"[My upcoming album] deals with a very dark theme that people don't really like talking about and probably won't be expecting from a folky band like mine."

The Weather Station has been simmering on the back burner of Toronto’s music scene for over a year now and has recently started to turn up the heat. A monthly residence at the Tranzac and a recent tour with The Postage Stamps have helped expose Tamara Lindeman’s recording project turned experimental folk band to new and savvy listeners. Doug Naylor asked Tamara to report from her distant outpost with The Weather Station.

Did you inherit an interest in folk and country music from family or did you develop it on your own?

I would say I developed it on my own. I grew up in the country, so of course I felt it necessary to say I didn't like country music, and aside from the odd Ian & Sylvia record, I wasn't exposed to many of the greats when I was a kid. Of course, when I left the country and went to the city I fell hard for country music. It is the music of nostalgia after all. That was followed by indie music, experimental music, and falling madly in love with all things banjo at 19, which led to the joys of oldtime, bluegrass, and folk.

It seems like a lot of younger bands in the independent music scene doing roots-influenced music tend to be allotted a qualifier when describing their music: e.g. It's not simply 'country' or 'folk' but 'alt-country' or 'psych-folk' or some other mutation. Do you feel this is necessary? If pressed, what genre would you consider the Weather Station?

I do feel it's necessary. 'Folk' or 'country' are very specific genres that bring with them a host of very stultifying expectations ranging from structure to instrumentation to lyrics. And don't even get me started on the rigidity of bluegrass or oldtime. As far as The Weather Station is concerned, we're 'folk' because we use banjo, mandolin, and violin, and there’s not a whole lot of wailing guitars or distortion, although there’s certainly some. But other than that, I'm pretty much just making the music I want to make, genre or no. Hence I tend to add the 'experimental' tag. I'm influenced as much by, say, Caribou as I am by the The Stanley Brothers.

Could you tell me some details about your recent Monthly Residence at the Tranzac? How is that working out for you?

It's been wonderful. The Tranzac is a treasure. We've got a Saturday a month (except this month, which is a Wednesday) and we've had really neat folks come play with us like Casey Mecija and Isla Craig, and our next show is March 12th with Sandro Perri and Eric Chenaux. I don't know how I managed to book those two on one day; it was kind of an accident. And quite terrifying, I might add. Those two are legends. Oh yes, and that's March 12th, 10PM, pwyc. Sometimes I bake cookies. You should come.

How do you usually come up with songs? Does someone come up with an initial melody or song structure that the others build off of? If not, then what?

It varies quite a bit in The Weather Station. Originally, this was a recording project, and it still is. Sometimes I'll take recordings to the band, and we then come up with an arrangement that may or may not resemble the recording. Then sometimes I'll take a fledgling song to the band who will come up with an arrangement and structure that forms the basis for the recording.

What's the story behind the name the Weather Station?

I was reading about high arctic weather stations – there were these tiny encampments insanely far north, manned by just one or two men up until the 60s when they were automated. I thought about what it would be like to have lived in such isolation for so long and then to suddenly be made obsolete by machines. And then I thought about the strangeness of watching the weather pass over the continent and reporting to cities far south. The name brought up lots of associations in my head – things that are changeable and out of our control, isolation, and obsolescence. And those were things that were in the music.

How do you feel about the current opportunities available for bands of your status in Toronto? Do you play as many shows as you'd like?

I feel like we're really starting to hit our stride now, and we're finally playing regularly. The Tranzac has certainly helped. But it did take a long time for us, especially cuz we started as a completely acoustic band with no drums. I think it's always easier, to a certain extent, for a rock band, because the music scene is a little more geared to that kind of music and there are more venues for it, more blogs writing about it, etc. It's been interesting being part of Entire Cities and The Weather Station, which both formed independently of each other at the same time. Entire Cities was able to become an experienced, mature band much quicker, in part because it would play 40 shows in the same time period that The Weather Station played 10, maybe.

My understanding is that your recent EP is of 4 songs that are intended to be part of a forthcoming full-length. How is that process coming? Where are you at?

Oh, I'm so close! I'm at the nitpicking stage right now – making decisions and changes and fixes and rerecording. I record everything myself on my laptop, and so it's an incredibly slow process, contending with my loud furnace and creaky house and my own limitations. That's in part why I put out the EP, cuz the idea of finishing the LP seemed insurmountable at the time and I thought it would be good to put something out in the world. It sounds odd, but I just had this idea in my head of the album I wanted to make when I taught myself recording four years ago, and I've been very slowly moving towards that goal ever since then, with many mistakes and detours and wrong turns along the way.

The full length is something of a concept album I guess, with a narrative structure. It's ambitious. And it deals with a very dark theme that people don't really like talking about and probably won't be expecting from a folky band like mine. Which makes it terrifying, cuz it's the kind of thing that could be awful or good. But it's also exhilarating. I've been incredibly stubborn about doing everything myself and staying true to my original idea and that feels good. That said, I will be incredibly happy to finish it and move on and start writing about other things.

Do you have any other ambitions with the band that you're pursuing at the moment, or hope to eventually?

Oh I was planning this narrative song cycle in one key that was supposed to be about an elderly couple bog farming in a post apocalyptic future. But I think that might have been a little too ambitious.
I'd settle for going on a nice tour.

By Doug Nayler