It’s been 21 years since Kim Deal formed The Breeders, but unlike other acts—including the Pixies, featuring Deal herself—the band isn’t touring for the anniversaries of old records yet. Fate to Fatal, the group’s latest EP, was released in April and has all of the hazy melody and sweet, flat vocals that have characterized the group since 1990’s Pod. And while some of us might always think of the 1993 hit “Cannonball,” Deal herself is more interested in where the band is going than where it’s been. Talking from her van, pulled to the side of the road in Effingham, Indiana, Deal dished about screening her own covers, using a four-track and liking Pavement despite Stephen Malkmus’ big mouth. You’ve been on the road for a few days now, how’s the tour going so far?
We’re heading somewhere and I can’t remember where! So far, so good. The two shows that we’ve done sound good—they’re selling OK. I live in Dayton, Ohio so I don’t know…I was talking to some people in Indianapolis and it’s the same thing there—they like their country music. Although Deerhunter came through with No Age and Dan Deacon and that show did really well.
From what I’ve heard, you did a lot of four-track recording for the new EP.
I’ve been using a four-track since they came into fashion. They’re harder to find now because it’s all digital…It’s weird, my car died this year and when I went out to get another car, I would ask to get one with a cassette player to replace it and people would be like [laughs like a maniac]. But it sure sounds good, doesn’t it? We ended up releasing it [that way], which was new for me. I always thought that if I wanted to do that, then why sell it? I should just give it away. If it’s solely low-key and casual, why make it a product?
This is the first time I’ve actually used something from a four-track and it’s because music is free, so why does it matter?
What’s the appeal of a more DIY approach for the new Breeders record?
We’ve always done that sort of thing. This EP does vary—one song in particular [“Fate to Fatal”] we practiced during sound checks in Australia last year and it was sounding good so we booked a 24-track studio in London. We played it, mixed it and finished it up the next night. For the Wailers song [“Chances Are”], me and Kelley drove to Chicago to see Steve Albini’s studio. We played it beginning to end and he just miced us. “Pinnacle Hollow” was recorded on four track, but the one [Mark] Lanegan is on [“The Last Time”] was completely on ProTools. For this one we run the gamut: it used to be that I would never touch ProTools, but it’s beginning not to bother me so much because music is free now because it’s hard to load everybody into the car and have them quit their jobs and drive up to a studio to record it on tape.
Are you into digitally releasing music? Would you ever do something akin to Beck’s Record Club project?
That’s cute and seems like fun but I don’t really know how to add information to the website we have. It’s like Euchre: It sounds like fun for someone who can actually do it, but I can’t. I can make something but I can’t share it. That’s why we’re pressing it on vinyl instead of giving it away; at least I know who to go to for that.
You’re the only person who’s been a constant in the Breeders. What’s the songwriting process like with the band now?
Jose the drummer will bring in a beat and we’ll mess around with that, but usually it’s me fucking around with the four track and sometimes it will start with a lyric line or with an instrumental melody line. Bringing in the original ideas to do the songs, it’s pretty much just me, but they collaborate on parts. It’s hard to write for a singer, so… although I like the fact that we try to do covers still. I thought that all the good people always did covers, it was just part of being an entertainer. We’re not entertainers, but I like to do covers. We do “Chances Are,” the Wailers song. The Stones and Beatles always did covers.
You formed the band in 1988 and were playing out when the alternative craze broke. Did you feel like you were part of something bigger than just your band?
I never really understood what that was. I remember the things happening at the time… It’s like when people think of me, they remember their childhood or favorite summer, so they expect that I would have the same sort of thing. Kelley says its like if you go to a vacation and stay at a really great hotel and remember it fondly, but to ask the bartender if he remembers that. We were working the whole time, so it seems. It’s like, ‘Oh! They have fond memories of the summer they heard 'Last Splash' on the radio and do I have a fondness for their summer?’
I dated this guy who worked at Spin magazine right around that time and I began to understand the relationship between things. The word alternative music came from marketing. People started calling it alternative music and it became fashionable. What I’m saying is that if Spin put the world alternative on its cover, then the advertisers knew that they would be reaching people with this phrase…like hip-hop or grunge.
Are there still records from that period that you listen to? What about new groups?
I like Micachu & The Shapes. If one of the Pavement CDs is sitting around, I’ll throw that on. Though some of it has lost its luster because of [Malkmus’] chatty mouth. I was looking at Bikini Kill the other day on YouTube and it reminded me that I always like Kathleen Hanna’s voice. She could reach these notes…Bikini Kill and Amps toured with Sonic Youth, so we were playing with them. I like the register she throws her voice at.
You were really involved with the packaging of the Fate to Fatal EP, what were some of the tough decisions you made?
I don’t have a good visual eye—I pretty much like anything. At the time we didn’t even know [Pixies boxed set] Minotaur was being done. When we were hand-screening our EP, I didn’t know.
> The Breeders
Aug. 18 & Aug. 19, Bowery Ballroom, 6 Delancey St. (betw. Chrystie St. & Bowery), 212-533-2111; 8, $25.
