Depuis qu’il est arrivé, j’écoute Orange You Glad, le disque de Julian Lynch sans arrêt. Quelque chose de curieux m’y ramène, comme si j’écoutais un album entendu il y a longtemps et revenu à la vie. On y trouve un peu de tout, mais surtout une belle atmosphère soyeuse, mordorée, évoquant l’Inde de Ginsberg, le nomadisme éthéré de Slowdive mêlant drone et pop, rêverie sonore et illusions d’optique. avant ce disque, il avait sorti des CDR (dont un reproduit ci-dessus) et un split single avec les excellents Ducktails (dont j’écoute aussi beaucoup l’album sur Not Not Fun, sorte de version West Coast de la musique de Julian Lynch). J’ai envoyé quelques questions à Julian, qui vit dans le New Jersey. Voici ses réponses et pour trouver son disque, on peut aller sur son blog.

1.When did you start playing music and recording ?
I started playing clarinet when I was around 11 years old. When I was in high school I played in bands and wrote songs, and started recording music I was making by myself.

2.Did you have a musical background or upbringing ? Did you listen to much music at your parents’ home ?
My parents are not very musical people. My father used to tell me and my brother that he took piano lessons for 10 years and could only remember how to play « Heart and Soul. » Despite the fact that he is not particular talented as a musician, my father did like to listen to the radio when I was little, and so I was exposed to a lot of music that remains very important to me. We pretty much exclusively listened to the New York City based radio station 101.1 CBSFM. My parents did encourage me to start playing instruments from a young age, and they continue to be really supportive of me playing my own music.

3.What are your earliest memories of music ? What are your fondest tracks ?
My earliest memories of music are songs from Disney musical films and pop music like the Four Seasons. These remain some of the biggest influences on the way I appreciate and make music. In terms of my earliest memory of playing music, it would have to be blowing my lungs out on this toy harmonica I had as a kid, with which I used to torture the hell out of my poor dog’s ears.

4.What did you learn from releasing CDRs ? How do you feel about the CDRs tracks as compared to the ones on the LP ?- Actually, how did you start working on your first LP ?
I’m going to answer these questions together. Everything I’ve ever done up until my 7″ with Ducktails and the LP has been self-released CDR. So, I actually feel pretty at home in the world of diy-style CDR stuff, since that’s been how I’ve distributed music for 10 years. I didn’t actually do anything differently for the LP than for the CDRs, since I had actually planned on releasing Orange You Glad myself, on CDR. The opportunity just arose for me to distribute that album a bit more widely, so I did it.

5.Did you have a definite idea of the sound you wanted to achieve on the LP ? Or the themes and ideas that inhabit it ?
Not really, actually. I usually go into a project expecting it to sound totally different than the way it usually ends up. The disparity was actually particularly great with Orange You Glad, which was originally going to be titled Winterer.

6.There is also a sort of Indian / hindu connection in the LP sleeve and sometimes in the music itself : is it on purpose ? what relationship do you have with culture / music from India ?
I’m a student of South Asian studies, and I listen to a lot of contemporary Indian and Pakistani music both for research and pleasure. I’m definitely inspired by a bunch of it.

7.What about the tracks on the split record with Ducktails : are they from the same recording sessions as the LP ?
One of those tracks, « Garden 2, » comes from a CDR I did called Garden is Adventure. The other one, « Topi, » was on another CDR called Birthday. I did Birthday in September 2008, Garden in October, and the LP stuff between November and January.

8.Please tell me a bit about the singing : how comfortable are you with your voice ?
I’m becoming a little bit more comfortable with my voice…I don’t really consider myself a vocalist though, and I never really sing live. Most of the songs on Orange You Glad do have singing, though. I guess I actually like singing more than I like writing lyrics, which might make an impact on the fact that there’s some instruments here and there. But mostly, I just thought those 2 tracks sounded the way I wanted them to sound without needing to put vocals over them. There’s that one track, Mercury. That one has a lead clarinet melody. I usually play clarinet live, but at the time I hadn’t recorded that much clarinet material. I think I wanted to have a track with lead clarinet on it, so that’s the story there.

9.How do you feel about your Time after Time cover ? Are you a fan of Cindy Lauper’s recordings ?
I am a very big fan of her recordings! That song means a lot to me and it was recorded for someone.

10.What are your projects right now ? Any other records planned ?
Well…I’m a student so now that my semester is starting I won’t really be doing too much touring or recording. But I’m sure I’ll release more music soon!