to release a twelve-track album in three-song installments every three months. After releasing two albums in the standard manner since their 2005 debut The King Must Die, singer/guitarist Nick O’Donnell explains the genesis of the concept dubbed 26×365: “We don’t sell all that many hard copies anymore, so we decided to release the next album in small portions. We were finding that people were buying singular songs rather than the whole albums off of iTunes.”

Each of the four parts to 26×365 is priced at $3.39. O’Donnell continues: “We thought maybe we could package a couple of songs together at a lower price point and you could get people buying them because they think they’re getting a bargain, as they’re getting three songs for the price of two. By April next year we’ll have the twelve songs that you can buy as a whole product, but our true fans can get the songs every three months. This allows us to introduce the songs gradually into our live set; in terms of the record, it’s like our fans are coming along for the ride.”

With the new release, the band are aiming to reduce the comparative tedium that they’ve experienced with past releases. “It’s not like the situation where the band records the whole album and they’re already already kind of over the songs; you know, you’ve already been playing the songs for a year or so. As an artist, you get to the end of the album process and the songs aren’t fresh for you, but they are for the public. So you’re pretending that they’re new to you, but they’re not.”

The band’s website further addresses the reasoning behind the project. Perhaps unwittingly, 26 have put their heads together and specified a bold manifesto for independent artists the world over. 26 state:

Unless you’re Coldplay, Metallica or Andre Rieu, the one thing a band must do is maintain momentum. Peoples’ attention span is becoming shorter and shorter, so we want to be attracting CONSISTENT attention.

The 26×365 release process will allow:

1. New material to the audience, but not so quickly that it will lose its impact.
2. Offer a time-based point of interest for the band
3. Allow the audience to see how we are progressing as a band
4. New content for an entire year, including pictures, videos, blogs, and give aways
5. New gig material for an entire year and having it ready for consumption on iTunes. No waiting for the whole album to be released.

The purpose of this article series is not to eulogise the demise of the album, or to bemoan the recording industry’s omissions. Instead, it’s to highlight that right now is a better time than ever to consider the ideal manner in which to distribute music to an artist’s fanbase. For independent artists, a direct artist-fan (one-to-one) connection may be the most appropriate business avenue. For bigger artists – the aforementioned Coldplays and Andre Rieus – a one-to-many, traditional distribution method may still be the ideal outcome. The keyword in this discussion is choice. Not only do customers now have the ability to choose how they consume music with more freedom than ever before; now, artists are privy to a wealth of release strategies, business models, digital distributors, while still retaining the option to engage in traditional physical product manufacturing and distribution.

“A lot of purists tend to complain now that an album’s artwork is gone. I think it’s really great, because what has gone is all the shit surrounding the music. You can still get the music itself, so you’re getting the purest version of the art, because it’s just the music. It’s nothing else.” – Nick O’Donnell, 26.

Brisbane-based Andrew McMillen writes for several Australian music publications. He can be found on Twitter (@NiteShok) and online at http://andrewmcmillen.com/

(Note: This is part five of an article series that first appeared in weekly Australian music industry magazine The Music Network issue #748, July 27th 2009. Read the rest of the series: part one, part two, part three, and part four)

For The Record: An Album Retrospective Part 4

In the fourth piece of a five-part puzzle, Andrew McMillen examines the digitally-inspired shift in consumer habits away from the long-established album format. This week, Andrew quits hypothesising, and instead speaks to those responsible for history’s loved and loathed albums: musicians!

In the last three weeks, we’ve indulged in much reminiscing and theorising on the value of the album format in an era of unparalleled consumer choice. “The track has been disengaged from the album!” “Artists shouldn’t automatically sprint toward the album endpoint as a result of historical programming!” “It’s easier to choose to part with around a dollar for a song you’ll love, rather than $15-20 for an unfamiliar collection!” You’re familiar with these arguments, professed from this writer’s listener/critic position. But, er – what about the artists themselves? The ones who make music? Where do they think the album belongs in 2009?

Brisbane’s Hungry Kids Of Hungary [pictured right] write hook-heavy songs that’re informed by a studious observation of the pop legends of generations past. Their two EPs have attracted radio attention, festival slots and, most recently, a Q Song award nomination. Are they treading down the pop-proven album release path? “We sure are!” replies singer/keyboardist Kane Mazlin. “We’re currently demoing and writing songs for a debut album. Like most independent bands, it’s a matter of balancing time and finance as to when we will record and release, but we’re certainly hoping to be in a studio within three months. I think it’s just a natural progression for us to put our ideas down on a long player. It will give us more scope to present ourselves more accurately, which is something we’ve only been able to touch on when creating EPs.”

No surprise, then, that the Hungry Kids are album purists. Drummer Ryan Strathie explains: “Artists put a lot into creating an album as an entire piece – a single song is only one part of the album puzzle. I think it’s crucial for an album to be experienced in full, artwork and all. For me, its just not the same without the whole package.” Strathie cautions, however: “Artists – big or small – need to take responsibility for the quality they put out. If you can’t put out 10 great songs, then don’t do an album! It’s obvious that people will still buy a record if it’s any good; too many artists maximise on a single song or a hit and put out an entire album, even if it’s not good enough.” He concludes: “People aren’t stupid, they have been burnt!”

From young upcomers to an established act: Perth’s Eleventh He Reaches London [pictured below left] have forged a respectable name for themselves at the intersection of the nation’s hard-rock, metal and hardcore communities. Their 2005 debut album The Good Fight For Harmony preceded 2009′s Hollow Be My Name, for which the five-piece received a $13,000 recording grant from the Western Australian Department Of Culture And Arts. Drummer Mark Donaldson rationalises the decision to release music in this manner: “We never really gave any thought to releasing an EP or singles, because we believe that you can get more enjoyment out of our band across an album. We wanted to release something that was quite cohesive, and had some continuity, with a good hour-long running time.”

“I’m still a huge fan of putting on an album and listening to it all the way through. It’s very rare to experience an album that you can listen to from start to finish, and not get bored. It’s very rare to experience that, and it’s one of the things you look forward to in life, as a music fan – that next band that you’ll become completely obsessed with.” When questioned about the free MP3 downloads offered on the band’s Last.FM profile, Donaldson continues: “It’s still good for people to be able to download a song in reasonable quality, just in case they are thinking about downloading the full album. Because we’ve basically arrived at the situation where you can download a song for free, get a feel for the quality of it, and then decide whether you want to waste your bandwidth on it!”

We laugh at the madness of trying to explain the rationing of 60-100 megabytes to a music fan fifteen years ago. But how does he feel about fans of the band who purport to love their music, but who’ve never bought anything from the band? “There’s no ill feelings toward those who don’t pay. What I don’t like is when people download the album, love it, but then don’t attend a show when we’re near them. That really cheeses me off, because touring is such a massive effort. You look forward to sharing the music with the audience, and that’s what playing live is all about. Being able to share your love of your songs with others.”

As co-founder of the Elefant Traks label and a renowned hip-hop artist in his own right, Sydney’s Urthboy [pictured below right] understands the record business better than most. Born Tim Levinson, his third album Spitshine is due in August 2009. He reasons: “I love the idea of the album because it allows an artist to make a little book, rather than a short chapter. I completely respect that people receive music in their preferred form, but as an artist I think the whole LP is worth holding onto. The album allows the artist to stretch out a bit, and from that perspective you’re able to tell a better story.”

It’s a valid comment, given that hip-hop song structures are perhaps more reliant on narrative than their rock counterparts. When asked about digital distribution’s effect on the album format, Levinson concedes: “It’s slowly changing people’s attitudes and expectations toward consumption of music. We’re in a transition period where albums retain a huge significance – but some signs suggest it’s disappearing. Stranger things have happened and trends don’t always result in their predicted outcome, though.”

Levinson’s position at the helm of Elefant Traks informs his optimistic wisdom. When asked whether Elefant Traks have adopted alternative release strategies to album delivery, he responds: “We’ve discussed it a lot; I want to keep open-minded about it. One of our key methods of promotion is bundling as many activities into the one ad spend. Usually this is simple: the album and the tour. We’re a record label, but we’re also a default management company – we spend money to invest in the artist who hopefully invests in themselves, and in turn helps us sell their records. Touring is not lucrative across the board – that’s an industry myth – but it forms part of the overall picture. The point I’m getting at, is that not every artist can simply put out a few songs regularly, sling ‘em to radio, excite the public’s imagination and wait for the money to roll in. There are significant costs associated with any release, whether EP or album. The public may like the freedom of picking and choosing but I don’t believe they’ve fallen out of love with the album yet. Singles aren’t for everybody, but our music industry is; there’s no use writing eulogies at this point in time.”

It’s worth reinforcing that the purpose of this column series is not to eulogise the album as a whole. Rather, it’s to highlight that digital distribution has allowed listeners to choose how they consume music, and musicians to choose how to deliver their creations to listeners. Next week, we’ll meet some artists who’re rejecting the album-release expectation in favour of innovation, and look to a bright future where musical expression isn’t necessarily confined to 10-12 tracks.

Brisbane-based Andrew McMillen writes for several Australian music publications. He can be found on Twitter (@NiteShok) and online at http://andrewmcmillen.com/

(Note: This is part four of an article series that first appeared in weekly Australian music industry magazine The Music Network issue #747, July 20th 2009. Read the rest of the series: part one, part two, part three, and part five)