PJ Harvey & John Parish no compromise - FILTER Magazine

BY PAT McGUIRE
Will Oldham is riding shotgun and there are red and blue lights in the rearview. I’ve just picked the musician up
from his downtown hotel in my unregistered Nissan and we’re headed for a Mexican restaurant merely blocks
away, but an L.A.P.D. officer has spotted my expired tags and asks, in her emphatic way, for a moment of our time.
Oldham shifts in the passenger seat and asks, “Do you think I should put on my seatbelt” then continues his
story about a recent trip to Milan. The soft, innocent question is the only thing he says to acknowledge the officer
during our 10 minutes of temporary captivity. After a brief but stern lecture, we’re let go with a warning.
CAPTURING THE
FLAGS
Fleeting Moments with Bonnie “Prince” Billy
PHOTO BY RICHIE WIREMAN
Soon, Oldham and I are walking down Olvera Street, the
Mexican plaza that marks the original center of Los Angeles.
Today, Oldham’s thicket of a beard is pulled into
two little pigtails sprouting down from the corners of his
lips, and he wears a knit beanie and ski sunglasses, black
motorcycle boots, dark jeans, a vest, sweater and blue tie.
We wind through the vendor stalls of hand-woven rugs
and strong-smelling leather and sit down to lunch at what
claims to be the city’s oldest restaurant. Oldham is widely
known to abhor interviews but is playing along today to
promote Beware, the newest record by his Supermansuited
alter ego, Bonnie “Prince” Billy. However, despite
his candor regarding other aspects of his well-guarded
life, I can’t say I’m surprised when not once does he mention
the album throughout our entire conversation.
Instead, we talk mostly about people, and the importance
of preservation. There are those Oldham has
met on the road who remain in his life, including some
here in Los Angeles and a married couple in Oregon,
and he looks forward to seeing them when he plays their
towns. But rather than deep friendships, Oldham seeks
the comfort of familiarity from these folks, a sense of
home in a foreign land. “Most people know where to
draw the line,” he says, but acknowledges the razor’s
edge that comes with letting his rabid fans get too close.
“Occasionally some people will ask me to go get a beer
or something after the show, and that kind of makes
me…uncomfortable.” Perhaps this is part of the reason
why Oldham has made such a game of swapping identities
and avoiding the spotlight. Whether this policy is
born of hopeful prevention or from disdainful experience
is unclear, but Oldham appears very used to the
impermanence of certain things in his life and has taken
to collecting memories “just in case.” Even though this
current trip is only for two weeks, while packing on the
day of his departure he took a series of photos of his
home. As for explanation, he simply says, “It might not
be there when I get back. I wanted to be sure to keep
part of it forever.”
To this point, I ask Oldham—a most prolific songwriter—if
he is in possession of all of his own music;
there are over 100 singles, albums, compilations, live recordings
and various dabbles that bear one of his several
names. He admits flatly that he doesn’t know, insinuating
that it’s veritably impossible to keep tabs on something
as cavernous as his oeuvre. Finally, he confesses
to a closet at home in Louisville full of “one to 10 copies
of pretty much everything” he’s released. He admits
to being a dedicated collector of other people’s music,
but keeping tabs on his inventory isn’t part of his practice.
“I love Patty Loveless,” he says, “and The Everly
Brothers, and Merle [Haggard], and I have most of their
records…but I don’t know if I have everything. I don’t
even know if I have the first five or six Leonard Cohen
records anymore. But I always have them in me. I know
them so well that I don’t need to have the physical copies.”
He goes through phases of listening exclusively to
older vinyl while in his house but is forced to listen on
his iPod while on the road—half the year, by his estimation.
Concurrently, he finds that music, too, creates a
sense of home for him in unsuspecting corners of the
world. “I find it in strange little glimpses on the subway
or in a restaurant,” Oldham says. “Sometimes in a
strange place I’ll get a feeling of home that overwhelms
me and I don’t know why.” He dislikes the claustrophobia
of cities but loves the country. He doesn’t care about
music news and doesn’t read many magazines. Instead,
he discovers music through friends and encounters it on
his own as he travels the world. “I leave home light,” he
says, “and return heavy.”
Oldham asks me how I first learned about music and
lights up at the notion that I grew up in a household with
a grand total of three musty vinyl albums. He claims that
one of his goals in life is to be one of those records for
someone; that to have made an album that finds such a
novice collector is how he would like to gauge his success.
Touring small places like Santa Cruz or Italy, as
he has done for over 15 years, somehow makes it more
likely for that mark to be reached.
At the end of our meal, a strolling mariachi stops
at our table and asks in broken English if we’d like a
song. Oldham thinks hard for a minute and asks, “Do
you know any really sad ones” Confused, the guitarist
replies that he knows “La Bamba,” and Oldham looks at
me and giggles, shaking his head. The mariachi slinks
away, and we exit right behind him.
At Oldham’s request, I pull into the back alley behind
his hotel to drop him off. “Get this thing legal!” he says,
flashing a cat grin and slapping the car’s hood. I study him
as he walks away, collecting a snapshot in my mind. You
have to do that with a guy like Will Oldham. You just don’t
know when you’ll ever see him again. F
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