Death Cab for Cutie

A conversation with Chris Walla

(August 2004)

Interview by Adam McKibbin

Thanks for doing the interview today.  How's life?

Life is quite good, thanks for asking.  It's hot in Seattle this week, and my windows are painted shut, but that's a minor complaint.

So...please bring us up to speed.  What's been going on since Transatlanticism had its release?

Lots of touring and very little of anything else.  Nick went to Comic Con in San Diego last week.  Jason got married and turned 30.  Ben bought a house.  I've been recording rock records for other bands.  Those things have eaten all of our non-tour seconds.

Well, the record was quite a success for you guys.  Is there a sense within the band that you're going to be around awhile? You're already approaching "veteran" status in indie rock years.

Funny, I feel like a veteran now.  I'd have scoffed at that concept a year ago, I think.  We've done a lot of things, many of them inspiring and good.  I see no reason for us to stop anytime soon.  We're all dying, however, to be done with the touring cycle for this record so we can write and record the next album.

You've co-headlined tours with Ben Kweller and The Dismemberment Plan.  A lot of bands I've talked to have had bad experiences with those 50/50 sorts of ventures, and it seems to get more complicated as the bands get bigger.  Is that just an ego thing?  What are the best aspects of that kind of tour?

The best aspects of doing a co-headlining tour are pretty unbeatable.  The idea is that you get to play for lots of people who will like your music but just haven't heard it yet.  And it's great to meet people who are in the same stage of their career as you are; similar glories, similar problems.  We've done very well with our co-headlining tours, and I certainly wouldn't rule out more in the future.

Transatlanticism was released on Super Audio.  Is SA worth checking into for the casually obsessive music fan, or is there a better format on the horizon?

There isn't a better format on the horizon, that's for sure.  I'm honestly a little tired of trying to explain the SACD's merits in text, because it's very, very difficult to convey without getting into a bunch of math that no one, myself included, understands.  I can say, however, that I can’t tell the difference between the SACD and our master tapes, whereas the CD is a much smashier and grainier representation thereof.  I do wish the SACD would catch on.

The title track of Transatlanticism was featured prominently in an episode of Six Feet Under, to cite just one of many examples.  Is it important to admire the various entities that license your music, or is that too idealistic?

I've never even seen Six Feet Under, but I hear it's good.  In fact, I don't even have a TV, so I have to trust what other people tell me about the shows or movies we're licensing our music to.  It's important to respect your work enough to be selective about what happens in that world, though, or you end up totally overexposed.

You guys were included on a pretty dreamy bill at Coachella last year.  If the world ended tomorrow and Ticketmaster put you in charge of the bill for Heaven, who'd be brought on board?

The Traveling Wilburys, because you'd get both Roy Orbison and George Harrison back.  That's all I could ever ask for, I think.  George was the antidote to Paul, and since his death I find my toxicology reports coming back less and less satisfactory.

What if you were booking Hell?

The Magnetic Fields will play the festival in my own personal Hell.  No one else.