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Category: Music
 28 SCENE l MAY 2008 www.scenenewspaper.com
Benjamin Cloyd: How would you describe your style of music to our readers?
Stephen McCabe: That's a question musicians can't usually answer very concisely, and I guess I'm not really an exception. I think I'm kind of willing to move into a lot of different stylistic territory with Attack, Octopus. The project started out kind of electronic sounding, with drum machine and synthesizer, atonal Rhodes piano, hemiolas and compound meters.
As I progressed and developed a sense of the technical limitations and formal possibilities of a multi-instrumental looping project, I became interested in creating some sonic mass. Since it's a solo project, it seemed kind of fun to construct songs that sounded as big and full as possible and that live would contrast with the visual presence of one person building these loops, so as a result these songs have a kind of '70s prog thing to them.
The first batch of songs that I just released exclusively through Snocap (www.myspace.com/attackoctopus) mostly reflect that sensibility. My newer songs seem to consist of a more traditional pop structure, but with more of a focus on mood, melody, and narrative. I don't know where it will go in the long run, but I really like being able to go any direction from here.
BC: What parts of creating music excite you the most right now?
SM: I've always loved songs. I'm a sucker for them, for the way structure plays off lyrics, the interaction between the expected and unexpected. I think I'll never get past that stuff, but after that I'm always interested in sonics and orchestration. I really spend a lot of time looking for the right tone, the right voicing, the right note, the right rhythm in a section.
Technically, though, I'm still discovering new ways of putting together songs with the Boss RC-50, a stereo looping pedal that I run the Rhodes, Alesis Micron synthesizer, drum machine and electric guitar through, then play drums to live.
BC: What are you up to right now, music-wise?
SM: Right now, I'm mostly writing a new batch of songs. I just released my debut, which Justin Perkins did an amazing job producing, but it's only a seven song EP, so I'm working on my first full-length that I'd like to begin recording this winter. In terms of secret projects, I'm still cooking up the idea of doing a one-hour live soundscape while a local painter paints a mural-size watercolor, possibly for one of the Oshkosh Artwalks. The whole project will be videorecorded, then the audio and mural will be immediately destroyed leaving only the video as an artifact of the performance. No date set for this yet.
BC: In what ways does Oshkosh affect the music you create?
SM: I'm profoundly influenced by the musicians in this town. It's a very incestuous environment musically, where jazzers play with rockers and rockers play with blues, metal, and country musicians. It seems like there's great exchange of ideas, along with a lot of support and general conviviality between people who in most communities compete with and envy each other.
BC: What do you think about the Fox Valley music scene right now?
SM: There's always a show happening. There's always something great and new and unique to see if you're willing to get out and find it. There are great songwriters, great musicians, and a lot of people with big, exciting, ambitious ideas that result in some genuinely spectacular events.
BC: Name a band or musician, past or present, who you flat-out LOVE and think more people should be listening to.
SM: My favorite musicians are my friends. I listen to all kinds of music from everywhere, but the music I know most intimately is the music my friends have written. Jeff Mitchell
is one of my favorite songwriters, anything Andrew Johnson does is brilliant, Eric Van Thiel from dropdeadgiants, The Poles (Doubleplusgood Records), Dallas Orbiter (Minneapolis), Patchwork (Madison). If you take the time to track these musicians and bands down you won't be disappointed.
BC: What's the saddest song you've ever heard?
SM: I get a little lump in the throat every time I even think of "I am Trying to Break your Heart," by Wilco. Amazing mood, stunning melody, lyric, arrangement, production, mixing. Also, if the vocal round at the end of "God Only Knows" by the Beach Boys doesn't make you cry, you probably have a soul of polyurethane.
BC: When was the last time you wrote a song? What can you tell us about it?
SM: I wrote music for a song this week and put a demo version of it to tape. It's not arranged at this point and I don't write lyrics (although I have a core melody) until I begin to get a sense of how the arrangement might end up. The song is very quiet, though, almost minimalist, and I'm pretty happy with it right now. Although, that can often change after I sit on it awhile and listen to it in a variety of moods.
BC: Where did you come up with "Attack, Octopus."?
SM: I stole the name from some friends and former bandmates from The Willis who used it for one show before they finally decided upon The Southside Stranglers. I added the comma and period to the name, as I liked the sort of fanciful idea of some evil Dr. No megalomaniac-type ordering his octopus to take the offensive on some handsome, quick-tongued, philandering protagonist.
BC: When can we come see you play and where?
SM: My next show is at Peabody's on Friday, May 9, in Oshkosh with the amazing selfevident from Minneapolis, dropdeadgiants from Oshkosh, and This Bright Apocalypse from Madison. I can't wait for that show!
3:17 PM
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