BADBADNOTGOOD explains prolific career, reaches out to jazz beginners and returns to Brazil with no hard feelings

THE BADBADNOTGOOD returns to Brazil just over a year after a controversial performance at MITAshort flight festival in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. In the last edition, in 2023, the Canadian group was a victim of the organization of the event, which cast it to play on a stage with a premium track for an audience eager for the show. Lana Del Rey.

“Still, there were some people back there who were really interested in what we were doing, and we always had fun playing there,” said the bassist. Chester Hansen in an interview with Rolling Stone Brazil held last Thursday, the 7th. He was still at home in Los Angeles, but with his bags packed to travel to Brazil the next day.

It wasn’t the band’s first time in the country, and the incompatibility with fans of Del Rey It wasn’t enough to scare her away. On Sunday the 10th, the BADBADNOTGOOD will be in Balaclava Festin São Paulo, alongside artists such as Ana Electric Chicken and Dinosaur Jr.

Mid Spiral and collaborations

Shortly after passing through Brazil, in May and June 2023, the BADBADNOTGOOD released remixes with Turnstile and an EP with Baby Rose. In May 2024, the musicians released three EPs, which, in July, would be compiled into the band’s latest album: Mid Spiral.

Hansen justified the prolific nature of the group: “A few years ago, we couldn’t do anything because of the pandemic, so we recorded a lot of songs at that time. Now we’re looking for people we can collaborate with and new projects to work on.”

“We have some albums that we’re working on that are going to take years to finish because we’re doing a lot of stuff with different people. It’s cool to be able to make things that come together quickly. Like, the thing with Baby Rosewe recorded it in December and released it in March. It was really quick, and she’s incredible,” he added.

In the same period, there was also space for a reinterpretation of “This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody)”, by Talking Headsfor the re-release of the concert film Stop Making Senseby A24: “It was really cool and a kind of random thing they asked us while we were doing the Mid Spiral“.

“We love Talking Heads and we love Norah Jones“, he added Hansenmentioning the singer who took care of the song’s vocals.

While the Canadians’ penultimate album, Talk Memory (2021), took around two years to complete, Mid Spiral it was planned to be ready “very quickly”, because the musicians wanted “to have something to play live”. Furthermore, Hansen stated that “it’s cool to capture where they are musically and release it right away.”

“I think that [Mid Spiral] It’s also about community. [assim como Talk Memory]because, for the first time, we had many musicians in the studio, composing, traveling and playing together. Before that, we were three or four people”, reflected the bassist.

Matthew Tavareswho took care of the keyboards, left the band for good around 2019, having not participated in tours since 2016. Therefore, the most attentive listeners probably noticed that the BADBADNOTGOOD has transformed its sounds and “incorporated different instruments”.

The keyboardist was one of the founders of BADBADNOTGOOD and is responsible for the group name. Originally, Tavares would use it for a television project that ended up being abandoned. “We used it in our first videos and kept it,” he confessed. Hansen.

For the Mid Spiral, Alexander Sowinski, Leland Whitty and Hansen joined Felix Fox-Pappas, Juan Carlos Medrano and Kaelin Murphy. “Node Talk Memoryit was just the three of us [Sowinski, Whitty e Hansen]”, compared Hansen. “Leland He’s a great guitarist, so I think we went more in that direction on Mid Spiral“, replied the artist before being asked about the deepening of rock and fusion in the first installment of the album, titled Chaos.

“This came from the music we listened to, like jazz from the 1970s”, he pointed out. “We all grew up listening to rock, Led Zeppelin and things like that… So we always felt inspired by rock and its combination with jazz. It’s a mix of everything we heard, I guess.”

Mid Spiral also includes EPs Order and Growth. Regarding this division, Hansen explained: “We did this because we recorded in a very short period of time and wanted to release [o álbum] fast. So we decided to break it into segments. This way, we were able to finish six songs and send them for mixing and mastering while we finished six others. We thought it would be interesting to release the songs in groups and then put them together on vinyl.”

It can be difficult [fazer música sem letras]especially with so many artists. Someone may feel that a song is sad, or melancholic, while another may completely disagree. But I think in general we all have an idea of ​​the feeling behind a track when we record it. In a way, it’s quite interesting, because anyone can listen to it and create their own story. When you listen to something with lyrics, you’ll probably feel how the singer was feeling… But with instrumentals, you can fill that in with your own experience, and music can make you feel in a variety of ways, depending on who you are. and. – Chester Hansen

Brazil: influences and partnerships

A few hours before falling into the hands of journalists in interviews, the BADBADNOTGOOD released “Poeira Cosmica”, with Tim Bernardes and Arthur Verocai. The song was recorded five years ago, still in 2019 — the same year that the group met Brazilians in person for the first time, in São Paulo.

Hansen recalled that “it was very special to meet someone for whom” they have “so much admiration” and who they have listened to “a lot over the years”. On the occasion, the bassist and company played with Verocai and got to know everyone The Suit.

“We met on the same night and then sent the instrumental to Tim and Verocai“, he said Hansen about what began as a composition of Leland. “It was the first time we worked with him and we had a string arrangement of his [Verocai]which led us to work together on Talk Memory and other things.”

Calloused, Hansen said: “It took us a few years to launch it [‘Poeira Cósmica’] because we weren’t sure if we were going to put it on an album, what we were going to do with it. We decided this was the right time to launch it. She is very special, Tim He’s an incredible singer and songwriter.”

It could be kissing ass, but it is credible that the musicians of BADBADNOTGOOD They have great appreciation for Brazilian music. Second Hansenhis academic training was focused on the jazz that flourished in the United States “60 or 70 years ago”. “As we got older, we started traveling and were exposed to a lot of things through DJs and people we knew,” said the artist.

I think Brazilian jazz, specifically, is very good, because it combines samba, traditional Brazilian music and everything else. Furthermore, they [músicos brasileiros] they were listening to things that came from the United States, but they were creating their own sound, which led to Tropicália, psychedelic Brazilian music and everything. It’s very fascinating. Yes, Brazilian songs are probably our favorites. – Chester Hansen

range Mid Spiral“Seventh Rule” draws attention due to its title — with an acute accent and everything. The origin of the name, however, is associated with Star Trek. Hansen clarified: “I’m a big Star Trek fan. It’s kind of complicated, but in Star Trekthere are the so-called ‘Rules of Acquisition’, and the seventh rule says: ‘Keep your ears open’. I thought it was a cool musical reference, because it’s related to what we do, and I put it [o título] in Portuguese because it sounds kind of… Brazilian”.

In the middle of the conversation, another curiosity arose. The percussionist Juan Carlos — who has been on tour (and in college) with BADBADNOTGOODbut made his studio debut with the group in Mid Spiral — ended up in the name of another composition: “Juan’s World”. This is a reference, as pointed out Hansento the film The Stupider the Better (1992) — or, originally in English, Wayne’s World. “It’s pretty silly,” he said. Hansen.

Long-time friendship and jazz

Tavares, Sowinski and Hansen they met during college, in Toronto, in the 2000s. “One of the things that brought us together was our common taste for music. MF Doom“, he recalled Hansen.

THE BADBADNOTGOOD opened the rapper’s show in London more than a decade ago and even collaborated with him on the track “The Chocolate Conquistadors”, which makes up the soundtrack for the album. Grand Theft Auto Online: The Cayo Perico Heist. “We miss him”, added the bassist when mourning the death of MF Doomwhich took place in 2020.

Whitty joined the band in 2016, but was also part of the band’s circle of friends. BADBADNOTGOOD. Second Hansenafter such a long time of friendship, they created “their own language and a way of communicating that is very deep and different from when you start playing with a musician you just met.”

He continued: “We share the same ideas and tastes, it’s very special.”

For spectators, the improvisation characteristic of jazz may seem to be the result of a deep connection between the musicians. In the case of BADBADNOTGOODthese improvisations are more for the stage than the studio.

“Recording a song can take a few hours, or a day, something like that. When you finish that song, you’ve been playing it for so many years, sometimes, and in order for it to still be cool, we like to change it up — change the arrangement, make it shorter, longer, faster…”, he exemplified Hansen.

Although the Canadian group prefers to distance itself from labels, Hansen assured that “the music [jazz] traditional is very important” to his partners and him. “If someone says they listen to jazz more because they heard something we did, we are very honored. I hope this is the case. We try to bring together different influences and ideas”, he argued.