It's time for Beginnings, the podcast where writer and performer Andy Beckerman talks to the comedians, writers, filmmakers and musicians he admires about their earliest creative experiences and the numerous ways in which a creative life can unfold.

On today's episode, I talk to musicians Kathryn Calder and Mark Andrew Hamilton. Kathryn and Mark have been making music in different bands for years. Kathryn is a member of The New Pornographers, has released three albums under her own name and was in the indie pop group Immaculate Machine from 2003 to 2011. Similarly, Mark's primary band since the mid-aughts has been Woodpigeon, who have released over two dozen albums and EPs since their formation. After a chance meeting in the hallway of a recording studio, the two vowed to form a band together one day, and in the late 20-teens, they did just that! Their first self-titled album was released in 2018, and their latest Parade was just released last week on Oscar St. Records!

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Kathryn Calder & Mark Andrew Hamilton; Photo by Steve Calder + Eva Blue

BY JORDAN MAINZER

With Parade (Oscar St.), Frontperson has taken a leap by taking a load off. Consider the making of their debut Frontrunner. A grant from FACTOR, the Government of Canada, and Canada’s private radio broadcasters allowed Kathryn Calder (The New Pornographers) and Mark Andrew Hamilton (Woodpigeon) to record an album at the National Music Centre in Calgary, at a top-notch studio that impressed even these seasoned vets. The two had also never worked together before and were under the pressure of finishing within the timeline of the grant and the studio availability. With Parade, however, not only did the two have the experience of recording together the first time around, but they recorded leisurely, on Vancouver Island, and with an attitude much more embracing of the chaos of imperfections. They went all-out with harmonies and layers. Calder was able to write with her preferred stream-of-consciousness approach. Hamilton encouraged her to not worry too much whether her vocal takes sounded perfect. They even dabbled in musical and lyrical tropes they generally don’t like, just to see what came of them. Everything just worked.

Parade certainly sounds close to perfect, but not in a sterile way. It sports that pop feel that ascends skyward because it’s loose and not overly mathematical rather than in spite of those qualities. The synth arpeggios and layered, wordless vocal harmonies bolster the title track’s strummed guitars. “Reach Out” buzzes in bliss. “Calgary ‘88″ chugs along as Hamilton weaves in a multi-continental tale of a relationship. “Fastest” is Calder’s time to shine and remind you of her soaring vocal turns on some of your favorite latter-day New Pornographers tracks. On the flip side, there’s an acoustic track like “Tattoo Boy”, a tale of queer heartbreak. “I’m afraid of pain / Like a fear of snakes,” Hamilton sings, vulnerable and raw. No matter the mood, cheeky or sincere, Frontperson shines.

Last month, I spoke with Calder and Hamilton over Zoom from their respective homes in Victoria and Montreal. We touched on some of the “fuck it” attitude behind Parade, finding their own meaning in one another’s songs, and collaborating with other artists. Read our conversation below, edited for length and clarity.

Since I Left You: What about the title track made you want to lead the record off with it and release it as the lead single?

Mark Andrew Hamilton: The second I heard it, I knew it was the first song. I usually give Kathryn the album order and the songs aren’t even written yet, but when I heard the demo she sent, I knew it was the one. It’s the perfect Kathryn song. It makes me joyful. It felt like a good way to start, especially since we started so dark last time with maybe the darkest song I’ve ever written.

SILY: It seems like the highs are a bit higher on Parade even if the overall record isn’t necessarily sunnier.

Kathryn Calder: It seems like it. We put a whole lot of stuff on a lot of songs this time. [laughs] I don’t know if those peaks are something we consciously did, but when there are those big moments as the song is progressing, it feels right to keep going until it’s really full. You can either dial it back if it feels too full, or leave it. We chose to keep putting harmonies on it. It felt right.

MAH: I keep forgetting that the first time we recorded together was the first time we met in this crazy world-class studio. We won a residency at the National Music Centre. [It’s] not that we were tiptoeing around each other, but you have to learn how to [record] with another person. This time, we were in home base. We know each other super well. It was fun, and we trust doing crazier things more. [laughs]

KC: That makes sense. Mark was playing guitar and had idea after idea, and we’d put them on. It’s one of those things where when you start getting in a direction, [and] you just keep going.

MAH: A residency is something where you have X amount of time. This time, Kathryn’s [right now] sitting on the sofa where I watched her do amazing things for weeks. It just felt way more free--not that it didn’t feel free the first time. But I wouldn’t be embarrassed about anything. The first time, I would think, “Ooh, is [Kathryn] gonna like this?”

SILY: A song like “Fastest”, with its synth arpeggios and Kathryn’s vocals and lines like “What we feel is what we know” and “Don’t be so serious”, seems to have that looseness to it.

KC: Yes. That song in particular, I was going for that, because it’s a little bit about kids and their experience of the world. I was writing from that place, a place of childhood. I think there’s a certain amount of in-the-moment that kids are. Not all kids, but in general, it’s something where everything is very visceral and in the now and time goes on and on forever. The way I write generally is I access words stream of consciousness, so I don’t always know what I’m writing about as I’m writing, but on that one, I was thinking about childhood and recognized I was talking about those things as I was going. The carefree part of the song comes from that place. 

It was a demo, and we built on the demo, and there was a lot of influence from Mark. Where we’re different is that I can be very precise--not that it’s not intuitive or emotional--whereas Mark loves happy accidents. There’s really that influence on the record from Mark. I’ll be like, “My vocal isn’t perfect,” and he’ll say, “That sounds great. It has character.” I tend to want it to be perfect. I think you can hear that a little bit more on this record, of me thinking, “It’s cool like that! It can be a little less perfect.” 

MAH: You’re singing messy and loose. That’s cool. What I love about Kathryn’s lyrics is that more than one time when making this record, she was singing something, and I went, “What the hell does this mean?” I told you what it meant to me, and you thought, “Oh, wow!” I knew that “Fastest” is about particular children in your life, but what I love about it is that it can mean something else entirely. That’s great songwriting. What did you think about it, Jordan?

SILY: Well, the two lines I asked about stand out to me, especially, “What we feel is what we know.” It’s a strong statement about empathy, particularly in context of writing from the perspective of your experience and feelings. You may not be trying to make a statement about humanity, but in writing what you know, you end up being more universal.

KC: Yep!

SILY: What inspired you to get into the headspace of a child, Kathryn?

KC: I was thinking about my niece and nephew, who I love. I don’t know why I was thinking about them, to be honest. They’re such wonderful kids. They’re both different and are into sports, and one of them in particular is into being really fast, hence “Fastest”. I think a lot of kids are. I can’t tell you why other than I love them dearly and was just thinking about them in the context of life. That’s what I mean when I say “stream of consciousness:” I can’t tell you why. I can only tell you I was thinking about them at the time I was writing the song. That was my method for this album, and in general. I find it to be a little bit blocking if I try to think too much about what the song’s gonna be about before I write it. It gets too in my head, and I get too intellectual about it and start to overthink it.

MAH: Things come to mean stuff almost like subconscious messages to yourself, too. The two lines you pulled out, Jordan, suit how we made this record. There’s a solo in this song I think is the greatest thing ever, and Kathryn was literally just messing about. We couldn’t stop laughing about it.

SILY: Mark, when I first heard “Messy Rooms”, I thought I was actually listening to Dire Straits. Then I read that your guitars on that song were a nod to your relationship with that kind of 80′s radio rock, which you grew up hating. What’s your relationship to that music now?

MAH: Our tastes change so much. I don’t know why I thought it would be a cool experiment to use the sounds of music I really didn’t like listening to. [laughs] To me, it was just fun. That song used to be played entirely differently. I was messing around, joking that [Dire Straits-esque] was the way to play it, and Kathryn said, “This is the way to play it.” She was right. I guess it’s also a nod to think about how a lot of the music I didn’t like at that time was because my parents forced us to listen to it ad nauseum on cassette. Now that I’m older, I can see the value in it. I like those sounds now.

SILY: What’s the story behind the song “Calgary ‘88″?

MAH: I grew up in Calgary when the Winter Olympics were a big deal. I still have all of these newspaper clippings and posters. I was thinking specifically about a failed relationship of mine and how time stretches and smushes together almost to the point where I could imagine that person at the Olympics in 1988. I don’t like the use of the word “baby” in songs, so of course, this song has a lot of uses of the word “baby.” There are very specific lines in that song where if that person was to hear it, they would know exactly what I was talking about, but just like those lines in “Fastest” we were just talking about, I hope they mean something very different to someone else. So it’s about something very specific, but: None of your business! [laughs] 

I love it when people tell me what songs mean to them. We’re doing all this music for a TV series right now. I’ve worked with this director on his first feature film. In this, he has a character singing some of my songs. He wanted the lyrics, and I actually refused to send them. I said, “I want [them] to sing the words you think I’m singing.” The words they came up with are amazing, but they’re the furthest from anything ever. That sort of thing is great to me.

SILY: Kathryn, do you find it easy to generate your own meaning from Mark’s songs?

KC: Yeah. I think that I probably do. We haven’t talked about what I think his songs mean. I’m always very curious when we do talk about it, but I just interpret them and don’t talk about it with him. [laughs] Plus, I know Mark really well, so maybe I misinterpret, but I think I generally have a pretty good idea of what they’re about. I can’t say I knew that “Calgary ‘88″ was necessarily set in Calgary ‘88, but that makes sense.

MAH: Part of it is set in Europe, too. It’s all over the place.

When Kathryn sends me lyrics, I think, “Whatever Kathryn wants to sing, I want to sing, too.” 

KC: I’m like, “Great! Sounds good. I’ll put some harmonies on it.” [laughs]

SILY: The song “Ostalgie (Für C. Bischoff)” imagines two people on opposite sides of the Berlin Wall and explores the theme of both physical and mental separation. In context of today, could you imagine it in terms of not only pandemic-related separation but political separation? 

MAH: I wouldn’t say I was interested in any sort of political statement. I don’t intend to glorify or romanticize something that was terrible for people for a long time and use it for a love song. Originally, the song was called “Germany to Germany”, and Günter Grass wrote a book about how the two sides wanted to reunite for so long and when it finally happened, they didn’t want each other anymore. You have this idea of “Ostalgie” which is the idea that life was better before, which a lot of people feel in East Germany. The song is not necessarily about walls, even though we came out of a couple years of people chanting, “Build that wall.”

I think I’ve written one song ever that was meant to be political. Here, I was just using it more as an example or a nod. It affected my family. Members of my family had relatives they didn’t get to see because of the wall and died shortly before the wall came down. It’s almost like a Cold War thriller or noir that uses it as a setting. I definitely started thinking about the song the last time I was in Berlin, but I wouldn’t say it’s necessarily about it. Again: None of your business, Jordan! [laughs]

This music was made before COVID, but we were also separated for a while because of COVID. One of those things that reveals itself to be true.

SILY: Are you playing live any time soon?

KC: We don’t really have any plans to do that. Mark is in Montreal, I’m in Victoria, and I just had a baby. But I’m sure we will at some point. It’s always fun to get together and play.

MAH: All the bands I know who are on tour, about 80% of them have cancelled shows due to COVID. Even Mitski [recently] played in Montreal, and [then] the rest of the tour was cancelled because someone came down with it. It’s hard to plan something like that with the shadow hanging over. If we wanted to be completely safe, too, either one of us would have to fly to the other side of the country, quarantine for a few days, and bubble together. How do you do that right now?

SILY: While the larger touring acts can afford their own medical professional to test them every day, for everyone else, there’s so much risk involved. Bands have to tour to make money, but the potential for cancellation makes it so risky. It seems like a lot of people are just playing hometown shows so at least if they do get it, they’re just at home and not on tour.

MAH: I went to two concerts over the weekend. I saw Low one night and Nick Cave the next night. The next day, I couldn’t get out of bed. It was great. [But] a friend of mine’s husband is in a very very big band who is touring right now. The way it’s described to me is like military camp. There’s no backstage. There’s no interaction between the band and anybody else. The busses pull up to the door they go in. They’re not allowed to go to restaurants or clubs or see friends in those cities. These are big shows to tens of thousands of people. They’re terrified all the time. I don’t want to tour scared. I want it to be fun.

SILY: Do either of you have a favorite song on the record?

MAH: One I can listen to a lot is “Reach Out”. I love how it keeps going. It feels like either 2 or 20 minutes long, and I love that about it.

KC: I really love “Ostalgie”. It has such a beautiful vibe and atmosphere. It always makes me smile.

SILY: Did you release the remix of “Reach Out” before the original?

MAH: Yeah, that’s a thing.

SILY: Like the last record, each single release is like its own EP, with remixes of various songs on the record. What role do the remixes play within the story of Parade?

MAH: I just love hearing how other musicians hear things. When you’re inside a record so much--and I know this record inside-out--it’s cool to hand it somewhere and say, “Here are all the pieces we made.” The “Reach Out” remix is by Devours, this amazing Vancouver musician. I’m more curious what Kathryn thinks of this one. I’m usually like, “Here’s a remix!”

KC: Like what you were talking about, Mark, with hearing how people interpret lyrics, it’s fun to hear what people think [musically,] because it’s usually different. It’s the same when we have collaborators come in and work on songs. I love other people putting ideas on things because they’re usually choices I wouldn’t make because I’m in my brain and my brain does things a certain way. When you give a song to somebody really talented and it comes back as this crazy sounding remix in a beautiful way, it’s really fun. That’s truly it.

Mark was like, “Is this weird we’re putting out the remix of ‘Reach Out’ before the original?” I was like, “I don’t know. Is it? Let’s do it.” The grand scheme of the album release cycle is so short, for most of [the remix’s] life, the album will be out [too].

MAH: I can’t think of a time I heard the remix of a song first and listened to the original after, but why not?

KC: We’re not precious.

Frontperson – Ostalgie (Für C. Bischoff)

Download Frontperson – Ostalgie (Für C. Bischoff) MP3 DOWNLOAD Veteran Singer, Frontperson has released new hip-hop joint, “Ostalgie (Für C. Bischoff)“. Frontperson latest entry, “Ostalgie (Für C. Bischoff)” is a mid-tempo record that received a million of streams across platforms. However, the song is here to get you entertained. Listen & Download Ostalgie (Für C. Bischoff) Mp3 Download by…

Frontperson