MJ LENDERMAN

MJ LENDERMAN

NINE PERFECT MINUTES

Lenderman comes clean, kinda

Jaan Uhelszki

Forewarned isn’t always forearmed. We knew that MJ Lenderman wasn’t going to be a chatterbox after we read an interview last year in Indy Week where he told the reporter that he didn’t think he was very good at talking. “The less people hear me talk, the more they can project on me or think I’m a smart guy,” he maintained.

We were not going to let him off the hook that easily. We read the Carson McCullers 1940 classic The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter about a deaf-mute to whom the lonely and isolated people of a Southern town turn for silent solace, all of them projecting their own meaning onto him, thinking he was almost a living Buddha. And we all know that Lenderman is a Catholic. (And if you don’t, he mentions it enough in his songs: To wit in “Joker Lips,” “Every Catholic knows he could have been Pope.”)

But the thing is, MJ Lender man is a smart guy. Wry, prophetic, full of advice for Gen-Z angst, with a touching affection for ’90s nostalgia, a decade he just managed to squeak into. He reads the late great Southern myth annihilator Harry Crews, the selftaught Larry Brown, Richard Brautigan, the bridge between the Beat movement of the 1950s and the youthquake of the 1960s, and Ashleigh Bryant Phillips; he listens to artists like David Berman, poor Jason Molina, and Bill Callaghan, taking cues from their eccentricity and genius, and turning out his own quiet masterpieces, full of uncommon wisdom, funny prophesy, and deadpan humor. If he doesn’t watch it, they’re going to start calling him the Voice of a Generation, like they did Conor Oberst two decades before. And you remember how much Oberst liked that. On the brink of the release of his fourth album, Manning Fireworks, we decided to Zoom in for a quick interrogation that we call Nine Perfect Minutes, an interview style that’s a lot like speed dating for reluctant witnesses like Lenderman. We only use this on the strong silent types and withholders who try to get off with “All the answers are in my music.’’ After nine minutes, Lenderman, who goes by Jake, started thawing. A little.

What astounds me, for a singer-songwriter, you’re such a good guitarist. In corporate speech, what is your core competency?

I guess guitar was the first thing I did, so I feel probably the most comfortable on a guitar.

Does place matter in the kind of songs you write or the way you look at the world?

I think in the way that I look at the world. I’ve toured a lot over the past few years and didn’t really realize how much that affected me before, especially going into more busy cities or something. I’m extremely aware of how much space I'm taking up because I'm used to not being around so many people.

Do you feel that the words come easy? Do you write all the time or do you have to coax the words out? Do you have rituals before you write?

Yeah. I think having somewhere clean feels good. With writing, it helps a lot to leave the house. I think that’s a big one for me. I think there’s a part of my writing that requires a level of shutting the brain off and clearing it out and accepting whatever’s happening. Because when I do sit down to write, sometimes what I’m writing doesn’t seem to be connected to anything, then makes sense later.

IF HE DOESN’T WATCH IT, THEY’RE GOING TO START CALLING Him THE MOKE OF A GENERATION.

You mention arks a lot in your songs. Do you feel like the end is coming and you need to build an ark?

That’s funny, yeah. The ark—one of them is a Noah’s ark reference that’s a made-up water park ride or something. But then you have the idea of the life arc. I think that is part of my generational dread, and it feels like the more time goes on, the closer we are getting to the end. Those kinds of thoughts definitely creep into my head.

You write a lot about your faith. What’s holy for you?

Music and just creating things in general.

What do you think your job is? Your songs are not simple, they work on so many levels. They work as poetry, they work as advice, they work as quick glances into your life. What do you think you’re here for?

That’s a good question. I don’t know. The advice thing comes up in songs a lot, but sometimes it’s not good advice. That’s part of it: Sometimes it says more about the narrator saying things confidently that adds to some of the humor. A lot of writing from songwriters I like, I find there’s a lot of just living and reporting back with evidence of something—I don’t know what it is, intangibles. Big ideas that nobody can really define.

My favorite song on the album is “Joker Lips.” You sing, “Coward cutting Joker Lips into a rubber mask.” Did that really happen or is it metaphoric?

My friend was wearing one of these rubber masks to dress up to look like our other friend, and I have this video of him cutting the lips open so he could breathe better. Then it just reminded me of Heath Ledger’s Joker and the whole scene where he talks about how he got those scars.

So, metaphoric, then? There’s also the line “Every Catholic knows he could’ve been Pope.” Is that a truism? Do Catholics think that way? I definitely thought at one point in my life I should be a priest. But that line came from an interview with Harry Crews [the late idiosyncratic writer known for his dark violent Southern gothic tales]. He said that, and he wasn’t a Catholic, but he’d tried every religion. And that line really stuck with me.

There’s also a song titled “Rip Torn.” I assume it’s named after the late character actor who was in so many movies, starring in Airplane II: The Sequel and The Man Who Fell to Earth with David Bowie. Listening to Manning Fireworks, it’s like you’re nostalgic for a time that you were too young to remember. Where does that longing come from?

Somebody once asked why I was so affected by the ’90s. It’s weird, but it seems like a lot of musicians I know that are contemporaries and are basically my age, they all like that [time period] too. But if you look at people making music in the ’90s, they were referencing the ’60s and ’70s, so that’s always happening now, only it’s 39 years later. How I got the Rip Torn was because of watching The Larry Sanders Show and seeing his name at the beginning of every episode. [He played Artie, Sanders’ producer.] I was like, that’s such a beautiful name. The two words kind of are the same.

TV’s come up in a couple of lyrics. Do you consider yourself a TV addict?

I don’t know if I’m a TV addict, but I spend a lot of time watching it. [Turning it on is] the first thing that comes to mind when I’m trying to relax and when I want to turn off my brain. Most of the time when I’m at home I’ll just watch TV and play guitar. But there’s two sides of it: I feel like it’s fucked up attention spans, and social media has made that a lot worse. But yeah, I love TV. I just got a good association with it.

What do you think your greatest strength is? I guess maybe trying to understand people before judgment?

When was the last time you cried?

Earlier today.

Are you lying?

No. There’s just a lot of change happening in my life.

Three things you’re afraid of.

Heights. I think I’m afraid of the dark, a little bit, still. What else? Bears—we got a lot of bears at our house, and I was always thinking about them. There’s a family of bears living behind the house. They’re pretty nice, actually, but you never know when you’re going to run up on one.

Three things that make you mad?

Lying. When you hit your knee or stub your toe or something, that makes me immediately angry. Traveling, which I’ve been doing a lot lately.

What are you like when you’re drunk?

I’m more talkative. More talkative.

You are a little stingy with your words. Maybe because you used up all your words in your lyrics. What’s a secret ambition? Not basketball. Yeah, that’s not a secret. Having a house, maybe? Buying a house?

Where do we go when we die?

In the ground or in a box, I guess. Maybe if you get cremated and you turn to ashes. Lately, I barely know where I am going to be tomorrow or the next day. Feel like I’m asking that a lot. “What time is load-in?”

Being that you’re a Catholic, don’t you believe in an afterlife somewhere?

Yeah, I guess I struggle with your life being the prelude to whatever’s happening afterwards.

What’s one thing you’d change about yourself?

Maybe be more disciplined or have a routine? Develop a routine? Or maybe not. School was the only time I ever had one, and I didn’t really vibe with that.

The last time you looked in the mirror, what did you think?

I need to get a haircut.

Can you tell more about a person from their handshake or their shoes?

A handshake, probably.

But you can fake a handshake.

That’s true. But you could fake the shoes, too.

Or go barefoot. Are you more yourself on stage or off stage?

I think both. I’m not necessarily the same person in both places, but I can’t really do anything but be me. I kinda shut down in that situation—like having my photograph taken.

What makes you most happy?

Creating. It’s energizing to be working on something or feel like you’ve made something. That’s a lot of the reason why I would stay up till the sun comes up, because I don’t want that feeling to go away.

How do you know when you’ve written a good song?

That’s a good question. I feel like some of it can have to do with external validation, like from other people that you trust.

What’s your most annoying habit?

That’s a good question. I’m really sensitive to mouth sounds or people when they’re shaking their knee or leg or something, stuff like that—generally, that anxiety transfers. Maybe my annoying habit is that I pay attention to other people’s annoying habits.