Who doesn’t know Ben Folds by now? As dynamic a presence to ever wind up behind a piano, the man matches the vim with a rare breed of songwriting. He folds giddy wit and inescapable melancholy into bouncy tunes bursting with hooks and vigour. That’s just as true of his latest work, Lonely Avenue, despite all the lyrics coming from star novelist Nick Hornby (High Fidelity, About A Boy, et al). With bracing string arrangements by regular Folds collaborator Paul Buckmaster, it’s an album that never settles for simple black and white, managing to tease out more nagging complexities.
As Folds points out in our interview, several songs on Lonely Avenue have been widely misinterpreted. We give him a chance to explain below, as well as reflect on how the music industry has changed since he first made his name with Ben Folds Five.
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TheVine: You’ve used new technology like Twitter to interact with fans and break down the walls that some artists impose. Is that sort of necessary at this point?
Ben Folds: Well, I think when my career started, there was a whole mess of middlemen between the artist and the fan. To be fair, that had probably been built off a basic blueprint that had worked really well earlier on. [Like] in the ’50s, where you had A&R people who were able to read music and were really involved in the decision making and were really good at it. By the time I came along, the middlemen had proliferated and they seemed to know so much more, when obviously they didn’t. Then that fell away. So I don’t have people telling me what’s not gonna work anymore. I was told that a lot before, and it may have been right some of the time. But what the Internet and these things represent is the opportunity to do what we always did at a live show, which is just do it.
But there’s a real element of fun to it, whether you’re doing something with Chatroulette or letting fans remix songs. Or doing a fake leak of Way to Normal.
That’s part of it. I suppose, too, that before the 20th century, a musician had been someone who lived in a village somewhere and played down at the pub maybe. Or played at church or in someone’s living room. And there was some sort of involvement, from people singing along to talking to them afterwards. They were more accessible and not so mysterious probably. I think that’s all the Internet is: a bigger village. And now the middlemen have been taken out, so I don’t have people rushing in front of me going, “No video!”
Ben Folds & Nick Hornby introduce Lonely Avenue
But it cuts both ways. There’s that line of Nick’s on Lonely Avenue: “Some guy on the ’net thinks I suck”. I guess that’s the equivalent of someone throwing rotten fruit in this analogy.
I think so. You can find a living analogy for all of it. So the equivalent is, some guy from another village that’s got a mask on and doesn’t say his name, and drives by and throws a shit bomb out. And there’s no accountability for that kind of behaviour. [Laughs] Really, what Nick was saying, was that if he’s insecure enough to look at those things and want to know what people think - and that’s gonna be what tells him if he’s good or not - then he deserves what he gets when he signs on. I think a lot of people have interpreted that as skewering bloggers, when it’s actually more about the artist’s insecurity. Nick is painting a picture of someone who thinks they’re great in the morning and by the afternoon he thinks he absolutely sucks. And at night again thinks he’s great. It depends on who told him he was good. And he feels weak for that.
By the same token, people could see ‘Levi Johnston’s Blues’ as simply making fun of that guy. But I think there’s a fair bit of sympathy for him there, actually.
That’s right. That’s the way I’d prefer someone hearing it, and that’s the way I think Nick intended the lyrics. I don’t think everyone understands that the chorus is word for word what Levi put on his Myspace page. [“I’m a fucking redneck / I like to hang out with the boys / Play some hockey, do some fishing, and kill some moose / You fuck with me and I kick your ass.”] Those were his words. And Nick, as a human being, can relate to that. He remembers being 16 years old. He’s showing the divide between the bravado in the chorus and the kid who’s basically being told, “No, you’re going to marry this girl, and here’s how you’re going to do it.” He’s like, “I’m 18, I’m grown up, I can make girls pregnant!” and they’re like, “You’re 18, you can do what the fuck we tell you.” So yeah, there’s a lot of empathy in there. Back to the bloggers, I was disappointed to see how many times someone just ripped the album based on that song. It was like, “Well, it’s not cool to be mean to this guy, so your whole album sucks.” And we weren’t even being mean to him.
As a songwriter, was it weird for you to abdicate that role to Nick?
Not if it’s gonna be to Nick Hornby. I might have a problem with anybody else. [Laughs] But I really relate to him and live inside what he writes. I was very happy to have a break from the things that happen in my head. It allowed me just to be a pure musician, and that’s nice.
Did you edit his songs much, or veto certain things?
No. I mean, my veto power was whether or not to write the song. He gave me a lot of lyrics, so if it was something I wasn’t really feeling, I just wouldn’t write it. I made it clear to him - and it was true - that it wasn’t because one lyric was better than the other so much, as I could or couldn’t make music to it. It was real simple: if I picked it up and music happened instantly, then we’re on. If it was going to be a struggle and forced, then no, it wasn’t going to happen.
There are a few other songs about real people, like ‘Doc Pomus’ and ‘Saskia Hamilton’. Were you already familiar with them, or did you get this sort of education from the songs?
I didn’t know anything about [poet] Saskia Hamilton. And I didn’t know anything about [songwriter] Doc Pomus either. So yeah, I got a bit of an education. I mean, if I hang out with Nick for very long, I tend to get an education. Because he’s read and listened to more than I could ever possibly in my lifetime hope to. Some of that’s just by nature: I’m touring all the time, and his job is to read and write. And listen to music - the fucking guy knows more music than I do!
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