Melodic Voices: Charles Spearin, 'The Happiness Project'

| Print Post This | Like (0) | Comments (0)

CHARLES SPEARIN KNOWS a thing or two about melodies. As a co-founder of the instrumental post-punk band Do Make Say Think and the now-defunct indie outfit K.C. Accidental, Spearin is used to recognizing patterns in music — and when he started working on deciphering melodic trends in people's voices for his latest album, "The Happiness Project," he knew he could create music out of anything.

"It's something I noticed repeatedly over years — I travel a lot and I've been to Europe many times, and when you don't speak the language, you notice the melody in someone's voice. And also being a musician, you note the sonic qualities of things," Spearin says. "Sometimes, the band will be sitting on an airplane and the airplane will be humming, and everyone will start singing along. And just by virtue of that, traveling and noticing these melodies, that was one of the things that inspired the project."

The "project" involved asking his neighbors in the summer of 2007 to detail their definitions of happiness. And Spearin says he was intrigued not only by what they said, but how they said it.

"It's hard to split your mind and listen to what somebody is saying and the melody of what they're saying at the time, and it starts to sound rude to listen only to that, so I would listen first to the meaning of what they were saying," Spearin says. "And I was surprised that everybody had something wise to say."

Spearin, who also plays with Broken Social Scene, has been exhibiting snippets of tracks from his solo debut during concerts with the group this past year. But tonight, he'll perform the album live at The Rock and Roll Hotel — and before the show, he spoke to us about his inspiration for the album, the way he crafted its songs and what his neighbors thought about his end result.

» EXPRESS: When did you start working on "The Happiness Project" and how did you get the idea for it?
» SPEARIN: I had the summer off in 2007, and that's when both Kevin [Drew] and Brendan [Canning] were working on "Broken Social Scene Presents" and I was working on that casually with Kevin, and Do Make Say Think had toured in the spring and fall. So the summer was free and I was spending it at home, being a family man, and this was my way of marrying family life with [my music]. And it was a way to include my friends and family and neighbors.

It wasn't so much about happiness, specifically, in the beginning. I just wanted people to talk about something meaningful — I didn't want it just to be chit-chat. And it's nice that people had a moment to be philosophical, in a way, and the subject of happiness — it kind of circumvents the pitfalls that you get with religion or politics. You can talk about happiness pretty freely, and people don't really get their backs up — and it made for some funny conversations.

» EXPRESS: Were you nervous that people wouldn't want to take part in your project? And once the interviews were completed, how did you transform them into songs?
» SPEARIN: Yeah, I was nervous about it at first, but everybody seemed quite willing to come over and have tea. At first, I said I was just doing a musical sketch of the neighborhood, and that was I opened the door to invite people in, and there was a discussion about who the neighborhood was and how it changed — I almost went down that direction, literally doing a musical sketch of the neighborhood. But it became more about the people in the neighborhood than the neighborhood itself, and people were generally willing to come over and talk.

It was really one person at a time — the first interview was with Mr. Gowrie, who closes the record, basically, and he was the first one I invited over to talk to because he and I talk quite a bit. And basically, I would take three or four seconds of the interview and then loop it, and try to and figure it out on guitar — so I would play the four seconds on guitar, and then sort of inch my way along the whole minute or whatever part of the conversation which sounded particularly melodic to me and try to figure out if there was a song in there somewhere. And I kept inviting people over and inviting musicians over to work with me in deciphering the melodies — it was sort of one interview at a time, and there were no interviews left over.

» EXPRESS: So did you end up being surprised by anything your neighbors had to say about their definitions of happiness?
» SPEARIN: Well, I was surprised that everybody had something somewhat wise to say. I was basically inviting them over as guinea pigs; I wasn't really bringing them over for their words of wisdom, because they're just my neighbors — they're ordinary people like everybody else, and that was what was so profound, in a way. If you gave them the right container, the right situation, they do access some of their wisdom and some of their kindness and say wonderful things. For example, I was actually quite surprised by Mrs. Morris in particular — she started speaking in poetry as soon as she came in; she was just amazing. So yeah, I had to very quickly turn the direction of the project more toward the meaning as well as the melody, because first I wanted to just experiment with the melody, and then I wanted to respect what my neighbors were saying.

» EXPRESS: And were you surprised by anything you learned or experienced during the technical process of making the interviews into songs, or was it not that different from what you do with Do Make Say Think and Broken Social Scene? Also, how did you reach the decision of performing the album live?
» SPEARIN: I'm used to co-writing, so I'm used to taking other people's melodies and chord progressions, so it was kind of an extension of the same thing: I would take these obscure melodies and arrange them into songs. So in a way, it kind of worked out how I expected it to: People tend to speak in a key, which was convenient (Mrs. Morris talked in the key of D, at least in the conversation that we had), but everybody seems to have some sort of a resting place [in terms of their key]. But musically, I had always heard melodies, so that was pretty easy to arrange them into songs — finding the meter in it was really hard, and that was part of the crossword puzzle of it, but it came together pretty easily in the end.

And well, I just kept playing it for my friends, and I kept getting more and more encouragement from my friends because I thought it was amazing and my friends kept saying that it was amazing, too. I kept playing it for people out of pride, and I gave a copy to lots of people, and eventually Jeffrey [Remedios] from Arts and Crafts asked if he could put it out, and then I figured out a way of performing it live.

» EXPRESS: So what should people expect from this? You've been playing snippets of it during Broken Social Scene concerts, but how will that transfer over in a live setting?
» SPEARIN: Well, Leon Kingston, who is the sax player on "Mrs. Morris," he was really great and figured out the whole speech and memorized it and could play along with it beginning to end, and I said, "OK, I'll just have other people memorize it," and I sat down and memorized "Mr. Gowrie" and a couple of others. Then we all sat down and figured out the songs, so in the live version, we play the recorded versions, and then the arrangement comes in quite naturally, so we play them pretty close to the record. But it was Leon's inspiration — and unfortunately, Leon has gone off to become a monk, so unfortunately he's not playing in the band anymore.

» EXPRESS: Well, what's next after the tour? How did your neighbors react to the album once they heard the completed version, and has that inspired you to make a follow-up?
» SPEARIN: Yeah, I played it for them, and I gave them all copies of it, and when we played in Toronto, I invited them all. And some of them that listened to the music and didn't understand it and were like, "What kind of music is this?", came to the show and really appreciated it. Mrs. Morris told me she felt like a newborn baby, because she kept getting hugs from people all through the night — so they're quite happy about it, and I think they understand the purpose of it now.

And I'm not exactly sure about a follow-up — I have some plans, of course, but they're top-secret. I've thought about trying different emotions … like, I've got plane, but I don't know which ones are going to come to fruition or not. But there will be a sequel — possibly 10 years from now — but no, I don't think I'm quite done.

» Rock and Roll Hotel, 1353 H St. NE; Tue., Dec. 1, 8 p.m.; $12 beforehand, $14 at the door; (202) 388-7625 Rockandrollhoteldc.com.