Hi, Dan! Emoticon is your 12th solo album, which is an amazing milestone. Looking back from where you started to now, does releasing a new record feel completely different than it used to, or do you still get that same rush when you hit ‘publish’?
A: I get a rush seeing my albums published because they come from nothing, and then here they are. Usually however, there’s a song or two that I regret something about but it’s too late to change it. Mostly, it has to do with mixing details where I think I may have made a wrong decision. On this album, I think I panned the rhythm guitar track on Collateral Damage too far to the center, so it’s now too pronounced in the mix. On my prior album Harmonia I think I mixed the bass guitar too low on the second song, If You Don’t Have A Heart. I know afterthought ruminations sound kind of silly, and I don’t obsess about them, but I’m my biggest critic.
The track listing kicks off with ‘Comfort Food’. Everyone has their own definition of what comfort food is—whether it’s music, a favorite meal, or a cozy spot. What made you want to open the record with that concept?
A: I went back and forth on this a few times and finally decided that Comfort Food was probably the easiest song to listen to musically speaking, and it has a nice warm message. The songs I write that are uplifting like this are therapy for myself because they put me in a pleasant mood when I listen to them. That includes this one, as well as Garden and Laugh About It. I’ve written other happy uplifting songs on prior albums, such as Spin the World Around, El Dorado, and Love in the Air.
This album spans a whole mix of styles—everything from piano pop and folk to progressive rock and psychedelia. When you start writing a track, do you usually know what vibe it’s going to turn into, or do you just improvise and let the song wander where it wants?
A: Good question. It all depends on what sparks my writing on any individual day. Sometimes, I listen to a genre of music I really like and decide that I want to write a song in that genre. For example, listening to Pink Floyd’s first album one day motivated me to write Garden. Like the Floyd album, Garden has this child-like psychedelic vibe. Sometimes I start with a lyric theme or chorus idea that pops into my head, then build a song around it. An example of that is Will I See the Light, which conjured up a whole lot of reflections about what happens after death. And sometimes I start with a bass and drum rhythmic groove and build from there. The song Emoticon started that way.
You brought in Ian Zalles on the track ‘Rapids’. What was the dynamic like collaborating together on that song compared to working solo in the studio?
A: Ian is my son. We play together a lot. He’s an amazing pianist with a great ear. We occasionally do gigs together. I ask him to collaborate with me on songs that I know would be really enhanced by his virtuoso playing. Ian and I put out an EP a while back called Instrumentals. It includes four songs he plays on: We Be, Serendipity, Stream of Conscience, and Nervous Freedom. He wrote Rapids improvising on his piano and I helped him finish it. When we play gigs, we do all these songs. Ian loves progressive rock and Rapids fits into that genre. I also sometimes do my own piano parts, but only when I’m looking for simplicity. A song with my piano playing is the jazzy number Nice and Easy. It’s a fun challenge for me to sometimes do my own piano parts, even though I know Ian could easily play them too and probably much better than I.
You’ve mentioned before that Beatles-era songwriting and self-taught, convention-breaking instincts play a huge role in how you approach music. Were there any specific artists or classic albums you were listening to a lot while putting Emoticon together?
A: I mentioned the Pink Floyd album, which is called Piper At the Gates of Dawn, as inspiration for Garden. Before I wrote Split the Difference, I was listening to Deliver Your Children, a Wings song that has a very distinctive flamenco style guitar. 1950’s and 60’s small combo jazz inspired Nice and Easy. I was inspired by some of the more restrained jazz of that era by people like McCoy Tyner, Herbie Hancock and Duke Ellington, when he put his big band aside and recorded small combo albums. Asleep at the Wheel’s Texas swing inspired Who’s the Bigger Victim. Folky harmony ballads by Crosby Stills and Nash inspired Laugh About It.
Titles like ‘Who’s the Bigger Victim,’ ‘Collateral Damage,’ and ‘I Don’t Get It Anymore’ carry some pretty intriguing, observational weight. Are these songs coming from personal reflections, or are you looking out at the world and poking a little fun at human nature?
A: Collateral Damage is a personal reflection and a protest song. It has a simple message. I don’t ever want to be killed or injured or left homeless in a war or other act of violence and it dismays me that too often we just ignore or dismiss this sort of atrocity as “oh well, stuff happens.” With an underlying seriousness, Who’s the Bigger Victim pokes fun at how self-professed declarations of victimhood could lead to a ludicrous contest. When people feel like they’re victims, it becomes tempting to channel their energies into grievances rather than look to how they can improve themselves. I’m not saying there aren’t genuine victims out there, just that victimhood can be a rabbit hole that leads to hate, scapegoating, and resentment rather than improvement. On a similar theme is Split the Difference, a broad reflection about futility of confrontation and how just walking away from that can be liberating. I hope that lawyers and their clients listen to it. A couple of others are purely personal but listeners may see connections to themselves. On I Don’t Get It Anymore, I reflect about feeling more out of touch with what’s happening in pop culture as I get older. It was inspired by how I feel when I’m with my kids and they mention celebrities or movies or products I’ve never heard of. On Master, I started with the concept of how goofy I look when I try to force a smile during photo-taking and built it into a song that pokes fun at insecurity and conformity
Speaking of the title track, Emoticon is such a modern term for how we communicate feelings digitally today. Why did that feel like the right umbrella theme or title for this collection of songs?
A. Emoticon is the latest in a line of songs I’ve written about technology and its impacts on our humanity. These include Virtuality, The System Crashed, Email Hell, Quantize Me, Disembodied Voice, and Automate Yourself. All of these are on prior albums. I actually don’t use emoticons/emojis much but I caricatured myself for the song to make a point. I thought that this theme would be good as a counterweight to the whole idea of writing lyrics, with real words expressing real thoughts and feelings rather than relying on manufactured images.
You track and produce a lot of your own music, handling everything from guitar and bass to trumpet and vocals. When you’re sitting in the studio wearing every hat at once, how do you decide when a track is finally finished and ready to leave the room?
A: I iterate a lot on my songs, and doing everything myself allows me the freedom and luxury to do this. For example, I may start with a beat, or a verse, or a chorus, and then decide I need a bridge, or a solo. Listening to the existing bits inspires what would fit next. By doing everything myself, I can compose, arrange, and produce songs whenever I want, for as long as I want, and for no cost (unless of course you count the electricity I use running my laptop).
Living in Salt Lake City surrounded by the Wasatch Mountains, does the environment around you bleed into the mood or pacing of your songwriting, or do you find you’re in your own world once you start playing?
A: I moved to Salt Lake City four years ago from the San Francisco Bay Area to be near my son and daughter, who moved here shortly before that. The main boost I got for my musical productivity then was the fact that my new house has a lot more space for my studio. And then there is the fact that where I live is very beautiful and I’m a great nature lover. Garden was inspired by that beauty, as were some songs from prior albums – Up In Neff’s Canyon, Snowfall, and Mountain Jig.
One thing that really comes through in your music is that you write purely for the love and joy of creating. When someone puts on Emoticon for the first time from start to finish, what do you hope they take away from the experience?
A: Just like when people listened to Beatles albums like Revolver or Abbey Road and they grooved on the eclecticism but also recognized and appreciated that the distinctive Beatles singing and instrumentation was the connective tissue, I hope they take my music that way. I also hope that listeners get something out of the lyrics. And I hope that they listen to the whole album rather than bits and pieces.
To wrap things up, Dan—now that Emoticon is officially out in the world, what’s next for you for the rest of this year? Are you taking a breath, diving straight back into writing, or putting energy into videos and playing live?
A: I’ve started on a new song for a new album and I also spend time gigging. I have four gigging musical projects: a rock band called The Greytones, an Americana band The Scoop, gigs that I do solo, and gigs I do with Ian. Knowing how audiences like to hear songs they already know, I mix familiar covers with originals. I usually play guitar at gigs, but sometimes I play bass. I may make some more videos too. Stay tuned. Visit my website to keep up – danzallesmusic.com
Listening to songs so you don’t have to! Just kidding :D, you totally should. Music blogger by day, nurse by night
