The Path

Jack kept staring up into the telling sky, waiting for something.
Anything.            
Everything.           
Jack stared and stared. Never once a blink. Never once a movement. Only a stiff board of a body, concentrating on the gray clouds forming above his head.            
Jack waited and waited.           
Jack knew it was coming.            
Jack…
A year earlier…           
A crowd gathered around the disheveled and limp body, sprawled across the wet, brown grass. Brown and old and dead, just like the body. Whispers flung about the sticky air in shocks and awes, just a little, maybe. Eyes were bold with worries and concerns but no hands dared to touch the body. One stranger knelt down, moved his head around a bit, extending his long, bird-like wrinkled neck, poking the body with his inexperienced eyes but never feeling it, only searching for something he knew nothing about. He rose slowly, cautiously, making a “TSK TSK” sound with his tongue to his teeth and turned to the crowd standing anxiously behind him.            
“I think he’s dead,” the stranger said but had no clue.            
“How do you know?” one called from the back.            
“He’s not breathing.”           
“Is there a pulse?”           
“I don’t know. I didn’t check.”            
“Then how would you know that he’s dead?”           
“Because I can tell he’s not breathing,” an accent of sorts bursting through his agitation.             Maybe the stranger was right?            
A dark-haired woman with weary emerald eyes, tugging the sides of her long red wool coat tight around her full body, with winter shivers down her back, pushed through the crowd until she was in front of them all. “Hold on, I’m a doctor,” her voice deep, authoritative, annoyed. “There’s always a doctor around at times like these,” the stranger mumbled, a sarcastic one. The woman shot him a look that said You asshole, a look that said Don’t test me, and marched over to the body, kneeled as the stranger had, checked for the pulse the stranger seemed to have forgotten about. She put her uncomfortable ear to the icy blue mouth, listening for any sign of breathing, any sign of life in the cold, stiff, lifeless body.            
“No pulse. He’s dead,” she called to the crowd without removing her eyes from what was before her.            
Sighs filled the air, a collective “I’m sorry for the poor guy” sigh that always found its way whenever a body was found.            
“Should we call the police? An ambulance?” a question from the back.            
“Yes,” was all the woman had to say before getting up and wiping away the non-existent dust from her pants.             
Jack walked down the same path he always walked down every Friday afternoon in McKinney Park. The snow, pure white, untouched, compacted, perfect, now ruined by the crunch and steps of his heavy feet. It was a secluded path, an unknown path, a path that wasn’t even meant to be a path, to exist. But he made the path and it was all his.            
The Jack Sariel Path.            
Jack named it after him, of course, and only to himself, because he discovered the path when it was just a straight line of nothingness cutting through petrified oak trees with fallen leaves and weeping limbs. It was narrow, so narrow, and dear Jack would scrape his sides getting from end to end of his path. But this didn’t bother Jack.            
This didn’t bother Jack because he would sacrifice anything for time alone with himself and the earth.            
But this Friday afternoon was unlike any other Friday afternoon in McKinney Park. This Friday was disturbed by a distant commotion and Jack, stopping in mid-stride, peaked through the trees with a squint so fierce, searching the blur of reds and blues and greens and whites and yellows and browns and all those colors of all those coats and all those people huddled together. Jack raised his left eyebrow.            
Jack was curious.           
Jack wanted to see for himself.            
Moving quickly, so dangerously through the skeletal, teeming path, and shuffling his shuffle so carelessly, Jack made it to the other side, through the exit patched with branches, to the top of the hill, to the end of his path. He now faced the idle football field where everyone unexpectedly gathered, for the first time since as long as he could remember, no snow stretching down to the feet of these strangers but instead fading away on the incline. Jack could see everything clearly now, his view broadening by such a high altitude. He rushed down to the bottom of the hill.             
The woman waited around for the ambulance to get there. She didn’t know anything. She didn’t know what happened but she knew she wanted to help somehow, somehow, maybe, to help this body. She can’t say anything more than what she saw, the body on the ground, and what she did, announce that he was dead.            
After what seemed like an eternity trembling in her long red wool coat on the field near the body with only a few strangers now waiting for the next step, the box-like white ambulance finally arrived. Two brawny men, in blue down jackets and blue slacks, holding red bags and their composure, exited their van and headed towards the woman. One of them called out into the endless sky, “Ya found a body?”            
“Yes. He’s right over here,” the woman responded with a slow move aside, the men now in full view of the body, the dead body across the dead grass.            
No one knew the body’s name. No wallet found to identify him. No marks to say who he was, if anyone recognized him. For all they knew, he was homeless, a wanderer, a lonesome drifter passing through McKinney Park. They all had stories for him.           
“Maybe he was a lawyer who knew too much.”           
“No, maybe he was just a messenger who got caught up in the game.”           
“No. No. He was just a business man in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Of course, they’ll never know who was right but their imaginations didn’t care.            
“Let’s bag it, Sam,” the man said, the man who made initial contact with the woman, writing information down on a white pad, on a metal clipboard. His partner, Sam, walked out from the back of the ambulance, a black body bag slung over his shoulder, over to the body, the dead body.            
“D.O.A?” Sam asked.           
“D.O.A.”           
The box-like white ambulance left the scene, that pitiable scene, with the body in a bag on a long stretcher in the back. The woman, the emerald-eyed doctor, turned to watch the van drive off, their sirens blasting and slicing the air like a sharp knife. She stood, she stood a long while watching nothing but the blue turn to black, the sun turn to the moon, the cold turn to a chill. The woman stood watching and in her watching, a new stranger emerged. Had he been there long? She didn’t know. But he watched her too. He watched her with a smile.             “What happened here? Was some hurt?” The new stranger questioned from far off, from his post closer to the hill, as he followed the ambulance in the distance with his inquisitive eyes. “No. Someone was found dead,” the woman inched closer. Jack’s eyes shot straight to her. “Really?”
“No one knew him. There was no wallet. The coroner’s probably going to mark him with a ‘John Doe’ toe tag.”            
“That’s sad.”           
“Yes. And I’m a doctor. Every time I think can handle these types of things, death and all, I am always wrong.”            
“You never get use to your job.”            
“I guess.”           
This stranger, the stranger she hadn’t seen when the crowd was full bodied, in full swing, introduced himself. “Well, I’m Jack Sariel. And you?”            
“I’m Audrey Abel,” the woman said, but her name didn’t matter. They never did.

***Present day…           
Jack turned his head away from the woman, clear tears, panged tears, staining his pale, ghost-like cheeks, angelic in the moonlight glare, and looked up to that telling sky once more, knowing, knowing so painfully what squall was ready to pass, a squall he’s met before. He closed his eyes, closed them tight, closed them tighter than he ever had, closed them tighter than he should, more tears escaping in a flush, and waited to see if the message was clear. It was and he could not hide from it. But he hoped he was wrong.            
He hoped but he wasn’t.           
The woman, with the tails of her long red wool coat flapping in the bitter wind, put her red gloved hand on Jack’s chin, a strong chin, a fearless chin, but an exposed chin, and turned his face to hers. He could feel the cold of her delicate fingers through the thin, so thin, so useless, cloth. It shall be done, his thoughts no longer attached to his memories.            
“What’s wrong?” The woman was confused.            
Bewildered.           
Attracted.           
Concerned.           
Jack’s shadowy black eyes stared harshly into hers, a chill felt through the outskirts of the path. “I’m sorry,” and he was but his hushed tone could only reveal what could only be revealed.            
And with this, Jack made a slow sweep closer to her, her silent, desperate plea, her silent, desperate “NO,” deafening. She knew him all too well now, without knowing him at all, and knew what was about to come but didn’t want it, she didn’t want it, but she couldn’t stop it, and she knew. He lifted his right hand, his right hand so use to this final moment, dreading it, over her frightened heart.            
Those same winter shivers she felt a mere year ago were back, back down her spine and into her toes. She was cold, incredibly cold, and was freezing in the muggy, searing air.
Her eyes, her beautiful emerald eyes, closed.  

Glory, Glory Hallelujah

The cover song. It can make or break an artist.Make them because if another musician covers their song and it turns out to be a huge success, they are set with a new found fame. Break them because if another musician covers their song and it turns out to be a bomb, they are stuck with the same fame they started with. Well, maybe the cover song, defined as any recording of a song that was “first recorded or made popular by somebody else,” would not necessarily “break them” as much as keep them stagnant. But what if the first is truer than the latter? Take for example Jeff Buckley’s 1994 version of “Hallelujah,” featured on his debut album Grace, originally recorded by Leonard Cohen, featured on his 1984 album Various Positions. Despite possible evidence to the contrary, it can be argued that Buckley was the sole musician to bring Cohen’s 1984 song to life. After its release, Buckley’s version has appeared on numerous “greatest cover songs” and “greatest songs” lists. A music electronic magazine, Digitaldreamdoor.com, ranked Buckley’s version as one of the greatest cover songs on their “100 Greatest Cover Songs” list while Rolling Stone Magazine ranked his remake number 259 on their “500 Greatest Songs of All Time” in 2004, stating that, “during his famed early gigs at the New York club Sin-e, Buckley used to break hearts with his version of this Cohen prayer. Buckley called it [sic] homage to ‘the hallelujah of the orgasm’…” On a 2003 “10 Best Cover Songs” list in The Agitator, written by Radley Balko,  Buckley’s “Hallelujah” was ranked number one with the comment, “best Cohen cover. Maybe best cover. Spooky. Romantic. Angelic. Ghostly. Beautiful.” (Cohen’s version was named the tenth greatest Canadian song of all time in Chart Magazine’s 2005 reader poll, while Rufus Wainwright’s cover of the song for the “Shrek” soundtrack was listed as number 70 for Retrocrush.com’s best cover songs list with the note, “Though I got a lot of requests to include the Jeff Buckley version of the Cohen tune, I really prefer the Rufus Wainwright version from the ‘Shrek’ soundtrack.  They’re all good no matter which one you prefer, for that matter. It’s such a beautiful soulful song from all three folks.”).The two songs, however, are drastically different. Cohen’s version is quite masturbatory – the vocals are mind-numbing and sleepy with a dependency on gospel hymn vocals and synth keyboards, definitive of 1980s folk – while Jeff Buckley’s 1994 take relies more on grieving guitar work. The vocals are reflective and mournful and overall, the song is fatalistic and religiously erotic. Unlike Cohen’s version, which the Canadian musician is quoted as saying took over two years to write in the 1993 Saturday Night article “Growing Old Disgracefully” by Ian Pearson, Buckley indulged himself in over 20 different experimental takes on the song, only to have Grammy Award-winning music studio engineer Andy Wallace splice together the final piece from said experimentations, thus arriving to the song heard on Buckley’s Grace, according to the Tim Buckley/Jeff Buckley biography Dream Brother by David Browne. Browne also wrote that Buckley discovered “Hallelujah” in 1991 after purchasing the Leonard Cohen tribute album I’m Your Fan while rummaging through record bins at music stores for different songs to cover. It was on that tribute that Buckley heard John Cale’s 1991 version of the song and decided to put his own spin on it.Lyrically, both Buckley’s and Cale’s versions are different from Cohen’s 1984 original. All three contain explicit biblical references in the lyrics – for example, the line “She broke your throne and she cut your hair and from your lips, she drew a ‘Hallelujah’,” which can be said to be taken from the idea of Samson’s strength in the Book of Judges – however, in 1994, Cohen released a different version of the song on Cohen live (recorded in 1988), retaining only the final verse of the song, and in this version, the lyrics take on more of a sexual shape. It is said Buckley and Cale mixed the original lyrics with the 1988 version.But how were Jeff Buckley and other artists able to obtain the rights to record and distribute their variations? According to a 2004 article, “The Cover Song Quagmire: Three Ways to Obtain Mechanical Licenses for Legally Recording/Distributing Cover Versions on CD,” by Dale Turner, as featured on www.CleverJoe.com, in order to legally obtain rights to record and distribute a cover version of any song, a musician must first obtain mechanical licensing, which is the licensing of copyrighted musical compositions for use on records, tapes, audio CDs and certain digital configurations. A musician can also obtain digital licensing, which is the licensing of copyrighted musical compositions in a digital format, such as downloads, on-demand streaming and CD burning. The article goes on to say that musicians covering a song should be aware that while they are granted mechanical licensing, it does not mean they can reprint the original lyrics of the song in their album’s sleeve. According to Turner, a performer must clear the rights to reprint any lyrics through the publisher directly and in order to use audio excerpts from the musician’s original master recording, the cover artist would need to be cleared separately by obtaining a master recording license straight from the record label that owns the master to the recording. Turner also goes on to say that once a song has been commercially released by an artist, that particular song can conceivably be re-recorded and released by anyone choosing to do so, only holding true if the melody and lyrics aren’t do not significantly differ in the cover version and that proper fees and royalties are directly paid to the song’s copyright holder (he does warn that if a musician is to release cover songs on an album, then try to acquire proper licensing afterwards, they are no longer eligible and can possibly subject themselves to penalties and prosecution for copyright infringement). So in short, anyone redistributing and re-recording a song is entirely accountable for meeting the licensing requirements of said song and paying any related fees and royalties to the owner of the said original material.It seems that Buckley was right to take on the task of being another musician to cover such a poetic song. His cover, despite the fact that it had failed to peak on the charts, according two Billboard websites: www.billboard.com (Billboard Magazine) and www.billboard.biz, (in fact, according to the aforementioned sites, neither John Cale’s 1991 cover version of “Hallelujah” nor Leonard Cohen’s original made any of charts), has received praise among music-aficionados. On an internationally-visited website dedicated to cover songs, www.cover-vs-original.com, Buckley’s version has so far received 78.5 percent out of 1071 votes in a poll about which version of “Hallelujah” is the better one, while Cohen’s original has only received 21.5 percent. A user, simply identified as Matt from New York City, commented on the site, “Buckley’s stripped-down version sounds more sincere & graceful. Cohen’s original seems less elegant & his spoken/sung lyrics sound almost tongue-in-cheek. Just my opinion. They’re both great versions of a masterfully written song.”  While others on the website do not necessarily agree that Buckley’s version is the “ultimate best,”  most favor the cover versions over the original. One user, Kelly from Ottawa, Canada, wrote, “Leonard Cohen is an amazing poet and songwriter; however, his voice does not do his songs justice. Some of the best versions of Cohen’s songs are covers, but this does not discredit Cohen’s talent in writing the songs.” Another user, Jan Verdonck from Antwerp, Belgium, wrote, “I’m sorry to say that my favorite version is the John Cale cover. You can come across it in the first ‘Shrek’ movie. Sadly, on the soundtrack CD, it’s yet another performer, Rufus Wainwright, the least of all, in my humble opinion.”An album review of Grace on Sputnikmusic.com called Buckley’s remake “intensely emotional” and “one of two of the album’s finest moments.” Another review on Amazon.com stated that the cover was “taking a Leonard Cohen standard and making his own testament.”There are also two online forums that have dedicated threads to the song. One thread, found on Whirlpool.com, which dates from September 28, 2005 to May 24, 2006, is a long discussion on the “most beautiful song in the world,” starting with one user claiming that such a titled belongs to Buckley’s “Hallelujah” (over 25 out of 35 posts tended to agree). Another forum, which dates from April 28, 2002 to May 24, 2006, on 8notes.com, a site devoted to finding sheet music for particular songs, starts with an inquiring into how to find sheet music for Cale’s version as heard in “Shrek” but turns into personal opinions of the song. Other artists who have put their spin on the 1984 classic are: Bono, lead vocalist of U2, Bob Dylan, Allison Crowe, crooner K.D. Lang, “brat pack” member Anthony Michael Hall, Ryan Adams with Willie Nelson, Fionna Apple, Imogen Heap, Ari Heist, Jeff Buckley fan Howie Day, Gavin DeGraw, Irish folk artist Damien Rice, Bronx-born Regina Spektor, Starsailor (who took their name from a Tim Buckley, father of Jeff Buckley, song) and Gord Downie. What’s particularly interesting is that Bono and U2 guitarist the Edge performed “Hallelujah” at one of their concerts out of respect for Jeff Buckley after his drowning in 1997, (this isn’t a bit surprising as many artists covered songs by Buckley after he died, most notably Canadian band Our Lady Peace, who did a rendition of Buckley’s song “Eternal Life” during numerous concerts). There is also an A Cappella version of “Hallelujah” by Clemson University’s Take Note, which is included on the Best of College A Cappella 2006 album. And, to add, Emo group Fall Out Boy sampled “Hallelujah” for their track “Hum Hallelujah” on their 2007 album Infinity on High.Each artist adds their own flare to the already haunting yet oddly uplifting Cohen copy but it seems most artists follow step-by-step the notes of either Buckley’s or Cale’s variation rather than Cohen’s. Most artists listed who have covered the song have covered it after Cale’s version was released and most notably, a large body of artists covered it after Buckley had, which makes one wonder: while some musicians put there own spin to the Cohen song, was Jeff Buckley really the musician who helped propel it into the spotlight?Let’s take a look at two particular covers: K.D. Lang’s, featured on her album Hymns of the 49th Parallel , and Anthony Michael Hall’s, for 2004’sThe Dead Zone television soundtrack. KD Lang’s version relies heavily on the piano, as it is the primary instrument that carries out the song, rather than the guitar-driven and reverb-heavy 1994 Buckley version, but her voice, indeed full and harmonic, tends to lean towards Buckley’s melody, creating a mix of the gospel-inspired style of Cohen’s original and Buckley’s lament one. Anthony Michael Hall, however, copies Buckley’s song note for note. The guitar work, while not as overplayed, sounds close to Buckley’s and Hall’s vocals too, while not as sharp or melodic, are similar. One student journalist, Audrey S. Yap, notes in her 2004 article “Foreseeing Death: A Truly Weird Science” for the University of California at Berkley newspaper The Daily Californian,  “the highlight of the [The Dead Zone] album is Anthony Michael Hall’s acoustic, wailing rendition of ‘Hallelujah.’ Earnest, unexpected and complete with choir back-ups and angelic cooing, Hall renders a lullaby quality you’d expect to hear in Baptist church.’According Answers.com, Jeff Buckley’s version has appeared on numerous television shows and movies and also has been mistaken as the original version. When researching the number of films and television shows, it turns out that “Hallelujah” has appeared in, those listed were released after 1994, as according to answers.com, and no one show or movie using the song premiered between 1984, when Cohen’s version was recorded, and 1994, when Buckley debuted his cover.  In particular, three movies listed (1996’s “Basquait,” 2001’s “Shrek,” and 2004’s “The Edukators”) featured covers of the 1984 original – “Basquait” and “Shrek” both used John Cale’s 1991 remake (Rufus Wainwright’s 2001 recreation of Cale’s cover was included on the “Shrek” soundtrack), while “The Edukators” played Buckley’s version. (Other movies that used “Hallelujah,” but didn’t list which version, are: 1995’s “When Night is Falling,” 2005’s “A Lot Like Love,” the 2006 documentary “Deliver Us From Evil,” and 2006’s “Lord of War.”)As for television shows, Showtime’s lesbian drama “The L Word,” which premiered in 2004, used Wainwright’s cover, while the campy teen soap opera “The O.C.” featured Buckley’s rendition twice and once by Imogen Heap and coroner-turned-unofficial copper drama, NBC’s “Crossing Jordan,” which premiered in 2001, used Buckley’s cover in one of the episodes. Other shows that used “Hallelujah” with no mentioned of which cover are: BBC’s “Holby City,” FOX’s “House,” ABC’s “Grey’s Anatomy,” ABC Family’s “Falcon Beach” (a Canadian show), CBS’ “Criminal Minds” and “Without a Trace,” NBC’s “Third Watch,” and FX’s “Nip/Tuck.”It seems that if it wasn’t for Buckley’s now-famous remake, or even Cale’s 1991 cover, Cohen’s original would not have gained as much popularity as it has in the past 13 years after Buckley’s release of his debut album Grace, which his version appears on. The number of artists who have went on to record their own rendition of “Hallelujah” either debuted or covered the song after 1994. However, one cannot just attribute the revitalization of Cohen’s 1984 song to Buckley’s or Cale’s popular take on it.  If it also weren’t for popular culture, i.e. being television shows and mainstream films, Cohen’s “Hallelujah” might not have received as much recognition as it has.  This theory, however, bears a new question: which came first, the cover or the television show/film?That’s something that can only be speculated and answered another day.

Marissa Moore of The Trucks

Chief Magazine: How would you describe your band?

I would describe us as friendly.  …Definitely bizarre and a little bit hyper active.

What motivated you to start The Trucks?

The trucks formed in March, 2003.  I had just graduated with an Art degree from Western Washington University and I was working at a coffee shop and not quite sure what to do with myself. I was good friends with Kristin, and sometimes she and I would get together and she’d work on her music (her solo project is called Kristin Allen-Zito) while I drew comics. We ended up inspiring each other, and she mentioned us forming a band but I didn’t really take it seriously since the last music I played had been trumpet all through high school, which I hadn’t touched since, and then more recently a toy xylophone, which I just messed around with. Anyways, I went on vacation (a road trip with friends) and by the time I got back, Kristin had hooked up with Faith and they’d started working on some songs. They already had a show booked up at Western Washington University when I got back and they were like, “Okay, we’re  a band now! Get out your xylophone.”  So I did and we had a great first show, which is actually where our record label scouted us. That was three years ago and we are so grateful we’re still writing and playing and recording and people are coming out to see us and buy our music.

Another big reason for starting the band was sexual frustration! A lot of my comics at the time dealt with that too.

Sexual frustration – how so? What were you guys so sexually frustrated about?

Well, I was dating a Vegan boy who was always saying the most amazingly ridiculous stuff. For example, he said, “I’ve never gone down on a girl” because he doesn’t eat meat and it would make him sick. I am serious. I think we went out for like a month. I made a bunch of comics about it and actually two of the songs on our CD stem directly from those comics – “Why the?” and “Come back.” Faith was in the process of a big breakup and a few songs came from that – “Old bikes” and “March 1st.”

“Titties” asks “What makes you think we can fuck just because you put your tongue in my mouth and you twisted my titties baby” and “Diddlebot” is about a dildo. We just were all dealing with dissatisfaction in our relationships and the idea of “how do we get what we want” kept running through our heads. Lindy was the only one who really had it good in that regard, but she humored us.

What kind of comics do you draw?

My comics project is called “sparkylittleheart.” I draw really sloppy but true comics about real situations in my life – usually just one or two panels, usually one-liners. There’s an element of sarcasm, sadness and strength in the characters. Most of them are autobiographical and starring my friends, especially Kristin, Faith and Lindy because they are all really funny and they crack me up – also starring ex-boyfriends that deserve some humiliation.

Lately, I’ve been getting into computer drawings too, which are different from “sparkylittleheart” but still pretty fun. (http://groups.myspace.com/welovemarissa39struestories)

Why did you start drawing comics?

I started drawing comics to organize my life, get things in perspective. Like you can handle it if you just put it in a box..

Who influenced you and what comics did you read as a teen and what kind of comics do you read now?

Well, when I was little, my dad always got all the Far Side books. I liked the twisted humor and just thought they were amazing. I was never really interested in the “strips.” They just weren’t pretty, sad, or funny enough for me. Then in high school, I discovered Love and Rockets, then Lynda Barry, and was just amazed that someone could portray humanity so truthfully. I guess in the category of “comics,” I’d include anything combining drawing and words. Now, I love the artists of the Royal Art Lodge, and Jeffrey Brown and Chris Ware, Maakies, Teppei Ando and, of course, still Lynda Barry.

Have you ever met Lynda Barry?

No, I’ve never met Lynda Barry. I’d love to.

What would you do if you did? What would you say?

I’d want to talk to her about how to stay calm and get things done. She’s pretty private and solitary, and I’d just love to sit around and see how she does it.

What are your aspirations with your comics? Is it just a hobby or is it something that you take seriously and put genuine effort into?

I take it seriously. I went to college for it and, actually, it’s incorporated into every creative project I do. Some of my comics are on the CD cover and always on the flyers and posters for our shows. Faith and I designed most of the T-shirts too. The band is really busy now, so most of my creative energy is going toward that, but there’s lots of room for the comics in the Trucks. I would like to publish them once I get a cohesive set, but in the meantime, I’m jotting down stuff, sketching and filling my notebooks, storing ideas for when I have more time to make them pretty. I’m working on a website right now and I have a few self-published ‘zines, available at www.clickpoprecords.com.

Do your band mates have other hobbies/talents other than music? If so, are they published?

Faith makes the craziest, most brilliant drawings. Stuff like shrimp kings with sand castles and vein hearts and dancing shit microbes. Whenever she fucks something up, she just paints a big, sloppy American flag over the whole thing. Her art is on the CD cover too. Kristin has had a solo music project for several years. She has two records out and her latest, “Helium,” is also on Clickpop records (www.myspace.com/kristinallen-zito). Lindy’s a really great drummer and just generally kicks ass. When we’re on vacation, she’s in two other bands – Everybody’s Debbie, and Flacid Wolf.

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You mentioned that you incorporate comics into every creative project you do – other than comics and the Trucks, what other projects are you involved in?

I incorporate comics into my gallery shows, which are usually one-panel comics with more detail, writing, acting, video, animation, personal diary, everyday life. I have a strange sense of humor and it’s showing constantly.

Who are you digging right now?

We really like Hot Chip and I love the Blow. They’re kinda experimental and art electro-pop. We’re really, really into local music and are supportive of a lot of local artists. We just like people who sing about things that are real and have a sense of humor.

Tell me about the process of your work – from song writing to album recording, live show to preparation, inspiration to actual drawing.

It’s really spontaneous. There are four of us and we all have different personalities. As soon as we get together, we just build on each other’s ideas. One person would write the lyrics and another, the instrumentation. It’s absolutely a collaboration. It’s pretty flexible and I think that helps us a lot creatively.

I know you said the songs are a collaboration, but how do you come up with the names of your songs?

Usually, it’s whatever shorthand we call them at practice.

Why Seattle?

We’re actually from Bellingham, it’s an hour away from Seattle. Bellingham is where the band started. It is extremely supportive of local artists. There are a lot of music magazines that only deal with local artists and several venues that are supportive of it. We love the area.

When I moved to Seattle, I really missed it. It’s just easier in Seattle for music. It’s a bigger city. All these other artists are coming up with stuff. There’s a lot of competition. You go see a show and it’s high energy.

What are you listening to right now? What’s the music in the background?

I’m at a coffee shop right now, so I don’t know what’s playing. But I was listening to Tiny Vapors earlier. They’re a Seattle band.

What do you like about Tiny Vapors?

It’s a woman. It’s just her and a guitar. It’s not the typical singer-songwriter stuff. There’s a grainy quality that makes it really intimate and the songs are haunting. There is also mythology in the lyrics. I personally just really like that.

I’m actually thinking about moving to Seattle.

Oh really? You should. The Northwest is a really nice place to live. People are really nice.

Speaking of people, how does MySpace factor into your band and fan base?

We resisted doing MySpace at first because it seemed impersonal. None of us were really on it so we didn’t know how many people used it. But it’s really valuable for us. It helps our fan base because if we’re on a page of a band someone likes, they can swing by our page and listen to a couple of tracks and see if they like us.
I think it’s beneficial for bands like us – bands just starting up. It’s a way for people to familiarize themselves with our music without paying $10 for a show and not liking it. It’s also great to find artists to tour with. It’s great for us to find artists doing things we’re interested in.

What’s up next for the Trucks?

We have a tour coming up in March. We’re focusing the next month or two on writing new songs. We just got back from our first tour and we settled back into writing new material.

We have a new distribution deal with NY-based SpinArt Records and our CD is being released nationwide on January 24th. It’s a really big deal for us and we’re super excited about it!

How was your first tour?

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It was excellent. It was really great.
A lot more stressful than we thought but it was great. We have a really good booking agent. All we’d have to do is show up and play. She is so efficient with that. It was just a really good experience. There was a good turn out at our shows. We were prepared to play night after night to no one but that wasn’t the case and I’m glad. It was a nice surprise.

Who’d you play with?

We played with Ultraviolet in Los Angeles. They were extremely fun, which is really funny because it was our worst show because we were
so tired…

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We also played with Hott Pink in San Francisco and we played with Monfrere when we got back home. Another band we played with were Ice Age Cobra and they were really fun to play with.

What was the best show the Trucks ever played?

Bellingham at the Nightlight with two of our favorite bands, Federation X and A Gun That Shoots Knives, on October 14th. We hadn’t played there for a long time and were about to leave on tour and it was packed to the brim and everyone was so into it. It made us feel so loved!

What band or bands would you just die for in terms of performing with?

The Go-Team, the Beastie Boys, Le Tigre, Hot Chip, the Blow. Oh yeah, and the Flaming Lips!

What city have you not performed in that you’d like to perform in?

We really, really want to go to Tokyo. We love those kids.

Does your booking agent choose all your shows or do you have a hand in it?

We chose our shows based on what we want to support and by what bands and venues are involved.  We’re not interested in doing the whole kiss this or that industry ass and get somewhere.  We work with people we like and not people we don’t. Our record label gives us all the  space to be ourselves. We weren’t even thinking about money from the start, so that’s just an added bonus at this point. We’ll do a show for less if it’s for something we believe in, like all ages venues and charity benefits.

Our booking agent basically helps us arrange shows, taking our suggestions of bands venues, and events we want to be a part of. For example, we really wanted to be in the Seattle PRIDE parade and she’s helping us get that arranged. But no one tells us what to do.

And what are you planning to do for the holidays?

Some of us are going out of town for the holidays so we’re taking a three week vacation, which just started. When we get back, we have a new practice space we’re moving into so if we like it, we’re going to write new stuff. The shows won’t start until three weeks into January. I’m spending time with family. There are two members who have really substantial relationships so they are looking forward to spending time with their significant others.  You’re in Brooklyn, right?

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Yeah, New York.

We were just in New York. It was really nice. We’d loved it, but of course you got to. It’s New York. We were there for five days and filmed a music video in Central Park. We also got a photo shoot in the Central Park zoo. One of our songs is about riding bikes through New York City.

And for what song did you shoot the video for in New York?

“Afros.” It was written from Faith’s dream about riding bikes through NYC.

How about a crazy story? Just for kicks.

I don’t know. There are two crazy things I want to tell you about. The first one, we were driving through Northern California and we saw signs for elk crossing and when we were driving around the corner we had to slam on the brakes because cars were stopped waiting for elks to cross. They were moving really slow. We realized that one of the elks was limping and the rest were keeping pace and protecting him to make sure he wasn’t left behind. We didn’t think we were going to die. It’s just a really cool story from the tour.
The second one, our van broke down near Los Angeles when we were going through the Grapevine and we were stuck at this truck stop for six hours, so when we finally got to the hotel in Los Angeles, we wanted to die. We weren’t sure how bad the van was broken but it ended up getting fixed and it didn’t cost a lot.

One more thing, how were you when you were a child and how does it differ from now?

Well me personally, I was really shy when I was young. I’m 28 now. At 18, I started getting into art. It was a creative outlet. But it was when the band started when I was 25 that I realized I really love attention and like to show off. I love to entertain. I’m a lot more of a show-off and an extrovert now than I ever was before. The band really helped me stop being shy.