Julian Lynch Profile ...
Eric Shapiro - for NY Press/City Arts ... August 2010
If such a thing exists as a distinctively 21st-century musician, Julian Lynch is it. His music is comprised of an amalgamation of styles from world music, to jazz, to rock, gleaned in equal part from Internet excursions and formal study. He is by no means the first to wed, for example, African polyrhythms with psychedelia, but he does it in a way that feels natural and unforced. In addition to dabbling in a variety of genres, Lynch is a multi-instrumentalist, most proficient with clarinet but also able to play guitar, keyboard, bass and drums. In a typical show of humbleness,
Lynch hails from Ridgewood, New Jersey, the same affluent suburb that spawned members of Ducktails, Real Estate, and Alex Bleeker and The Freaks, many of whom are frequent collaborators. Nevertheless, he sees his hometown more as a “community of friends” than a legitimate music scene.
Lynch’s first full-length album, Orange You Glad, gained modest attention in the indie press, but its lo-fi production and occasional lack of direction made it easier to appreciate for its unlikely smorgasbord of styles than for its songwriting. Follow-up LP Mare is just as adventurous, but also a lot more focused and accessible. It alsomade a much bigger splash than its predecessor, earning positive reviews from many publications including Pitchfork, where it received an 8.5.
Nevertheless, Julian Lynch has remained humble. Despite his talent and considerable knowledge of everything from jazz musicians to sci-fi B movies, he is always quick to point out that others know a lot more than him. He has not taken success as license to bludgeon anyone with his ego. On the contrary, he is always quick to temper even the most minor of criticisms with apologies and disclaimers. A cynic might say he’s concerned about his image, but to me his lack of malice towards just about anyone seems genuine.
But don’t take that to mean he doesn’t have strong opinions. Although Lynch is mostly content with how his music is portrayed in the media, he takes issue with a few common misconceptions. He feels that critics sometimes make too much of his music’s esoteric influences. “I listen to a fair amount of Bollywood pop songs and that’s exotic and sexy to people and a good thing to print. But I also listen to Frank Sinatra and Pink Floyd.” For all its ethnic flavors, Lynch’s sound is firmly moored in familiar folk, country and especially rock archetypes. “Rock is the musical language earlier on in my life. I guess that’s sort of what I default to.”
Lynch cautions fans against trying to interpret his lyrics. “I don’t really know how much they’d get out of it. I think a lot of them sound cryptic to people that to me make perfect sense because they pertain to a specific experience I’ve had. But I have to say, people’s misunderstandings are hilarious.” Melody, on the other hand, is a key component of Lynch’s unusual songwriting. “I’ll fill a cassette tape up with drum tracks and use one of them and then layer stuff over it. That’s really how the songs start; I rarely sit down with a guitar. If anything, I have no idea what the vocal melody’s gonna be like until I’m almost done with the song.”
Lynch stresses that his lo-fi sound is a practical necessity, not an aesthetic choice. As a consequence of his preference for tape over digital recording, Lynch is forced to make due with cheap equipment: “If I had a bigger space and had some money [for better recording equipment], I don’t think people would think of my music as being lo-fi. It’s not a choice.” The same goes for instruments; Lynch gets most of them secondhand. “I used to live in DC and my friends started to notice that I was collecting lots of instruments and they would give me their old crap. I got my clarinet in this thrift store for $40 bucks.”
Lynch is glad people are enjoying his work, but don’t expect him to become a full-fledged rock star anytime soon. His ambitions go beyond just playing and recording music. Currently a resident of Madison, Wisconsin, he is pursuing a PhD in ethnomusicology, the social and cultural study of music locally and globally, at [probably the University of Wisconsin]_______. He considers class a lot more stressful than performing live. “You can always knock down a couple of beers before playing a show whereas I think in a seminar that’s pretty unacceptable,” he jokes.
Balancing education and a music career presents some difficulties for Lynch. Foremost among them, he can’t tour extensively when school is in session. This dilemma is in part responsible for giving rise to an idea Lynch has long considered: playing shows via webcam. “There’s people who buy my records who are in Europe or Japan or Australia and I don’t really have any way to get out to any of those places at this point in my life. With technology, I can reach them.” So far, Lynch has played two webcam shows, both of which went smoothly, and he hopes to do more in the future.
While Lynch admits that he has benefited creatively from the music lessons and educational opportunities that come along with a comfortable upbringing, he feels no guilt drawing on foreign, often-times impoverished cultures for inspiration. “I can understand accusations of appropriation on a musical or artistic level, but it’s weird when it’s O.K. to bite off a rock artist that lives down the street but not someone who comes from another culture.”
Furthermore, Lynch points out that cultural cross-pollination has been occurring for long enough that when he incorporates, say, elements of Indian music into a song, he could just as easily be borrowing from the Beatles as from a musician who actually comes from India. The real factor keeping non-Western music from Western audiences, Lynch explains, is not appropriation, but accessibility. “Granted, through Torrenting you can get whatever music you want on the internet so easily,” he concedes. “But most people don’t do that. They go to iTunes and big chain record stores that don’t have much of a selection of non-Western music.”
In addition to playing live, Lynch has devoted the summer to working on a new LP, which he estimates to be 70% complete. “I’m a lot farther along than I thought I’d be. I’m starting to feel more comfortable about starting school again because I know I won’t have a bunch of unfinished tracks to loom over me.” And you should feel more comfortable going back to school knowing there’s a Julian Lynch record on the horizon.
If such a thing exists as a distinctively 21st-century musician, Julian Lynch is it. His music is comprised of an amalgamation of styles from world music, to jazz, to rock, gleaned in equal part from Internet excursions and formal study. He is by no means the first to wed, for example, African polyrhythms with psychedelia, but he does it in a way that feels natural and unforced. In addition to dabbling in a variety of genres, Lynch is a multi-instrumentalist, most proficient with clarinet but also able to play guitar, keyboard, bass and drums. In a typical show of humbleness,
Lynch hails from Ridgewood, New Jersey, the same affluent suburb that spawned members of Ducktails, Real Estate, and Alex Bleeker and The Freaks, many of whom are frequent collaborators. Nevertheless, he sees his hometown more as a “community of friends” than a legitimate music scene.
Lynch’s first full-length album, Orange You Glad, gained modest attention in the indie press, but its lo-fi production and occasional lack of direction made it easier to appreciate for its unlikely smorgasbord of styles than for its songwriting. Follow-up LP Mare is just as adventurous, but also a lot more focused and accessible. It alsomade a much bigger splash than its predecessor, earning positive reviews from many publications including Pitchfork, where it received an 8.5.
Nevertheless, Julian Lynch has remained humble. Despite his talent and considerable knowledge of everything from jazz musicians to sci-fi B movies, he is always quick to point out that others know a lot more than him. He has not taken success as license to bludgeon anyone with his ego. On the contrary, he is always quick to temper even the most minor of criticisms with apologies and disclaimers. A cynic might say he’s concerned about his image, but to me his lack of malice towards just about anyone seems genuine.
But don’t take that to mean he doesn’t have strong opinions. Although Lynch is mostly content with how his music is portrayed in the media, he takes issue with a few common misconceptions. He feels that critics sometimes make too much of his music’s esoteric influences. “I listen to a fair amount of Bollywood pop songs and that’s exotic and sexy to people and a good thing to print. But I also listen to Frank Sinatra and Pink Floyd.” For all its ethnic flavors, Lynch’s sound is firmly moored in familiar folk, country and especially rock archetypes. “Rock is the musical language earlier on in my life. I guess that’s sort of what I default to.”
Lynch cautions fans against trying to interpret his lyrics. “I don’t really know how much they’d get out of it. I think a lot of them sound cryptic to people that to me make perfect sense because they pertain to a specific experience I’ve had. But I have to say, people’s misunderstandings are hilarious.” Melody, on the other hand, is a key component of Lynch’s unusual songwriting. “I’ll fill a cassette tape up with drum tracks and use one of them and then layer stuff over it. That’s really how the songs start; I rarely sit down with a guitar. If anything, I have no idea what the vocal melody’s gonna be like until I’m almost done with the song.”
Lynch stresses that his lo-fi sound is a practical necessity, not an aesthetic choice. As a consequence of his preference for tape over digital recording, Lynch is forced to make due with cheap equipment: “If I had a bigger space and had some money [for better recording equipment], I don’t think people would think of my music as being lo-fi. It’s not a choice.” The same goes for instruments; Lynch gets most of them secondhand. “I used to live in DC and my friends started to notice that I was collecting lots of instruments and they would give me their old crap. I got my clarinet in this thrift store for $40 bucks.”
Lynch is glad people are enjoying his work, but don’t expect him to become a full-fledged rock star anytime soon. His ambitions go beyond just playing and recording music. Currently a resident of Madison, Wisconsin, he is pursuing a PhD in ethnomusicology, the social and cultural study of music locally and globally, at [probably the University of Wisconsin]_______. He considers class a lot more stressful than performing live. “You can always knock down a couple of beers before playing a show whereas I think in a seminar that’s pretty unacceptable,” he jokes.
Balancing education and a music career presents some difficulties for Lynch. Foremost among them, he can’t tour extensively when school is in session. This dilemma is in part responsible for giving rise to an idea Lynch has long considered: playing shows via webcam. “There’s people who buy my records who are in Europe or Japan or Australia and I don’t really have any way to get out to any of those places at this point in my life. With technology, I can reach them.” So far, Lynch has played two webcam shows, both of which went smoothly, and he hopes to do more in the future.
While Lynch admits that he has benefited creatively from the music lessons and educational opportunities that come along with a comfortable upbringing, he feels no guilt drawing on foreign, often-times impoverished cultures for inspiration. “I can understand accusations of appropriation on a musical or artistic level, but it’s weird when it’s O.K. to bite off a rock artist that lives down the street but not someone who comes from another culture.”
Furthermore, Lynch points out that cultural cross-pollination has been occurring for long enough that when he incorporates, say, elements of Indian music into a song, he could just as easily be borrowing from the Beatles as from a musician who actually comes from India. The real factor keeping non-Western music from Western audiences, Lynch explains, is not appropriation, but accessibility. “Granted, through Torrenting you can get whatever music you want on the internet so easily,” he concedes. “But most people don’t do that. They go to iTunes and big chain record stores that don’t have much of a selection of non-Western music.”
In addition to playing live, Lynch has devoted the summer to working on a new LP, which he estimates to be 70% complete. “I’m a lot farther along than I thought I’d be. I’m starting to feel more comfortable about starting school again because I know I won’t have a bunch of unfinished tracks to loom over me.” And you should feel more comfortable going back to school knowing there’s a Julian Lynch record on the horizon.