Ah, the self-titled first release. A common animal, often seen in the shadows, preying upon your wallet. Creating a self-titled album is almost like creating a mission statement for what the rest of your band's career is going to be like: this is what we are, plain and simple, naked, no puns. Mother Mother is exactly like that; the album isn't gussied up for a night on the town; it highlights the band's strengths as a Pixies-like folk/country act having a lot of fun. The result is a catchy affair with its own share of infectious quirk. Ryan Guldemond sat down with Miles Baker, via the World Wide Web, to share these thoughts.

Speaking of self-titled albums, what's your favourite self-titled album?

Weezer. (The blue one.)

Is this your first tour on this side of the country? How is it going?

Yes, it is our first tour in Eastern Canada. It's a relatively small one as we're only playing a couple of festival dates and a couple of club dates but I think it's an important one. The Montreal Jazz Fest is a prestigious event that will offer a lot of exposure, and Toronto is a major hub in the Canadian market, so I think it's worth the trek. We haven't left yet, but I hope it goes well.

You mentioned that during the recording process you'd often only use one mic to record the guitar and voices. I'm curious as to why you'd do that when it seems doing separate tracks would be much simpler to mix.

Simpler to mix yes, but it was important to capture the spontaneity and honesty of what we do, which is not sitting in isolation booths trying to make things perfect. Also, we didn't have a lot of money to make the album and so we recorded 90 percent of it in our living room where the luxuries of modern studios weren't available.

Did you know that The Trinity Sessions by The Cowboy Junkies was recorded on one mic?

Yeah. In a church.

I ask because it was my Dad's microphone and I was curious if the legend had spread. Two mics were used, one to amplify the vocals but only one was used to actually record the band... I like the three-headed chicken on the cover of the CD, was there any grand design behind it?

One of the heads is actually a rooster, and we wanted to incorporate a rooster 'cuz there's some rooster talk in a couple of songs and it was also the year of the rooster when we made the record. The image of three fowls squawking was also meant to depict the vocal-heavy quality of the music.

You seem to get a lot of love from CBC, glowing reviews and such, what's that all about? Family connections? Bribery? Honest-to-goodness fandom?

Honest-to-goodness something.

So what's the plan? Is this what you're going to do with your life?

Music is a vast field. I will always be in it. As for Mother, I think there's a lot of life and potential. I'm excited to see it grow and develop.

Mother's self-titled debut CD is available from their website motherband.com and is worth picking up over groceries.

By Miles Baker