20 or so questions for Robert McCreedy ex of the Volebeats

WHERE WERE YOU BORN, WHERE DID YOU GROW UP?

I was born in Detroit, Michigan and grew up on the west side of the city.

WHAT IS YOUR EARLIEST MUSICAL MEMORY?

Listening to CKLW out of windsor, ontario (Canada) in the backseat of my
parent's 1967 Pontiac station wagon .


WHAT WAS THE FIRST RECORD YOU OWNED?

Hard to say since my father owned a record store and my house was full of
45s and LPs.  I guess I always owned records.


WHEN AND WHERE WAS YOUR FIRST PERFORMANCE?


Marsh Elementary school.  I played trumpet in the school band.


HOW DID THE VOLEBEATS COME TO LIFE

Jeff Oakes and I formed a band called the Frames in the early 1980s.  We
wrote and recorded about 20 or 30 songs together, which we never released.
After it broke up, the drummer Terry Rohm, Jeff Oakes and his brothers Al and
Brian continued on in the band which they renamed, the Volebeats.  They recruited
Rebecca Kaplan, high school chum Matt Smith on guitar, and made their first
album (Ain't No Joke) in the late 1980s.  Then I was asked to rejoin the
band and we worked together on the Up North album.  The collaboration continued
through the 1990s.


WHY DID YOU WALK AWAY

I wanted to try a different approach and i was drawn to minneapolis because
of the music scene.


WHAT WAS HOLLYWOOD LIKE AND HOW DID THAT COME ABOUT

I don't know.  I wasn't invited, but i'm sure it was lovely.  The Voles did
lip-sync to my song, however.  Apparently, Steve Martin or someone in his
organization was a fan of the Volebeat's "Sky and the Ocean" album and he
had the producer track down the band to perform "Two Seconds" in a scene in the
movie with Claire Danes.  When the producer found out I wrote the song and had
originally performed it with the band, he was apologetic.


WHO IS THE SINGLE BIGGEST MUSICAL INFLUENCE ON YOUR WORK?

I don't have one big influence, but here's a list...gordon lightfoot, jimmy
webb, the beatles, nick lowe, johnny cash, marty stuart, bob seger, steve
earle....i could go on.



WHAT IS THE MOST MEMORABLE CONCERT YOU'VE ATTENDED?

Dizzy Gillespie at a high school auditorium in 1976.  I got to meet him
backstage.


WHAT IS THE WORST JOB YOU'VE EVER HAD?


Swinging a hammer in the San Francisco Bay area for a construction company.
I was in a crawl space under a house during a sizable tremor.



WHAT IS THE BEST JOB YOU'VE EVER HAD?

Working at the family record shop.  It's where I got my musical education.



WHO IS YOUR FAVOURITE ARTIST (ALL MEDIA)?

Let's see...Vargas left an impression at an early age...but, I'd have to say
Van Gogh.


 WHAT IS YOUR ALL-TIME FAVOURITE BOOK

Hiroshima by John Hersey.



WHICH IS YOUR FAVOURITE INSTRUMENT?

Hammond B-3.



WHAT IS YOUR FAVOURITE SONG YOU'VE WRITTEN?


Music Box (instrumental) on the Volebeats Solitude album.



WHAT IS THE FAVOURITE SONG SOMEONE ELSE HAS WRITTEN?

Today it's Come Together by the Beatles.   (I was just listening to Abbey
Road.)


TELL US ABOUT THE NEW ALBUM AND THE COLLABORATION

It was a one-week, whirlwind experiment with Tim Bracken from Baltimore, a
fellow that Jim Reynolds introduced me to.  Tim and I hung out for a little
while in Nashville rubbing shoulders at the Bluebird and writing songs at a
crappy hotel outside the city before we went to Jim's studio in Vermont to lay it
down.  Then we wrote more songs in the studio and played most of the
instruments ourselves.  Jim recorded the album and invited JD Foster (Dwight
Yoakam/Richard Buckner) to go up to Vermont to play on a few songs and mix
the album.  Jim put it together like a week at summer camp.  It was fun.

CAN SONGWRITING BE TAUGHT OR IS IT A GOD-GIVEN TALENT?

I think formulas can be taught, but there's definitely a spiritual investment
beyond that.


WHAT SINGLE THING HAS HELPED YOU MOST IN YOUR CAREER?


Being in the Volebeats.


WHAT SINGLE THING HAS HINDERED YOUR CAREER?


Being in the Volebeats.


WHAT'S YOUR FAVOURITE DRINK?

Mexican Beer in the summer and Guinness in the winter.


WHO'S YOUR FAVOURITE POLITICIAN?

Paul Wellstone. (US Senator from Minnesota who died in a plane crash a few
years back.)


( THE ADVERT) IN LESS THAN 100 WORDS DESCRIBE YOUR LATEST DISC

Perfect world music with lots of interesting flaws....I dunno.

 WHAT COMES AFTER THIS?

I just started recording a new album in Minneapolis in Mark Stockert's
studio.  It's working title is "shade."  I'm recruiting a lot of my local
friends to play on it (Eric, Jimmy and Mick from Bellwether, Jimmy Johnson, and a cast
of local derelects and drinking buddies).   Here are some of the song
titles: Castle, Frisbee, This Time Around, Just In Time....  I'm approaching the
recording as if I were making a half dozen 45's.