Episode 1623 - Will Oldham

Summary

WTF with Marc Maron – Episode 1623: A Deep Dive with Will Oldham

In Episode 1623 of the WTF with Marc Maron podcast, host Marc Maron engages in a profound and revealing conversation with the enigmatic musician and actor, Will Oldham, widely recognized by his stage name, Bonnie Prince Billy. Released on March 6, 2025, this episode delves into Oldham's extensive career, creative processes, personal relationships, and philosophical musings on art and authenticity.

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1. Introduction to Will Oldham

Marc Maron opens the episode by expressing his long-standing admiration for Will Oldham, highlighting Oldham's prolific output as Bonnie Prince Billy with over two dozen studio albums, including his latest release, Purple Bird. Maron also touches upon Oldham's acting career, recalling his haunting portrayal of the child preacher in John Sayles' film Mate Juan.

Marc Maron [00:10]: "Bonnie Prince Billy is one of those guys, not unlike some of the other Drag City artists, who just are very prolific, put out a lot of work and a lot of it is great."

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2. Navigating the Artist’s Dual Path: Music and Acting

Oldham shares insights into balancing his dual careers in music and acting. He reflects on how his early acting roles influenced his musical journey, emphasizing the importance of expressing truth through both mediums.

Will Oldham [26:27]: "I have no idea what anybody notices or thinks... It's really exciting."

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3. Collaborative Creativity and Recording in Nashville

A significant portion of the conversation centers on Oldham's collaborative spirit, particularly his work with Matt Sweeney on the Superwolf project. Oldham discusses the dynamic of working within the Nashville music system, praising the efficiency and professionalism of its session musicians.

Will Oldham [22:18]: "It's so amazing. It was just so amazing. First time experience I had done a thing."

Oldham elaborates on the structured yet spontaneous environment of Nashville recordings, where albums can be produced swiftly without sacrificing artistic integrity.

Will Oldham [23:01]: "People thought it was pop country, you know, back then. But to Ferg's ears, and probably to mine, we did not make a country record."

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4. Personal Anecdotes and Artistic Influences

The dialogue transitions into personal stories, including Oldham’s relationship with his mother, an artist who profoundly influenced his creative path. He recounts how his mother's intense and private artistry inspired him to channel his emotions and experiences into his music.

Will Oldham [31:41]: "That's the last thing she was able to. That's the last piece of art she made. It's the front cover of that record."

Maron reminisces about his interactions with Oldham, particularly a poignant moment when Oldham shared his life story during a late-night dinner in Nashville, revealing the personal struggles that shaped his artistry.

Marc Maron [56:32]: "He fucking tells me his life story... It was heartbreaking because it was all about this mythic battle with his father."

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5. The Creative Process: From Songwriting to Recording

Oldham delves into his songwriting process, emphasizing the disciplined approach he adopts during writing and revision phases. He discusses the organic nature of his music creation, where spontaneous ideas are continuously refined and reimagined.

Will Oldham [19:07]: "There's like, periods that are writing periods and then periods that are revision periods... And the revision periods are longer than the writing period."

The conversation highlights Oldham's dedication to authentic expression, where every line and melody is meticulously crafted to convey genuine emotion and storytelling.

Will Oldham [25:10]: "I sit in the corner, play the song on a guitar for the keyboard player, Mike Rojas. He writes down the progression."

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6. Reflections on Art, Authenticity, and Community

Both Maron and Oldham explore the philosophical aspects of creating art, discussing the need for truth and authenticity in their work. They touch upon the role of community and collaboration in sustaining creativity and maintaining a sense of humanity within their artistic endeavors.

Will Oldham [25:43]: "Everything about it is super raw... I think it's a really good record that we've made."

Maron shares his newfound understanding of acting as an artistic pursuit of truth, inspired by conversations with legendary actors like Al Pacino, drawing parallels between acting and music in their shared quest for genuine expression.

Marc Maron [38:15]: "The idea of acting was really, for him, it was an artistic pursuit of truth... [I] think that was the trickiest part."

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7. Legacy and Influence: Shaping Future Generations

Throughout the episode, Oldham reflects on his influence within the music and acting communities. He speaks passionately about mentoring younger artists and fostering meaningful collaborations that push the boundaries of conventional artistry.

Will Oldham [61:35]: "Every time... And have community, too. Urgent community. Urgent collaboration."

Maron echoes this sentiment, acknowledging the importance of surrounding oneself with like-minded creatives who inspire growth and evolution in their craft.

Marc Maron [61:34]: "You get something new out of yourself when you're in relation with other people. Every time."

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8. Conclusion: Celebrating Purple Bird and Future Endeavors

As the conversation wraps up, Maron lauds Oldham's latest album, Purple Bird, appreciating its emotional depth and intricate production. Oldham expresses gratitude for the opportunity to share his journey and creative processes with Maron, leaving listeners with a sense of admiration for his enduring artistry.

Will Oldham [77:33]: "I think it's actually getting a place for my songs. Brain. No, my brain, My consciousness. To go instead."

Marc Maron [78:18]: "We did all right. We did good."

Maron concludes by promoting Oldham's new album, encouraging listeners to explore his expansive body of work.

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Notable Quotes

• Marc Maron [00:10]: "Bonnie Prince Billy is one of those guys, not unlike some of the other Drag City artists, who just are very prolific, put out a lot of work and a lot of it is great."

• Will Oldham [22:18]: "It's so amazing. It was just so amazing. First time experience I had done a thing."

• Marc Maron [38:15]: "The idea of acting was really, for him, it was an artistic pursuit of truth... [I] think that was the trickiest part."

• Will Oldham [61:35]: "Every time... And have community, too. Urgent community. Urgent collaboration."

• Marc Maron [78:18]: "We did all right. We did good."

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Final Thoughts

This episode stands out as a testament to Will Oldham's unwavering commitment to his art and his ability to navigate the complexities of creative expression. Through candid discussions and heartfelt reflections, Maron and Oldham offer listeners an intimate glimpse into the life of a multifaceted artist dedicated to authenticity and collaborative creativity.

For those unfamiliar with Oldham's work, this conversation serves as an enriching introduction, highlighting the depth and breadth of his artistic endeavors. Whether you're a long-time fan or a newcomer, Episode 1623 provides valuable insights into the mind of Bonnie Prince Billy and the enduring power of genuine self-expression in art.

Transcript

[Marc Maron]

Hey, folks, I need your questions. I'm getting ready for another Ask Mark anything bonus episode on the full Marin, so fire away. Just click on the link in the episode description and send me a question. Then subscribe to the full Marin so you can get every Ask Mark anything bonus episode. All right, let's do the show. Lock the gate. All right, let's do this. How are you? What the. What the Buddies? What the Nicks? How's it going? I'm Mark Marin. This is my podcast. Wtf. Welcome to it. Are you all right out there? Wow. Right? Every day. Holy. I'm dealing. I'm doing okay today. I try to stay engaged, entertained, self aware. I try to allot myself about, not even intentionally about, I don't know, two to three hours of relentless, catastrophic thinking and panic a day. And then I actually exhaust myself and it frees me up to do other things. I don't know if that's a healthy process or spiritual or practical. It just seems to be something that happens, that exhausted peace of mind. But look, today on the show, I talked to Will Oldham. Now, this guy, he's been on my periphery for a long time, man. You may know him as Bonnie Prince Billy. He records under that name for most of his stuff. He's put out more than two dozen studio albums and the latest is called Purple Bird. He's also an actor who's been in movies like the Bike Riders with Wendy and Lucy and Old Joy, but also Mate Juan, remember John Sayles and Will Oldham as a kid, actually played the child preacher in that. And it's a performance that before I never. I found out that he was that guy years later, after I knew about or I'd heard about or listened to Bonnie Prince Billy. Because that role when he was a kid as that preacher kid was haunting and intense and menacing. He's a fundamental part of that movie. And he's like, I don't know. I talked to him about it. I can't remember how old he said he was, but probably under 20, you know, and it was memorable. But now Bonnie Prince Billy is one of those guys, not unlike some of the other drag city artists that label, who just are very prolific, put out a lot of work and a lot of it is great. I don't even know how you'd really classify Will. I guess there's a folk element, but he's not beyond doing kind of rock ish records, and he's not beyond collaborating with people from other types of music. And he's quite the artist, this guy. And And I was a little. I don't know if I was nervous talking to him, but I'd met him once before and I felt like there was a tension there. But I can create that with anybody. And not even in the moment, totally in my head. But I didn't know if we would get along. He had done some musical work with a guy I know, him and Matt Sweeney did that amazing record, Superwolf. And that's where I sort of. I'd gotten the Bonnie Prince Billy records before, and I'd listened to them here and there. But the Superwolf record really kind of blew my mind. And I talked to Sweeney about that. But then I just started getting into Will and into Bonnie Prince Billy. And there's a lot of really lyrically and musically beautiful work with a lot of different types of musicians. And so when the opportunity came up to talk to him, I did. I had this conversation that you'll hear today. And it's a very. It's pro art, it's pro self expression, it's pro poetry, it's pro finding your voice in what you do. It's pro community. It's all those things that we still have to believe are important to maintain humanity and civilization the best we can. Communicating through expression and art and engagement. Can you dig it? Can you dig it? It's a good conversation. I'm glad we met. He actually came out to see me down in Louisville when I was there, because that's where he lives, him and his wife and some friends. And they're kind of like rural groovy, you know what I mean? Tonight I'm in Oklahoma City at the Tower Theater. Tomorrow night I'm in Dallas at the Majestic Theater. Saturday I'm in Houston at the White Oak Music Hall. And Sunday I'm in San Antonio at the Empire Theater. Then Durham, North Carolina. I'll be at the Carolina Theater of Durham on Friday, March 21st. Charlotte, North Carolina. I'm at the Knight Theater on Saturday, March 22nd. And I'll be in Charleston, South Carolina, at the Charleston Music hall on Sunday, March 23rd. Then I'm coming to Illinois, Michigan, Toronto, Vermont, New Hampshire and New York City for my special taping. Go to wtfpod.com tour for all my dates and links to tickets. All right. In uncertain times, folks, people look for peace of mind and a sense of security wherever they can find them. With simplisafe. Millions of Americans enjoy greater security and peace of mind every time they arm their system. When they head out each morning or when they lock up each night. We've been using Simplisafe for almost a decade and they always provide the best, most up to date methods of protecting your home. Traditional security systems only take action after someone has already broken in. But Simplisafe's Active Guard Outdoor Protection can help prevent break ins before they happen. With AI powered cameras and live professional monitoring agents, there's always someone keeping watch over your property to detect suspicious activity. If someone's lurking around or doing something they shouldn't, those agents see and talk to them in real time. Hey buddy, get away from the hedges right now. Head to SimpliSafe.com WTF to get the best value in home security. WTF? Listeners get 50% off their new SimpliSafe system with professional monitoring and their first month [e-mail] WTF that's SimpliSafe.com WTF for 50% off, there's no safe like Simplisafe. So what's going on? You guys watching the shows? Are you watching the shows? Are you watching the White Lotus? Are you watching the Severance? Or am I kind of pigeonholing myself into a bubble of people that watch those shows? I don't know what everybody watches, but I also rewatched A Face in the Crowd. If you got Criterion again, is this a bubble? Am I in a bubble of people that do this? A Face in the Crowd is on Criterion channel. Now. This is a, I believe it's a Bud Schulberg script. It's Ilya Kazan directing, and it's Andy Griffith from the Andy Griffith Show. You know, if you've ever watched reruns of that, I don't know how old you are. I mean, I never saw it originally. It's really old. But he's, he was just sort of a shucks guy, you know, on the Sheriff and Don Knotts was on there and a little Ron Howard. And it was kind of a nice, simple life, kind of, you know, you know, kind of goofy but not menacing. But A Face in the Crowd is one of the best movies about show business ever. And specifically about the sort of megalomaniacal celebrity and the impact of that. It was a different culture and a different, certainly a different business in the way it operated back then. But, but the movie, it's menacing Griffith, it's evil Griffith, it's Griffith, Andy Griffith, the human monster that you understand and get. So the character is genius. You gotta watch it. I told Nate Bargetsi to watch it because I think he'd enjoy it. It's Funny. Cause I was talking to Nate and I was like, you like Andy Griffith? He's like, of course I love Andy Griffith. I'm like, you ever seen evil Andy Griffith? Well, I want Nate to watch it just because there's a moral lesson in it about show business. Look at where this can go when you get huge. I guess it was a little passive aggressive, but it was. I think it was a friendly and honest thing to do. But I would recommend that movie to anybody while it's out, because it's not one of those movies you can find easily. I guess you can if you're looking for it. But it's right there on Criterion. And it's about a guy, you know, just kind of a. Is the word itinerant? He was a. Just a drifter, a drunky drifter with a guitar in a jail cell. And some local reporter in Arkansas, Patricia Neal, is doing a radio show of people telling their stories about their lives. And she goes into this jail and interviews Andy Griffith's character, who's called Lonesome Rhodes. I think his name's Larry. And he's just such a charming kind of yarn spinning, you know, kind of a rural character. And it's just about from that moment where they talk in that jail cell and people respond to him on the radio. His kind of journey through stardom to becoming the biggest star, seemingly in the country. And then one of his sponsors wants to maneuver him and his charm into helping a politician get elected president. And then it's just sort of the Meg maniacal character versus his new power and what he does with it and can he handle it. And there's a genius kind of, I think might be the first performance of Lee Remick. And Walter Matthau plays a writer. And it is such an amazing and thorough examination of fame and demagoguery through celebrity. That there. That exists. It might be the best one. So I recommend watching that fucking thing. But then again, I'm in show business and I feel like I have to watch it every few years just to make sure I understand the world I run in. All right, so look, Will Oldham is Bonnie Prince Billy. There's a new Bonnie Prince Billy album, the Purple Bird. It's now available wherever you get music. This is me talking to Will Oldham. I'm just, like, getting over a minor trauma that happened just minutes before he got here. I was putting some honey on a cracker with peanut butter on it, and I just cleaned out the top of Dr. Bronner's All In One, soaked to get The. You know, the. When it solidifies in the top.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

I guess some of that was on my finger and I assumed it was honey. And I took a nice hit of lavender. Dr. Bronner's. All in one.

[Will Oldham]

Gross.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah, but it. I felt like it was going to be healthy in the long run. I didn't feel like it was going to hurt me.

[Will Oldham]

I think it'll be good for you.

[Marc Maron]

Because of Bronner's. Do you use Bronner's?

[Will Oldham]

I've used it forever.

[Marc Maron]

Forever. Right.

[Will Oldham]

Like, yeah. I learned it about it at camp in southern Indiana. 80s. And we would go out in the woods and that's what everybody brought with them to bathe in the little ones in the rivers.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. We were kids.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah. And it stays with you forever.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. That's the only thing I like to use. But lavender. I have a thing with lavender, like some people have with cilantro.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, really?

[Will Oldham]

Where? I don't find it a pleasant flavor. I don't find it a pleasant smell. And I'm sure that it has some weird genetic thing. It's not. I don't think it's a bad smell. It just doesn't work for me. Like, some people can't stand cilantro and I think it's wonderful.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah. Cilantro, coriander, great. But some people repelled.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, I think I have that with lavender.

[Marc Maron]

Well, I don't think you should eat lavender generally.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, but they put it in cupcakes.

[Marc Maron]

And cookies and things like that in your fancy town. They put some lavender everywhere.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. My wife likes to cook with it sometimes.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, yeah.

[Will Oldham]

In sweets, mostly. Sweets? Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

I guess it's a nice hint of this or that.

[Will Oldham]

It can be, but.

[Marc Maron]

So, dude, we met once, and somehow in my mind, I decided we have problems, but we don't.

[Will Oldham]

Good. Yeah. We'll see. At the end of this conversation or halfway through it.

[Marc Maron]

Do you think maybe we do?

[Will Oldham]

Who knows?

[Marc Maron]

Are you guys.

[Will Oldham]

There's a class divide. There's a continental divide.

[Marc Maron]

Is there?

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. There's big Rocky Mountains in the middle of the United States of America. Where do you come from? Arizona. Is that right?

[Marc Maron]

I grew up in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

[Will Oldham]

New Mexico.

[Marc Maron]

And. But I'm Jersey, genetically.

[Will Oldham]

Oh, New Jersey, righteously.

[Marc Maron]

Sure. I mean, you got like.

[Will Oldham]

It's something to be proud of, I think so.

[Marc Maron]

Jersey. Wasn't always, but now I own it. Pretty heavy. I own the. Because I. You Springsteen fan?

[Will Oldham]

Some.

[Marc Maron]

Some.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

Like. Like. Well, this is a good question.

[Will Oldham]

I liked his interview with me. Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

That was pretty Intense.

[Will Oldham]

It was great.

[Marc Maron]

But Nebraska have an impact.

[Will Oldham]

It seemed like a natural thing to pick up when I was a kid, and it never hit me. But have you ever heard. I'm sure if they haven't put a box out of it, they will. But there's maybe 30, 40 songs recorded around the same time.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

Those really, really do it to me. But the Nebraska record, it doesn't do a thing. Except for my father's house.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, it just seems like that model. I mean, you were a kid still.

[Will Oldham]

When I heard it, I was probably 14 or 15, something like that. And it had come out maybe five years before, but it was one of.

[Marc Maron]

Those things where it's like he's just doing it in his bedroom. Yeah. It's a big deal.

[Will Oldham]

Well, I get. Wait, wait, is that a big deal?

[Marc Maron]

No.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. I mean, I know what the big.

[Marc Maron]

Deal was because I just appeared in the movie as Chuck Plotnick and I read the book.

[Will Oldham]

I read the 33 and a third born in the USA, which covers a lot of that stuff.

[Marc Maron]

Did Warren Zanes write that one?

[Will Oldham]

I don't remember who wrote it.

[Marc Maron]

Warren Zanes wrote the book on the making of Nebraska, Deliver Me From Nowhere. And I think the. The issue at that time.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

Was that after he recorded those things that were supposed to be demos. Ish.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

He didn't know what he wanted to do with them.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

That they tried it every which way to do with the band to do it this way or that way. And he decided that they tried to record the songs in the studio with just him on the guitar.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

But they wanted. They wanted the recordings that he did on that tac4 track, but they couldn't figure out a way to transfer it onto vinyl with the quality necessary.

[Will Oldham]

To make millions of dollars or.

[Marc Maron]

Well, I don't think that was. I think that was. The big problem is that, you know, he was poised to be. He'd already started.

[Will Oldham]

Boy.

[Marc Maron]

Him in the usa.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And they were like, this is it, Bruce. And he's like, I want to do that.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

I'm going to do these songs. I don't want my face on the COVID I don't want to.

[Will Oldham]

I would have picked different songs out of the. Out of the repertoire that I've heard from bootlegs. I would have chosen different songs. The song Nebraska always bothered me because it's a song about. What's it about?

[Marc Maron]

Yeah. Isn't it about the Killers?

[Will Oldham]

No, it's about the movie Badlands.

[Marc Maron]

Right.

[Will Oldham]

Masquerading As a song about the Killers, which I don't. I mean, it's like, I don't want to hear Bruce Springsteen sitting in a movie theater. If he wants to write a song about Charles Starkweather, I want to hear that. But I don't really care what his experience sitting in a movie theater watching Sissy Space act twirling a baton is. You know what I'm saying?

[Marc Maron]

I do know what you're saying.

[Will Oldham]

It's like not a song about what people say it's about. It's a song about Terrence Malick's vision of Charles Stark weather with Martin Sheen and Sissy Spacek.

[Marc Maron]

Right. And that gave him the vibe.

[Will Oldham]

Gave him the vibe that drove the whole record.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah, but it's not an earnest vibe. It's not an authentic vibe.

[Will Oldham]

Except there is on all those other songs, there's a lot of pretty intense stuff. And My Father's House is pretty intense. Maybe just that selection for me just didn't necessarily do it. And at the time, you know, if you're listening to. As he was like Suicide. He was listening to Suicide. If you're listening to certain records at that time, it's not a very intense record. Nebraska is not an intense record compared to the things that he was even listening to or that we might have been listening to.

[Marc Maron]

Right. To. Yeah, to that first Suicide record. And he gives them credit. He doesn't own it. Oh, my gosh.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. No. A Jersey boy friend of mine, Alan Licht, sent me from, like, a live acoustic tour in the 90s, maybe.

[Marc Maron]

What did he does, John? Dream Baby Dream Dream Baby Dream.

[Will Oldham]

And he does it, you know, at the end of his. And he announced. He talks about Alan Vega and he plays this long, beautiful harmonium version. So gorgeous.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah. Well, that's good that he gives the credit.

[Will Oldham]

I once. Cause I was in a movie in my teens called Mate. One Jersey movie made by your performance.

[Marc Maron]

In that haunts me still.

[Will Oldham]

So John Sayles made it. And he'd also made Glory Days, at least video for Springsteen after Around that time.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, really?

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. So a woman who worked with Springsteen was around and eventually became his manager, Barbara Carr.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah, maybe.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, I think that's right. And once I was on a plane coming Australia from Melbourne to Sydney and then Sydney, I was going back to the States and Springsteen was on the plane.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, yeah.

[Will Oldham]

And he. He had played the night before in Melbourne. I'd played the night before. So different venues. He was walking with this woman that I had met in West Virginia, and I was like, hello, Barbara and she said, hey, Will. She's like, bruce, you know, this is this guy that I had. I had told you about. And then she introduced me to Bruce. She peeled off, we're walking through the airport, and Springsteen's like, heard you made a pretty good record.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

You know, I was like, yeah. I was like, yeah, we competed last night in Melbourne. Talked for a minute. He was so sweet.

[Marc Maron]

He was. And he was on the set of the movie the whole time. So anytime I didn't have a big part, but anytime they said cut, I could just go talk to Bruce.

[Will Oldham]

How will it be as a motion picture?

[Marc Maron]

Good question. My question about it is really. I mean, the story's compelling, about trying to get this sound and his tortured nature at that time, trying to get that sound and then eventually getting that sound. But is that a. You know, is that gonna. Is that story something regular people are going to be engaged with? And I guess enough people love Springsteen that maybe they will.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

You know.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

Your new record's fucking great, buddy.

[Will Oldham]

I appreciate you saying that. I really love it.

[Marc Maron]

Like, there's a couple of songs on there. The Breathing Song.

[Will Oldham]

Oh, yeah. Sometimes it's hard to breathe.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah. Love that one.

[Will Oldham]

Thank you.

[Marc Maron]

And I like the Gun song.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. Right on.

[Marc Maron]

Do you feel, like, elated or destroyed?

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

Exalted.

[Will Oldham]

Exalted or destroyed?

[Marc Maron]

Exalted or destroyed?

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

So when you're writing that, do you feel like. Are you, like. Yes. Exalted or destroyed? Because the poetry, I have to assume you're writing constantly in periods of time.

[Will Oldham]

There's, like, periods that are writing periods and then periods that are revision periods, right? Yeah. And the revision periods are longer than the writing period.

[Marc Maron]

But how does it work for you? Because it's all. You know, you've sort of maintained this relatively haunting but elated tone for a long time, and it must all come from the same place, which is your heart and mind. But you don't. You know, you don't carry a little notebook around. You don't.

[Will Oldham]

I do. I mean, I carry a tiny notebook around. Like a little memo pad.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

Like this.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah. And just. You scribble things.

[Will Oldham]

No, most of it is, like, if I'm away from my real notebook, which is the. Like, whatever, six inches by nine inches. One or whatever it is, six inches by eight inches. Something like that. That's usually at home. I don't trust most things that happen when I'm traveling in terms of my brain.

[Marc Maron]

Really?

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. Musically, like, when we're performing, I trust that, but I don't Trust.

[Marc Maron]

Like trying to write something, but things don't. Just all of a sudden come. Little noodle, little riff, little turn of phrase, and you write it down on the plane, and you're like, can't trust that.

[Will Oldham]

I just don't. Yeah, I think I wouldn't put my mind in that position. I guess, like, it's got so much to do when we're, like, out on the road playing music. My brain has way too much to do already.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Will Oldham]

Sometimes there'll be a song that we're playing, and I'll stumble on a line, and I keep stumbling on it night after night and think, oh, I guess that means I have to rewrite that line. And then I'll rewrite that line, and.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, something that just happens organically, and you change it.

[Will Oldham]

It happens organically that it's screwed up. And I can't. Like, I can't remember a line, even though I've tried to sing it 70 times or something like that. Just stumble every time. And I even write it on the set list. I'll write the line down and think, why am I doing that? Obviously, that line doesn't want to be in the song.

[Marc Maron]

So I gotta listen to it.

[Will Oldham]

Gotta listen to it. Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

Gotta listen to whatever delivered me that line to begin with.

[Will Oldham]

And then it's fun because you're in shape anyway. You know, you're in fighting shape, but you just don't have the time to sit down. But one line I can work on one with the idea that I'm gonna throw it in the song tomorrow night.

[Marc Maron]

Sure.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And do people notice or just you?

[Will Oldham]

I have no idea what anybody notices or thinks. I mean, it's been really fun talking about this Purple Bird record. Cause people are. I don't. The songs are really easy to get into, and so people are talking about so many specifics about specific songs. It's really exciting.

[Marc Maron]

Well, it's, like, interesting record because, like, the production on it and, like, you know, you have probably, like, 40 records. You drag City guys put out a record every few months.

[Will Oldham]

I try to think of it as one a year.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it feels like a legit country record. Is that wrong?

[Will Oldham]

Well, I mean, it's funny because it's a legitimate Nashville record, and it's made within the system. The Nashville system, in a way that has been in practice for decades.

[Marc Maron]

Okay. So, you know, in terms of engineering and the guys.

[Will Oldham]

You use engineering, the. The musicians and then the style of. Of, like, the way we did it. Ferg, the producer, David Ferguson, he calls his team of guys.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

And we all get in the studio and there's 12 songs. We're going to do them in two days. And I sit in the corner, play the song on a guitar for the keyboard player, Mike Rojas. He writes down the progression.

[Marc Maron]

Right.

[Will Oldham]

And xeroxes it, hands it to everybody, and then we play it.

[Marc Maron]

Wow.

[Will Oldham]

And then we might do up to, you know, if we're doing four takes, we're in trouble. You know, four, five takes is. We're in trouble. So we just every. We do six songs roughly one day and six songs the next day. And that's a Nashville kind of style of recording.

[Marc Maron]

And that's pre pop country. Old school Nashville. Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

I mean, it was. People thought it was pop country, you know, back then. You know, we think of Conway Twitty as hardcore, and people would have laughed at that idea.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah, they were making pop country, but, like, as opposed to the layers of sound. Three or four producers. Let's bring R and B guy in to lay down a beat.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. No, but Ferg has made a lot of country music. He probably started his professional career maybe in the late 70s, I think, as a producer and as an engineer and as a player sometimes. And to him, you know, he announced to me, he said, willie, let's not. I don't want to make a country record. And I said, that's fine with me. So to Ferg's ears, and probably to mine, we did not make a country record. But I know that to the rest of the world, just like I knew when I left Louisville, Kentucky, as a teenager and moved to the Northeast for a little bit, everybody said I had a really strong accent. I never thought I had an accent. I don't even know if I have one anymore. But at the time, they would. They kept making fun of me. Yeah, it's like, oh, I guess, you know, I guess this is country music. It just doesn't. It's just the music that we played with. Even with the conscious directive from Ferg to not make a country record, people will still recognize it as a country.

[Marc Maron]

Well, I think I. Like, I. It must have been the production. I mean, there's a couple of songs.

[Will Oldham]

Ferg said he didn't want to make a country record.

[Marc Maron]

No, but I mean, like, I think it's. A couple of the songs structurally are kind of country. And then there's other stuff. There's like. I think the Gun song is almost sounds like it's got kind of a Leonard Cohen gypsy groove to it almost.

[Will Oldham]

That's Interesting. Ferg said polka. He said. He said he wanted to. When he. When he heard the lyrics, he said, we have to do this as a polka.

[Marc Maron]

Really?

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And. But, like, I think it was just a production thing because, like, even with those later Steve Earl records, he's not necessarily playing country music, but, you know, he's a country guy, I suppose.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah, a little bit.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

But your. Your decision to do it that way was you wanted to do the Nashville thing.

[Will Oldham]

No, this record was kind of 110% just wanting to do something with Ferg.

[Marc Maron]

Okay.

[Will Oldham]

And sort of play by Ferg's rules.

[Marc Maron]

Right.

[Will Oldham]

And almost. I mean, almost every idea about making the record, including the writing of the bulk of the songs, came from ideas that Ferg had about how we should do things.

[Marc Maron]

So when you're doing this, there's a whole discovery process that happens outside of your song.

[Will Oldham]

A whole discovery process? Yeah, absolutely.

[Marc Maron]

Because your control is limited to, like, well, this is how I play it. This is the words. And then these guys, they get their charts done and they pass them out, and you're like, what's gonna happen?

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. What was dreamy about this? It was kind of, I would imagine, many people's. It was my fantasy. And I didn't even know it was my fantasy because I've been doing this for a living for 30 years, and I haven't ever quiet quite had this experience. But the fantasy of, you know, we put the songs together. We started putting the songs together, writing them without the intention of necessarily making a record, and then decided to. So then there's these songs. I practice them at home. Revise, practice, revise. And then we get in there, and at that point, all I am is the featured vocalist. You know, I'm the singer, whatever you call it, the artist on the session whose name goes on it. But that's my job and everybody else's job is to sort of buoy the things that my voice does.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

And that's how it, like, played out. You know, for example, get up there, get on that mic and sing, and everybody will be there, and they're gonna go where your voice goes.

[Marc Maron]

Was it amazing?

[Will Oldham]

It was so amazing. It was just so amazing. First time experience I had done a thing. So the first time I went to Nashville was in the early 2000s. I was trying to make a record in Shelbyville, Kentucky, with my younger brother, where we used to make records out, and it wasn't working. I called David, the late David Berman, say, what should I do? And he said, you should go to Nashville and work with this fellow, Mark Nevers. I went down and worked with Mark Nevers. We made a very simple. We were making a very simple record with me playing guitar, singing, my brother Paul playing bass. And then I said, well, what if we wanted to have a woman singing on this record? Mark said, well, I'll just call the singers union, and what do you want? I said, somewhere between Sandy Denny and Dolly Parton. So he calls and describes it. They send over this woman named Marty Slayton. And she's just the most fluent, efficient, amazing, expressive musician that I'd ever worked with in a studio, because that's her job. That's like how Nashville people work in Louisville or other places where I'd been. The artists are.

[Marc Maron]

You all know each other.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And you go to the coffee shop and you're like, you want to do this cut.

[Will Oldham]

Exactly. And nobody's nobody. It's never. It's not that urgent. Everybody has other jobs. But this is what she did. And Mark saw my jaw drop, and he said, we can make a whole record like this if you want, with just this kind of. And so maybe a year later, I went back and he put together an A team of Nashville session guys, because Nevers had been in the industry in the 80s, and so that was the first. And I brought a bunch of songs that we'd already recorded as, like, palace, the songs in the 1990s. And I was like, I'm gonna make these Bonnie Prince Billy songs with this Nashville team of folks. And I witnessed the insanity of Nashville session music. The magic and their influence in the Magic.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, so that's interesting, because that's why people go there. I mean, it had to be the same when Dylan went down there.

[Will Oldham]

I'm sure. I'm sure. Yeah. I mean, if you listen. Yeah. He goes in with his interesting songs right at that time, his whatever.

[Marc Maron]

Was it National Skyline or maybe Blonde.

[Will Oldham]

On Blonde might have been first, because I think that was the Nashville record. A mix of some of his. Some of, like, the Hawks, the Band, and the Nashville people, but just the.

[Marc Maron]

Idea that, you know, you're in a music city like, that has its own history and legacy. It's not like la, where they're doing everything. I mean, Nashville's doing Nashville, and there's these people like, yeah, I can get you exactly what you're picturing or hearing.

[Will Oldham]

In your head, or I'm gonna actually get you something that's better than what you hear in your head, because you didn't even realize what's possible.

[Marc Maron]

That we had these people on call.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, that. We have these people on call.

[Marc Maron]

That's fucking amazing.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

But when you start, let's go through a little of the history, because I know that you don't do much acting anymore.

[Will Oldham]

No.

[Marc Maron]

And at some point you just turned on it.

[Will Oldham]

Well, also, music schedules and acting schedules don't really line up. I don't know. If someone casts you, I don't know how much notice they give.

[Marc Maron]

It might be weeks. Might be.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. And playing music. You know, usually someone will say, hey, can you play? Can you do three days on this movie? In two weeks, I'll say, no.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

But in 14 months I can, right?

[Marc Maron]

And they're like, we'll be done.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, it'll be out.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah, the movie will be. You can go see it and the part you would have played.

[Will Oldham]

But.

[Marc Maron]

But early on. Where'd you grow up? In Kentucky.

[Will Oldham]

In Louisville, Kentucky.

[Marc Maron]

I'm gonna be there. Do you live there?

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. Are you doing a movie?

[Marc Maron]

No. You're doing a comedy.

[Will Oldham]

Cool. Where at?

[Marc Maron]

Good question. Is that where the Bombhard theater is? Yes. Yes. I'm at the Bombard.

[Will Oldham]

Oh, that's a beautiful room.

[Marc Maron]

That's a pretty decent hip city.

[Will Oldham]

It's. I know. Like an octopus. Asked about the ocean, there's not much I know how to say about Louisville.

[Marc Maron]

But what was your experience growing up there? I mean, what'd you. You can do that.

[Will Oldham]

No, it squeaks.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, yeah. There. Are your family in the arts?

[Will Oldham]

My family wasn't necessarily. My mom was a, you know, had a classic woman's transitional role of, you know, growing up. She had a really crazy childhood. But then ultimately she was brought up in a kind of a conservative family, and she married someone that she knew from Louisville. And then she stopped working in order to raise kids. But it turned out that she wanted to. That she was an artist.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah. Oh, really?

[Will Oldham]

She just did her art.

[Marc Maron]

Like, what medium she drew.

[Will Oldham]

The first thing she started doing when I was, I don't know, 10 or so, was waking up and drawing her dreams.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, wow.

[Will Oldham]

With markers.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

And she created kind of a scary avatar for herself. So she would just draw one scene, usually from each dream. But she was represented always by this certain avatar. And then other people might be. And those are very intense drawings.

[Marc Maron]

Did she do any of your covers?

[Will Oldham]

Yes, she did. Yeah. Because then she got into collage. So. Yeah. The I See a Darkness is the skull that she made.

[Marc Maron]

That's like a classic cover.

[Will Oldham]

And she did. There's one called Lie down in the Light where she did she was obsessed kind of with. There's a little bit. Little image of Jacob wrestling the angel in a Gauguin painting.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah, yeah.

[Will Oldham]

And I was excited about Gustave Courbet, and he had this wrestler painting. And so I said, mom, would you do Jacob and the angel wrestling each other in sort of Gauguin crazy colors, but use the Courbet light pairing, like the choreography. So that's what the lie down and the light is. So she did. Yeah, throughout. And then I saw the wonder show of the world.

[Marc Maron]

I love that one.

[Will Oldham]

That's the last thing. She ultimately got Alzheimer's. And that's the last thing I was able to. That's the last piece of art she made. It's the front cover of that record.

[Marc Maron]

You know what's amazing about that record is like, I gotta give that a listen again. And the color of that record, you can find it immediately. Yeah, you know, it stands out, that turquoise color.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

Well, that's amazing. So you had this relationship with your mom that was creative.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, exactly. I mean, it's interesting witnessing somebody who was very committed artist with a practice who didn't. She never showed. It wasn't about showing. It was just.

[Marc Maron]

She did it at home about getting it out.

[Will Oldham]

Getting it out. But it was beautiful. Very intense, you know, and inspired. And she did it every day, you know, and so that was a weird thing. Like, is that. I guess maybe my brain thought, is this something that we're supposed to hide? Is this supposed to be our private thing?

[Marc Maron]

But also, it seems like, you know, one way to sort of combat either darkness or depression.

[Will Oldham]

Absolutely.

[Marc Maron]

Is to enter it into the world in a creative way.

[Will Oldham]

Yes. Well, see, I guess that's. She maybe on some level had a little bit of a feedback loop going, because she wouldn't. You know, that's what I find is you put something into the music in order to share it. Yeah, but she wasn't really. She was sharing it with those of us who lived in the same house as she did and certain friends of hers. But she wasn't. It wasn't actually getting out. So she was maybe identifying something that needed to come out. But it didn't go very far. You know, it didn't go very far.

[Marc Maron]

Well, that's interesting. Cause it's almost like I need you to know this is happening.

[Will Oldham]

I think she. Ideally, maybe she would have wanted to put it out in the world, but she didn't have a careerist mind.

[Marc Maron]

But then you did.

[Will Oldham]

And then with the covers, was she thrilled? I think so. I mean, she Would always agree when I would ask her to. So you used images.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, so she did it specifically for.

[Will Oldham]

The COVID You know, the icy of darkness had been. She had made the skull and then superimposed, like a degraded xerox photograph of her as a baby. And so I said, you know, could I put this on a record cover without you as the baby? And she said, yeah. And then I would ask her, you know, sometimes I would. Yeah, I've used collages of hers like this.

[Marc Maron]

Sort of the symbiosis of your vision for your music and then your mom's art. It just makes perfect sense.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. And at the time, my father was an amateur photographer. And almost every image, photographic image, on most of the records were pictures that he took. Like, any picture of me would have been a close up of you.

[Marc Maron]

That looks like Nietzsche.

[Will Oldham]

That's Steve Golic, who for years, he's a British photographer. And for years I was the only two people I really like to take my picture. My dad and Steve Goller.

[Marc Maron]

Okay. Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

And my dad's gone, so it's just Steve now. No, but there's other people.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah. So when you start playing, is music the first thing? I mean, I know acting was the.

[Will Oldham]

First thing it was. Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

Because I don't know where sales found you, but you must have been, what were you, 15 or something?

[Will Oldham]

I think I was maybe 13 when they first contacted me. And then they lost the money from 8:1 and they made brother from Another Planet. Then they got the money.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, so stupid.

[Will Oldham]

And they called and said, like, you know, do you still have that script we sent you a couple years ago?

[Marc Maron]

And how did you get on his radar?

[Will Oldham]

Because there's a theater in Louisville. It's in an interesting place right now. Since COVID it hasn't. But there's a theater in Louisville called Actors Theater of Louisville, which was in the 70s. In the 70s, Louisville was kind of an important cultural center for the United States. You know, we had a really strong newspaper, we had a really strong orchestra from decades. And this theater, Actors Theater of Louisville, which had annually a new play festival that kind of the theatrical world would come to.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, really? From around the country.

[Will Oldham]

From around the country, sometimes even around the world to see a group of maybe 15, 16 plays.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

And so one year, I think. I think I was 13. I was in a play, a really strange and interesting play called Food from Trash by a playwright named Gary Leon Hill.

[Marc Maron]

It was an original play.

[Will Oldham]

Cause they would commission new plays. And a lot of the play, you know, there were a Lot of plays, a lot of actors. A lot of plays that turned into bigger runs on Broadway, maybe, or off Broadway or turned into movies and then actors. I saw so many actors there who later went on to be, you know.

[Marc Maron]

Is that how you learned or did you take lessons?

[Will Oldham]

I took lessons. I started taking lessons when I was about 8 because I just. I loved going to that theater.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

And I loved watching movies. Theaters.

[Marc Maron]

Theater.

[Will Oldham]

The theater was so good, though. Yeah. And movies and. Yeah. Like, my dad got one of the first VCRs from a local camera store, and they had 10 movies you could rent. We started renting. And then the library had them.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

But that's what I. So I just assumed because of the fulfillment that I got from witnessing theater and witnessing movies, cinema, I thought, this is what I'm going to do with my life. You know, like, these actors are helping me live the life, and that's what I want to do. I want to. I want to help people live the life that they have inside of them. Right. That's what. That's interesting to be doing.

[Marc Maron]

Well, you know, I mean, like, I've learned recently, I had a big switch in terms of how I approach it or what my understanding of it. Because when you start to think about craft or this or that, that, you know, you just think in terms of, like, how do I do this? And, you know, for some reason, it wasn't until I talked to Pacino and this was like, a couple months ago.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. That'd be fun.

[Marc Maron]

It was great.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And I read his book and, like, you know, he's, you know, he's a. He's a kooky guy and a very shy guy. And, you know, you know, life is, you know, gets away from him. But. But the idea of acting was really, for him, it was an artistic pursuit of truth. And I don't know that I really thoroughly looked at it like that. That what you're honoring. Whatever you think you. Okay. You can be like, I know. I can be in the moment and listen.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

But the other side of it is you honor the truth of that moment.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And what you're going for is the truth of a story or the truth of a character. And it just blew my brain open. I don't even know why I didn't.

[Will Oldham]

Think that way with Ideally. Right. The hope that that energy gets translated to the audience's experience, and then they are able to. They are witnessing the conveyance of truth.

[Marc Maron]

Right.

[Will Oldham]

So then they can convey truth either.

[Marc Maron]

Just to see things differently.

[Will Oldham]

See things differently. Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

You know, like. But you know, ultimately, like you said earlier about the music, you have no control over that part. All you can do is be, you know, engaged and authentic in your work and then you've done your job. I mean, you can't. There's nothing you're going to do that's going to make the audience. You know, you can't think in terms of them all the time.

[Will Oldham]

Maybe you, I mean, well, it's. They're always a part of it. They're always a part of.

[Marc Maron]

No, no, they're part of the experience. But I mean, do you find yourself over the. Of 30 records or however many you've done, you know, playing, knowing you're playing to your audience? Always.

[Will Oldham]

Well, except, I mean, it's not a specific. It's not a specific. It's an audience that is evolving always. And maybe so kind of also because maybe the opposite of my mom, I've always thought like, well, I'm going to make a song so that I can connect. Connect. Yeah, that's the reason. Because I'm already connected to. By watching great performers or listening to great records or going, you know.

[Marc Maron]

And I guess what I'm saying is, is kind of false in the sense that like over time, you know, if you're authentically you, your audience kind of knows what to expect and knows you and they want to engage in that. You don't have to honor, like, you can't, you don't have to think like, I gotta do the record. Exactly. Like the last record.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

But after a certain point, your voice is what brings them.

[Will Oldham]

I'm still learning what brings them or doesn't bring them, but. Yeah, what brings, what brings the audience? I mean. Yeah, I think so.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah. I mean like now, like I know that over time, you know, somehow or another my audience are, they're grown ups, they're sensitive, they're probably aggravated, they're politically like minded.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And they find some sort of relief or release or comfort in what I do.

[Will Oldham]

Right.

[Marc Maron]

And that's within the last five years. Because I'm an old man. And that's the other thing about doing art is that you don't really feel like you're old, you know, and at some point you're like, God, my, my audience is all over 40 and it's okay.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

You know, because there's some ideas like where are the kids?

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

How come I'm not cool?

[Will Oldham]

Right.

[Marc Maron]

I mean, old man.

[Will Oldham]

Well, you want also you. I mean, I guess I do, I do crave. I love the idea of maybe having the goal of having the bulk of the audience that comes to the show be people that you would like to spend time with.

[Marc Maron]

Right.

[Will Oldham]

On an individual level.

[Marc Maron]

Because you're gonna be.

[Will Oldham]

But even. Even if. For some reason. Yeah, if some reason you were invited to their house, that you would look forward to going to their house.

[Marc Maron]

I don't look forward to going to anyone's house, but I understand what you're saying.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. I mean, it's. I get.

[Marc Maron]

Do you get a lot of that? Where you get emails through whatever the outlet is and they're like, oh, you're gonna be in my town. Do you wanna. You need a place to sleep? And I'm like, buzz, I know.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. Well, you have to read. You have to read between the lines a little bit. I remember there was. I got to meet, you know, one of my heroes, Jonathan Richmond, maybe a decade ago or something like that.

[Marc Maron]

How long ago?

[Will Oldham]

Maybe. Maybe we met a decade ago.

[Marc Maron]

Was he making pizza ovens? He. Davis.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. But he came to a show in Grass Valley.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, my God.

[Will Oldham]

And I knew. I mean, I had studied him since I was a child, you know, so.

[Marc Maron]

He was the guy.

[Will Oldham]

He was one of my big guys, you know, his picture was on my wall and different conversations with him then about life and work and things like that. You know, I said. Which I knew because of what you're talking about. I had these invitations and. But I said, I'm gonna tell you that when, next time you come to Louisville, you should stay at our house because you would like to stay at our house more than you would like to stay at anybody else's house or in any hotels. Just trust me. And that's where he stays.

[Marc Maron]

You stayed at your house?

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

How is he?

[Will Oldham]

He's just. He's a hero. He's a hero. I mean, he's. As a performing artist as well. Now, he just played here, I think, in December, so if you didn't see it. But he's. He's. I can't imagine. I can't think of a better and more fulfilling performance, you know, that I've seen in my life, really, than seeing him in the last two or three years.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, my God. I'm so mad that I don't go to more life shows and to spend.

[Will Oldham]

Time with, you know, he. He called maybe a month ago and said, I'm gonna. We're just driving through because we're playing, I don't know, Nashville or Lexington or something like that, or Cincinnati.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

I said, well, come. Come Stay. You know, and he came and we had a. We were already with some neighbors having a fire in the backyard. And Jonathan Richmond comes up and he's got his guitar and he sings a serenade to the moon before going to bed.

[Marc Maron]

How can you not love that?

[Will Oldham]

It's amazing.

[Marc Maron]

It's just so earnest. Right.

[Will Oldham]

And then first thing in the morning, he comes over at 7:30 in the morning to the back door, knocks, and he's got a guitar. You wanna spend some time.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah. And play?

[Will Oldham]

Play, chant.

[Marc Maron]

Sure.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

Wow.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

Now for you, the arc of that, of having loved him as a kid and then to have that relationship with him is just beautiful. And there's something about him that is so specific and unique and. And honest and earnest and so like there's a childlike engagement with the world that like, no one really has.

[Will Oldham]

No. Yeah. Nobody has.

[Marc Maron]

And he seems to hold onto it and nobody has.

[Will Oldham]

Especially because then when you see him on stage, it's still, you know, it has. It's maturing now in a really complicated and beautiful way. Is he in like a little spiritual way?

[Marc Maron]

Isn't there a little flamenco involved too?

[Will Oldham]

There's definitely some flamenco in there.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

But what he's doing with his performance and changing it night for night and changing songs around and just he's engaging in whatever a 70 minute improvisational performance that he anchors with certain song structures. But those structures can change night to night. And so you are witnessing. It feels like, you know, it feels like what we've understood to be, say, maybe a great 1965 Miles Davis kind of experience.

[Marc Maron]

Or almost like a raga.

[Will Oldham]

Like a raga, exactly. Yes.

[Marc Maron]

Okay.

[Will Oldham]

That's more precise, actually.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah, yeah. Like, I was just listening to someone like Shankar the other day. Ravi. Cause I was turning someone on to Ravi Shankar.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And, you know, and it was the first record from 58 where he explains the music and the structure of the music. And I hadn't listened to that in forever. And it really sets you up to be like, okay, here we go.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

So that's the kind of night you spend with Jonathan Richmond.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. He might even talk about. Yeah. The ragas are essentially kind of scales. Right? Is that right?

[Marc Maron]

Well, they're scales, but there's also a very specific structure that you're going to build to this thing.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, yeah.

[Marc Maron]

The scales are the scales, but so.

[Will Oldham]

That'S what his sets are like.

[Marc Maron]

The destination is this thing and then you come down a little bit and then you end roughly on the same notes you started with. Do you structure like that.

[Will Oldham]

Maybe I'm still learning. Yeah, I mean, yeah, we. I think so.

[Marc Maron]

So at the same time you're doing theater, you're listening to Jonathan Richmond and the Modern Lovers.

[Will Oldham]

That first record I'm listening, you know, I was turned on by an article in Spin that probably was from 1984 and 1985.

[Marc Maron]

That's already late.

[Will Oldham]

Oh, it's very late. I think the record that came out when I started listening to him was called It's Time for Jonathan Richmond and the Modern Lovers.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

Has Corner store, double chocolate malt.

[Marc Maron]

So this is after he's almost exercised some of that Velvet Underground from him.

[Will Oldham]

Fully, fully, fully. Which he did very early on.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Then when you, you're doing the acting, when do you start playing?

[Will Oldham]

So all of my, you know, my older brother was a musician. Is a musician. He's a great musician. And he started getting in somehow to the Louisville punk art music scene and bringing back records, you know, to the house and playing lots of really amazing records and then aligning himself with some pretty amazing creatives in Louisville.

[Marc Maron]

Well, that's interesting because people like, now they hear that and you know, the way one thinks about punk, you gotta be specific at the time because it really was an umbrella term for anything artistic.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

You know, Mike Watt kind of set me straight on that, that whatever punk has become or what people think it is, is not what it really started.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, yeah.

[Marc Maron]

So like what you're talking about is what, like the late 70s now this.

[Will Oldham]

Would have been 82, 83.

[Marc Maron]

So you got a lot of people, some people doing performance art, some people are doing body art, some people are doing soundscapes, other people are doing audio visual things. That kind of stuff.

[Will Oldham]

That kind of stuff as well as just the spectrum of music is broad. Even in a given all ages show on a Sunday afternoon, you might see things that are very abstract along with things that are kind of hardcore.

[Marc Maron]

Right?

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

Isn't that amazing that there was a time, because I'm a little older than you, but there was a time when we were kids where you could go get your mind blown by something totally new and something that would probably you would never see even again.

[Will Oldham]

Exactly, yeah. Yeah. And to see it in person and made by people that might call you by your first name, Right?

[Marc Maron]

Yes.

[Will Oldham]

People who just blew your mind, you know, they're like, hey, Will, how are you doing?

[Marc Maron]

Thank God.

[Will Oldham]

What, you're on the plane with the gods already?

[Marc Maron]

Well, I remember like. Cause you know, I worked at a restaurant across from the University. So I was tapped into all that age group. And this would have been in the early 80s, right. And this guy that worked at the record store next door, he played in a band that played two times a year called Jungle Red. And it was just him and this other guy, and they're on stage, you know, in operating scrubs, and he's got a. You know, he wanted to barely borrow this Ibanez West Paul copy I had, so. And I said, sure, if you need a guitar. But then he ended up just taping a doll's arm to it and, you know, hitting it occasionally. And in the middle of the show, he just took his Collection of original McCoy Fiesta Wear and started smashing it with a hammer on the mics. And I just remember, like, half the audience was like, gay men. And they were like, oh, my. They were just. It really hurt them, the Fiesta Wear part. But I'm like, what the fuck is this?

[Will Oldham]

Right, Right. Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

But it blew my mind. It introduces you to possibilities.

[Will Oldham]

Yes, precisely. Yeah, it's just. Well, it introduces you well. It kind of sets you up for an expectation that boundaries, the pushing and destruction of boundaries is a norm. And then you realize, oh, this is not a norm at all. Almost nowhere is this a norm. But it became part of your formation.

[Marc Maron]

That's right.

[Will Oldham]

So you're a little lost also then, you know, lost.

[Marc Maron]

But also, you know, if that's what you gravitate towards, you know that the challenge is upon you.

[Will Oldham]

You know, the challenge is always available to you as well. Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

But also, you're being pummeled by mainstream music, which you like. But you do realize, like, well, there's something else out there. I mean, I. I got turned on to Fred Frith and the residents, and I'm like, what the fuck? No one's playing this. What is this?

[Will Oldham]

I think there were certain, because we weren't. We have University of Louisville. But for some reason, college culture wasn't a part of Louisville culture in that way. The record stores and things like that were nowhere near the university. The university was in a part of town and kind of still is that people don't go to unless they're playing. It's not even a campus. It's just in southern downtown Louisville. It's kind of an urban area. So we didn't have this college culture, which can be so valuable to certain communities. So those of us who were hungry for things were tended more towards the more underground because the residents had, for example, probably better record distribution than some of the things that we would end up Listening to. Because I don't know. Because we managed it ourselves, I guess because it was all mail order catalogs and things like that.

[Marc Maron]

So when you start playing, what are you playing?

[Will Oldham]

Well, everybody I'm spending time with is music. Except for when I'm doing my theater classes for my theater performance. So I'm spending time with all these music people.

[Marc Maron]

Your brother's friends?

[Will Oldham]

My brother's friends. Eventually he sort of moves away from that scene and I get into it and I'm fully in it. And so I'm spending all my time going to shows or in, you know, my friends basement practice spaces, watching them practice and it never occurred. And taking pictures because my dad taught me pictures. Not playing anything. I couldn't play anything. Didn't think I had any. I didn't have any thought about playing anything.

[Marc Maron]

No inclination.

[Will Oldham]

None. And then I remember when I was going to do Mate one, three of my best friends said, let's how about we start a band? Because we were spending all of our time together.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

And listening to music together. And I said, okay, and what do you want me to do? And they said, you could play guitar. Okay. So I think I borrowed a guitar and took it with me maybe to the shoot in West Virginia for a couple months, but. And they sent, they're giving me demos and I don't. I don't know what, you know. And finally after a few months they say, we're gonna move on with this concept with somebody else. Because. Because you're not doing anything. I'm like, yeah, I don't know what to. I think that's a good idea.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

But did you learn how to play?

[Will Oldham]

So then those were the. Those guys then were Slint, the group slint.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, sure.

[Will Oldham]

No, so then I.

[Marc Maron]

That's a heavy band.

[Will Oldham]

I went, you know, I moved out here for a little bit to try, you know, I got an agent out here.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, because of May one?

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, exactly. When I graduated high school.

[Marc Maron]

That was a crazy role, dude.

[Will Oldham]

It was crazy role.

[Marc Maron]

I mean, the child preacher. Yeah, it was like, like it was jarring. Like I remember seeing that movie and I kind of remember what it was about, but I remember you.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, I just watched it again because there's a new like 4k print. I watched it for the first time since the 80s.

[Marc Maron]

And you're like what, 17, 16. Yeah, it's unbelievable.

[Will Oldham]

It's a good movie.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah. And sales was great.

[Will Oldham]

Sales is so great. Yeah. I mean I really got set up in my teens to think that the world was this amazing, wonderful, generous, collaborative, cooperative, inspiring place. And, you know, when I really left home, I realized that's not the case because that's how the sales production was. And that's how our community, our music community in Louisville was, and the theater community. And I thought, and you go out in the world, that's not how the world is.

[Marc Maron]

So you got to LA and you were just hit in the head.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. Yeah. And then I said, maybe. Maybe I'll try New York. And then realized that none of that was for that acting wasn't. It would be impossible for me to do what I thought I was, you know, wanted to do.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

In that. And then. And then someone had given me a guitar when I was about 19.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

And here and there, people would, you know, I would just write little songs.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

For. No. You know, like my mom.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

Just writing. Just writing songs. Why? Exactly. And then. And then I sort of started to apply discipline to it, even though, again, I had no. What was I going for? I was not. I was listening to the weirdest music at that point. Lots of just records checked out of the library.

[Marc Maron]

Like what?

[Will Oldham]

Cause the covers looked interesting.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

I mean, just, I don't know, records from other countries or going to church on Sundays to, like, gospel churches. So I didn't know what one did with music once you recorded it. For example, like, I lived for a summer with my friend Todd Brashear, who was in this audio program at University of Indiana, or Indiana University in Bloomington. In Bloomington. And so we had access to recording equipment, recorded some of these songs. And I thought, well, all I know from my growing up is that you make a 7 inch once you've recorded songs. So then I'm like, I'm gonna send this your single. Yeah. Send these demos out to record labels to see if they would be interested in releasing a 7 inch record.

[Marc Maron]

So it's just you and your buddy.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, me and Todd. Yeah. And then other people, you know, we roped other people in to play on the sessions or whatever these things were.

[Marc Maron]

And that became a record.

[Will Oldham]

And then. Yeah. Like, I. But I sent it to. You know, I sent it to Interscope Records because I didn't know anything about anything. You know, I thought I wrote them a letter saying, Would you 7 inch out of this music?

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

And. But then also to Drag City, because I had seen a silver Jews 7 inch that a girl named Tanya Small had given me because she plays on the first Silver Jews ep.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

And I was like, this looks great. This sounds great. You know, maybe These people would be interested. And they said, we like these songs.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And he'd been with them ever since.

[Will Oldham]

Pretty much, you know, hiccups here and there, but. Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

That's crazy.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

But Berman moved you.

[Will Oldham]

I mean. Yeah. Have you. Did you ever spend any time.

[Marc Maron]

Dude, I had one of the weirdest nights of my life in Nashville with him. Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. Because I had about 50 of the weirdest nights of my life with him. Just because that's what it is.

[Marc Maron]

I came to him later and, you know, I read the poems and I listened to the records, and I found him, you know, brilliant and interesting, and I wanted to do a conversation with him, and we had reached out a couple times, and then he comes to my show in Nashville with his then girlfriend or wife.

[Will Oldham]

Wife, Cassie.

[Marc Maron]

And then afterwards, we go to this restaurant, and I swear to God, we're the only people in it.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And it's like 11:30 at night, and he fucking tells me his life story. We were there for, like, two hours about this almost. It was heartbreaking because it was all about this, almost what he saw as a mythic battle with his father.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. My gosh. Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And. And how that, you know, crippled him and, you know, he didn't want to talk on the mics.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

But it was. The story was, like, mind blowing and tragic.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

That he was like this. This guy who can. Couldn't get out from under it. And obviously, you know, it ended very badly.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And we had. We had emailed right before he. He, He. He passed.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And. And I had no idea. And then I saw Sweeney in. In New York, and it was just. It was sad because it didn't seem to surprise anybody.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

That he took his own life. That he struggled like that.

[Will Oldham]

No. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. The struggle was on. His was evident. Yeah. The struggle was evident.

[Marc Maron]

And that Purple Mountains record is crazy.

[Will Oldham]

It's. It's too much for me.

[Marc Maron]

Right.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. I know that it's a great record, but I think I've listened to it two times, and I just say, well, I know that it's there.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah. Because it's too sad.

[Will Oldham]

It's too sad.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah. But, okay, so when you start with Drag City, I mean, obviously we're not gonna get through every record, but.

[Will Oldham]

And the new record is on no Quarter.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, it is.

[Will Oldham]

It's one of the diversion hiccups.

[Marc Maron]

But you're still okay with Drag City?

[Will Oldham]

I think so. Yes. Yes.

[Marc Maron]

I got mad at them because they wouldn't put out my comedy record.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, they can. They can have interesting stances on.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah, I just. They. They were. They said they put me out on their other label, whatever that one is, maybe. I don't know. And I was like, no, I want to be. Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

So.

[Marc Maron]

But look, I. You know, I listen to their artists, but. So that's where you start the career. You wanted to do 7 inch and you're just in. The music is just stuff you're putting together without any real guidance.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. And so he had the seven inch, and then. And then a few months later, Dan from Drag City says, well, when's the full length? And I'm thinking full length. Right? You want full. Sure, I'll get to it right now. Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And you did it.

[Will Oldham]

Did it, yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And you released that under Palace, Palace Brothers.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And you did what? Three records. Palace Brothers.

[Will Oldham]

It was. The first record was. See, at the time, I was still coming from this film world. And that's what I understood about if you're gonna be in a play, you get a group of people together, prepare for it, make it, do it. It's this entity, and then it's over and you move on. And so I was thinking, like, well, that's. I wanna try to make records that way. So you put people together, you make this thing, and then you move on and try to make something else. How do you connect them so that maybe an audience could follow it? Well, that's why I thought, well, I'll keep this palace word, but let people understand that we're moving on into different territory with each record. So I didn't even know, like, the first record was a palace, you know, I just thought, I just want. I don't want to have a band, you know, but I don't want it to be a solo artist thing because it should be about the record and about the songs. So.

[Marc Maron]

So it was a collaborative effort with some people that you gelled with. And when it was done, it was done.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And then, like, eventually you decided still not to really record under your own name because you wanted to have that anonymity.

[Will Oldham]

Well, also, eventually, it's not necessarily even anonymity as much as it is. Like, when you see a record and it's credited to somebody, are you expected, you know, a Neil Young record? Does that mean Neil Young did everything? No, no. So I think to just be a little more transparent about that. So I'll say Bonnie Prince Billy, because that's just. That's an entity through which all these thing forces can be brought together to make something, whatever it is, and then the audience will. Because that's our tendency to look at it as an individual. But I can look at it, too and say, yeah, that's Bonnie Prince Billy, whatever. Whatever you need to say. But it isn't. There's not a single artist on this record. There are however many artists on this record.

[Marc Maron]

And you move and you work with many.

[Will Oldham]

So many.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah. Like, almost like. It's an interesting thing. Cause there's not a lot of people that do that. I mean, Dylan does that and that, you know, everything is a collaborative effort with new voices and new artists.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And that was sort of the goal. Yeah, you honor that goal.

[Will Oldham]

I mean, it's. You get yourself in a position where you get to spend time, creative time, with people that you really, you know. Like, I wanna. It's a way of getting intimate with people.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah, for sure. Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. And have community, too. Urgent community. Urgent collaboration. Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And also learning and learning.

[Will Oldham]

Absolutely.

[Marc Maron]

And evolving. All different things. You get something new out of yourself when you're in relation with other people.

[Will Oldham]

Every time.

[Marc Maron]

Every time.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

But ultimately, what's interesting is that. Because a lot of it is your writing. There is a through line to your point of view and your vision.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

And, you know, wherever that comes from, well, that's. That's your business. But you do honor a sort of, you know, taking it up to the edge of sort of almost heartbreaking poetry a lot of times. But then you get propriety. Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, in terms of. Yeah, yeah. But like.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, but you're.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah, you will get goofy.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. But the idea was always to create structures for the purpose of gathering people around rather than the other way around. Like, I didn't. It wasn't gathering of people to put the songs forward. It was getting the putting. You have to write songs so that you have something to share with people that you can then make a record out of or make shows out of.

[Marc Maron]

And the first record that got significant critical attention was I See a Darkness.

[Will Oldham]

I don't even know what that means.

[Marc Maron]

Well, I mean.

[Will Oldham]

I mean, I really don't.

[Marc Maron]

I guess. I guess maybe not critical attention, but it was out there enough to. Where, you know, people cover your songs.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

So within the community. And I guess that's another benefit of working with all different artists, is that people are like, do you know this guy? Or you should work with this guy? And have you heard this song by this guy?

[Will Oldham]

Right.

[Marc Maron]

And then other people cover the stuff. To me, outside of critical recognition, if somebody plays your fucking song, that's a big deal.

[Will Oldham]

Big deal. Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

Like, you're like, oh, my God. And then you get to hear that interpretation. I mean, not everybody gets Johnny Cash to cover a song. I don't even.

[Will Oldham]

That's the truth.

[Marc Maron]

I don't even know how that happened. Do you?

[Will Oldham]

I know vaguely how it happened. I think it was.

[Marc Maron]

Was it Rick?

[Will Oldham]

Yes, I think it was Rick. I think he was talking to the music journalist slash sex writer, Neil Strauss.

[Marc Maron]

Sure, I know him.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. And I think Neil Strauss said this is. Yeah. Played him. Played him. I think he played him a few records. A few records that I'd been involved with. And. Yeah. And then I think Sweeney ran into Rubin on the street. I think Neil Strauss had told Sweeney that he'd been with Rick Rubin, and Rick Rubin was listening to all these records or something like that.

[Marc Maron]

And that's how.

[Will Oldham]

Or before Superwolf, because that's Super Wolf.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah, right. But like. But that's what got Sweeney into the Rubin Circle. Right? Or Superwolf.

[Will Oldham]

Sweeney got into the. Yeah, I mean, essentially. Yeah. Even. Because Sweeney and I were playing together when the I See a Darkness cover was going down. So I think Sweeney at one point saw Reuben and said, hey, I heard you've been listening to these records. We're playing a show at the Bowery Ballroom in two weeks. You want to come? And I think at that point, you know, they then recognized each other, and that was the beginning of their relationship.

[Marc Maron]

But it's so wild that, like. Because whatever you started as, which was, I guess, kind of qualified as lo fi to a degree, but then because of your need to collaborate, that Sweeney record that the two of you did, I don't know how much you were working before Superwolf with him is this whole other thing, but it's not that different than what you always do. But there was something infused in that, primarily because of whatever you two were doing.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. I think we'd probably played together four or five years, something like that. And then in the middle of that four or five years, though, was the kind of Zwan debacle.

[Marc Maron]

What happened?

[Will Oldham]

Well, that was when the band Zwan formed and ultimately dissolved Self imploded. And that was the Billy Corgan.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, right. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Will Oldham]

And Sweeney was in that.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, he was. I didn't realize that.

[Will Oldham]

And so he was sort of lost to us for. For a couple years.

[Marc Maron]

Probably lost to everybody.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, exactly.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

And then. And then when that was over, you know, I had missed playing with him and just said, let's. How about if we try to make some songs up together?

[Marc Maron]

And. And in when you do that experience, I don't know how most of your records go, but obviously the natural experience is very different. But when you settle in with a group of people, is it just like all day, every day, for weeks, days, to kind of come upon something?

[Will Oldham]

No. One of the things that thrilled me so much about the Nashville experience and the speed of it is that I've always. I've understood that many of the great records that, you know are. The great records are records that were oftentimes recorded in one, two days or five days or something like that. And that's also a necessity. If you're going to a recording studio in your 20s and. And you're on an independent label playing relatively underground music, you have budget and time constrictions. And so going into the studio, no one was throwing us, you know, 10, 20, 30 grand. It's just you go in and you say, we've got this amount of time we have to make a record.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

And I like the Nashville people because everyone's prepared to do that. And this was like sort of. We were always just forcing everybody to work harder than they're comfortable working. So even, you know, with Superwolf, we wrote for a period of time, long distance mostly, and would get together every once in a while and try to work out the songs. But then when we went into the recording studio, which was my brother's studio in Shelbyville, Kentucky, we just, I don't know, five days or something like that.

[Marc Maron]

He still got the studio.

[Will Oldham]

He doesn't. No. Yeah, he moved to. He decided he wanted to become a luthier, and he moved out to Mesa, Arizona, and then was on the west coast for a while. Now he's in North Carolina.

[Marc Maron]

And when in this sort of arc of the music career, do you start working with Kelly Reichardt?

[Will Oldham]

I think so again, Alan Licht, who gave me that Bruce Springsteen Dream Baby Dream bootleg song. And he's one of my favorite musical artists as well. He was working, I think, at Keno, and Kelly was working at Keno, I think, and they were friends, and she was working on. She had made a movie called Rivers of Grass in her native Florida. Had a little bit of recognition, but not much.

[Marc Maron]

She was in New York, and then.

[Will Oldham]

She was in New York, and she was working on. She wanted to remake the movie Ode to Billy Joe, which had been a Robbie Benson, maybe even TV movie based on the song. And so she wanted to remake it on Super 16, maybe, might have been Super 8, and asked Alan, because we were friends, if he thought I would be interested in making some music for her. And so I was, you know. Sure.

[Marc Maron]

Were you gonna do a cover of that song?

[Will Oldham]

No, just the score. Just like score music for it.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

So she sent me an edit with, you know, temp music in.

[Marc Maron]

Was that ever released?

[Will Oldham]

I have a VHS copy of it. I mean, it's pretty. It was very low budge and everything about it is super raw.

[Marc Maron]

So was the grass one, the rivers of Grass.

[Will Oldham]

And so then we just. We had a communication going on from that point on.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah, because that role in Old Joy.

[Will Oldham]

Old Joy, Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

That's great.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, it was a great experience.

[Marc Maron]

Your character was slightly disturbing character.

[Will Oldham]

Yes.

[Marc Maron]

But the weird thing is, is that if you run in the circles that we run in at that time, you know that guy?

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. I mean, in their own ways, both characters were kind of disturbing.

[Marc Maron]

The one at the fire, what was the other guy?

[Will Oldham]

There's the two guys, the friends. He's great. Yeah, Daniel London. He's great. But originally she had asked me to play that part, and I was deeply. Both parts are so intimidating because one of them is somebody who has kind of yielded to Normie world, and the other one completely hasn't. And neither one is in a place where nobody aspires to be, where either of these people are. So if you're thinking, like, as an actor, oh, I'm gonna enter in and find the sympathetic aspects of this character. And you think, like, but what if I become either one of these. I don't want to become either of these people, you know? And so she couldn't find somebody for the part Kurt, that I ended up playing. And ultimately she's like, would you just do it? Because I can get. I think I can get Daniel London. And he's gonna be great as Mark.

[Marc Maron]

Well, the part of Kurt is like, you know, that guy who's just a little too old to be in that mindset. Yeah, It's a tragic but very specific character. And, you know, if you are in art worlds or around those people, everyone knows that one of those guys. And it just doesn't end well for them.

[Will Oldham]

No. And, you know, whatever age I was, was something, I don't know, 33, 34. Still thinking, like, could I be this guy? You know, anything? I don't know what is happening in this world. I don't know what I do in my, you know, I don't have a, you know, a retirement plan or anything like that. Is this potent? You know, it's unrealistic. But I was, you know, I was Paranoid that you might be.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, yeah, you could. Not only do I know this guy, but I could be becoming this guy.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

So when does that change? When do you realize that you're not that guy? What record?

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, I think probably around. Probably. Maybe it was cathartic, you know, And I think when Old Joy came out, I think it was around the same time that. Yeah, I made this record, the Letting Go in Iceland with Balgir Sigurdsson, who I'd met because I'd opened for Bjork when he was doing a lot of production and arrangement things with her and worked with this woman, Dawn McCarthy, who's got a group called Fawn Fables that are based in Cotati, California now. And first time I worked with Emmett Kelly and Jim White was on that record, My brother. And yeah, we just. We took this thing. There's a guy named David Tibet who has a musical project called Current 93. And at the time he was kind of collecting. He was in this period in the early 2000s, of collecting the wildest ensembles that at one point Sweeney was a part of. But. And Baby D. And so it was just like all of a sudden I knew every day that I wasn't desperately trying to figure out how to find a place for my songs. Brain. No, my brain, My consciousness. To go instead. Thanks to people like David Tibet or being able to make. Or Kelly Reichardt or getting to go to Iceland and make this Letting Go record that every day I could wake up and get in right away, just jump in all the way. And then it was like, well, if I can hold onto this.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, that's interesting.

[Will Oldham]

For the rest of my life.

[Marc Maron]

So you learned a sort of discipline for yourself.

[Will Oldham]

Exactly.

[Marc Maron]

And it was. It was because of other artists.

[Will Oldham]

Because of other artists, yeah. I mean, there's no. You can't go to college. I mean, maybe Black Mountain College in the mid century of the 20th century. But where can you go and really learn to do this. This work? Right.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

It's only by somehow kind of getting past your insecurities and entering that moment where you're like, I gotta fucking show up for this and be who I am. I mean, that's the trickiest part.

[Will Oldham]

And surround yourself with people who are further along in figuring things out, or at least appear that way. Not that everyone or they figured something out so that you can think, okay, well, they're doing it. This is what Jim White puts in his suitcase, right?

[Marc Maron]

Yeah. Which album was that? The one.

[Will Oldham]

The Letting Go.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, my God. So in Terms of. Because I think it's important because I can't speak to it, but maybe you can if you are willing, because you have such a significant catalog. And I imagine a lot of people listening to this may not know much of it, you know, outside of getting the new record. And maybe that, you know, I See a Darkness record, you know, in between. What would you think are the significant records for you to introduce people? I like the Blueberry song, but I don't think people should start there. That was fun.

[Will Oldham]

That was so much fun. Oh, my gosh. Oh, my gosh. Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

I was like, look at him lighting up. He's lightening up. Thinking about Blueberries.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

But what do you think?

[Will Oldham]

Well, also, thank you so much for. I'm really grateful to be here with you. Thank you so much. Yeah. Well, so between I See a Darkness.

[Marc Maron]

And the new record, I mean, like, 30 records.

[Will Oldham]

Well, the Greatest palace music is a big deal. It was a really big deal to me, and I know it's effective. I hear the kind of feedback I hear from people. I think, oh, that record works. The first record, the Binding print, the first one I did in Nashville with the full. Oh, yeah. So that's called Bonnie Prince Bili Sings Greatest Palace Music. So it's all these insane pros, one of whom is actually on the new record as well, a guy named Stuart Duncan, who's a fiddle player, mandolin player, just brilliant musician. And, yeah, that was me just saying, like, I'm gonna own this Bonnie Prince Billy life, you know, and bring it to Nashville. But then also, I took the tapes around the United States to have different friends, family, colleagues that I'd worked with over the years at that point and asked them to overdub on it so that it was this, you know, new fully realized thing. Yeah. Quilt of a quilt or something like that. Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, that's good.

[Will Oldham]

And then the. Yeah, the Superwolf record. Great.

[Marc Maron]

You just did another Superwolf record.

[Will Oldham]

And then we did another one, which is. I have full respect for that first one that we did. I think it's a one of a kind, and I know that people get something out of it, but there's something that. There's something that happened for me musically just since COVID kind of where I think that Superwolves record the second one.

[Marc Maron]

And that's post Moktar, too, right?

[Will Oldham]

Well, Moktar's on it.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah, they're on it. Yeah. On three or four songs. Yeah. And that. Yeah, I think that's one of the. I mean, you know, I think it's a really good record.

[Marc Maron]

Oh, good, good.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

I'm glad you can say that.

[Will Oldham]

I am, too. You know, when we had finished it, and I remember, like, listening to the master at home, and just because it was. I think that we mixed. We were tracked in February of 2020, November of 19, and then February 2020. So we mixed in Lockdown. So we were listening to the master in lockdown. And I remember. Yeah. Just laying sort of laughing helplessly on the floor of. Of my kitchen, listening to this record. Because I'm thinking, this is a really good record that we've made. Like, this is a record that is good in ways that I have never been able to put into a record before.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Will Oldham]

And I feel like. And then. And then there was this series of singles with Bill Callahan where we did these 19 singles also during lockdown, each with a different guest artist, covers.

[Marc Maron]

He's a genius, right?

[Will Oldham]

Indeed. Yeah. And, yeah.

[Marc Maron]

The urgency of lockdown is not nothing.

[Will Oldham]

Oh, no. I mean, I'm so grateful to lockdown for many things. I'm kind of globally and societally grateful that it seemed to put many, if not all Americans into closer to an understanding of the urgency of our existence. Right. And making. I mean, more so than in 2019.

[Marc Maron]

Sure. And now there's this fascistic pushback, which, oddly, I think the new record speaks to in its way.

[Will Oldham]

I believe it does. And, you know, as we were coming up with songs for it, I was also getting giddy thinking because some of the songs that most directly, indirectly addressed the new. The new reality, the new order, you know, we were aware that it was encroaching, and we're sitting around making up these. I'm making up these songs with these older amazing songwriters and thinking. And I'm getting giddy because of the subtext of some of the songs. I'm like, this is cool.

[Marc Maron]

Yeah.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

I definitely felt it and I definitely heard it.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

Well, it was great talking to you, man.

[Will Oldham]

Good talking to you.

[Marc Maron]

I think we did all right.

[Will Oldham]

We did all right.

[Marc Maron]

We did good.

[Will Oldham]

Yeah.

[Marc Maron]

There you go. Great talk. Enjoyed it. Enjoyed it. The new Bonnie Prince Billy album, the Purple Bird, is out now. Hang out for a minute, folks. Hey, listen, over the years, we've had some amazing musicians perform here in the garage and on the full Marin. This week, we put together another live music mixtape with 11 of those live performances, including this one by Billy Strings. Hard work pup coming down the lane.

[Will Oldham]

Mama Getting back his walking cane Lord.

[Marc Maron]

Lord I got them browns fairy blue well, he throwed it away and he.

[Will Oldham]

Went to town to see that woman and now he's down Lord, Lord, I got them Brown Berry Blue.

[Marc Maron]

To get bonus episodes twice a week plus all WTF episodes ad free. Sign up for the full Marin go to the link in the episode description or go to wtfpod.com and click on WTF Plus. And a reminder before we go this podcast is hosted by Acast. Here's some kind of droopy grungy guitar Boomer lives monkey and La Fonda cat angels everywhere.