When people think of a single man and his Casio the name that leaps to mind before all others is the late Wesley Willis. Chris A. Cummings (a.k.a. Mantler) could easily be a Willis knock-off of with a better keyboard, but Mantler rises above the novelty and actually busts out some solid jams. Besides his combination of funk grooves and pop, Chris seems to have a fascination with wombos (word combinations) given the name 'œMantler'? and his first record Sadisfaction. Chris traded electrons about wombos and his music with Wavelength cub reporter, Miles Baker.

What is the first record you ever bought and what is the last one? What do you think this says about you?

I'm not sure, but one of the first ones I bought with my own money was the soundtrack to Mel Brooks' History of the World, Part One, in the summer of 1981 at a small record store in my Mom's hometown of Bellingham, Washington. One of the last ones I bought was an original pressing of Doug Carn's Adam's Apple at this great, great record store in Montreal, Primitive. I collect records, especially 60s and 70s jazz, so to find an original pressing of this rare album at a price less than $100 was something of a miracle. What it says about me is that I like songs that have a bit of novelty to them '” there isn't such a huge gap between "The Inquision Song" by Mel Brooks and the quirky, passionate "god-rock" of Doug Carn. Except that one is a comedy song and one is totally, deadly serious. But both are unique, personal expressions.

Around the turn of the century you were working with the theatre company Canadia dell'Arte doing their music and what not. You were even nominated for two Dora's. Are you still working with the gang from Canadia dell'Arte?

Canadia dell'Arte is still very much a going concern, and in fact two of the members of Canadia dell'Arte, Peter Reitzel and Dennis Frey have been working with me on a new project since February '” somewhere between a musical and an opera '” the details of which I won't go into here, but which, when finished, will be spectacular.

How is writing music for a play different than for writing for a record?

It's more like an assignment. You have to write music to suit a particular mood or atmosphere. I try to write "out of character" '” i.e., try not to sound like Mantler when doing work on other projects.

You were a film major when you went to school; why did you switch to theatre?

There isn't really a satisfactory answer '” things just turned out that way. I was at loose ends when I started writing songs, but I convinced myself that if I developed my abilities, eventually I would get good at it. That took awhile, but by 1998 I had written some songs I was proud of, and it was because of this that Peter Reitzel approached me to work on the musical Spirits. It turned out to be a hugely rewarding experience '” I got to work with Dennis Frey and Sam Allison, both of whom influenced me and helped me more than I can really say. Working with them changed my songwriting and made my whole horizon seem to expand, so it was a real turning point for me and it also led into my longtime friendship and collaboration with Zack G, who I met through Sam. He co-produced Sadisfaction with me in 2002, produced Landau in 2004 '” both of which were long projects '” and we are just starting to record again. I'm incredibly grateful to have met and worked with all these people, and hope to continue working with them.

What's your favourite wombo? Can you give me any good ones and why they are so damn good?

I don't know, but one of the best ones that people recently started saying is "craptastic". It's good because it expresses something that hadn't been expressed before: that sometimes things are so crappy they're fantastic.

By Miles Baker