“All I’ve ever wanted was to have a legit touring band at the most basic level”
A few weeks back, I had the pleasure of interviewing Zach Van Hoozer, the rock and roll songwriter behind the band Zulu Pearls. While Zulu Pearls is a relatively new band in the public sphere (their first LP No Heroes No Honeymoons was released in late 2012), Zach has privately been wailing away over tracked drum beats for the last 6 years or so, writing the record between bar shifts and throwaway day jobs while living in Washington D.C. and Berlin (after relocating in 2009). Zulu Pearls is a DIY outfit (Zach even directs his own music videos) and the band sounds musically like the auditory cousin of Paul Westerberg’s solo material; it’s a guitar-based, no-frills response to all the pomp and circumstance of today’s indie rock. It’s decidedly excellent and thankfully we won’t have to wait another 6 years for the sophomore effort; Zach told me that he is “all in” when it comes to the band.
You can also check out his latest, super-rad video below.
The premise for the above vid came from this idea: Have you ever thought to dig up dirt on your old man; to root through an old photo album or yearbook searching for evidence of his hard-partying days? Zach Van Hoozer did just that, and in doing so he found just the inspiration he needed for his latest video for “Hard & Young.” The DIY video debuted on Vice/Noisey and it follows Zach’s father, Paul Van Hoozer, on an evening out on the town: he smokes, he drinks, he cruises in an old car, he tries that carnival game where you use the giant claw to pick things up, and all the while sporting a dapper Hawaiian shirt.
INTERVIEW
Words & Fire: So you relocated from D.C. to Berlin in 2009, right? Normally artists seem to move to Brooklyn or LA or London or wherever—some music “mecca” of sorts where they can “make it,” so to speak—but I don’t think anyone thinks of Berlin as having a great rock scene by any means. What prompted the move to Berlin? Can you comment on the scene there as well?
Zach Van Hoozer: I was going to make a move to NYC, but decided on Berlin after visiting again in 2008. I met a lot of people (including band members and my girl) and had a lot of fun, so much so that I just went for it. I’d always wanted to live in Europe at some point and I had coincidentally studied German in school. When I moved I’d basically decided I’d give music a break, but luckily it didn’t work out that way.
The scene? It is completely disjointed, if you could even say one exists at all. There are actually quite a few cool and interesting acts that happen to live here, but as far as a scene goes, it only exists in small pockets. I want to try to change that by booking some shows with local bands and building the traditional way, but there’s a lot of nonsense to wade through.
W&F: Now that you have had the chance to live in Europe for a bit…Lets say there’s a gun to your head and you can only live in the US or Germany for the rest of your life. Which?
ZVH: Can’t call it. Ideally I’d like to be able to live off and on in many places.
W&F: You mentioned in a previous interview that Zulu Pearls has been around, in one form or another, since 2005-2006. With this being your first full-length record after all that time, what was your understanding of the band or music during those years, in terms of what exactly Zulu Pearls was? Was the plan always to get to this point?
ZVH: Zulu Pearls was a name that we started using when I was still at college. Back then that line up was the last time the band was a democratic entity with guys writing parts and riffs and songs together. After I graduated, I was back at home and that phase of the band was over, but I just kept on writing songs over and over on a set of drum tracks recorded with some friends. Those tracks became No Heroes No Honeymoons.
All I’ve ever wanted was to have a legit touring band at the most basic level, so yes it’s nice that I’ve been able to keep it moving forward. Still quite a bit to go till I’ll begin to be satisfied.
W&F: Why now for your first full-length release then?
ZVH: It just took that long to finish a record; working on it off and on for years, moving to Berlin and figuring out that I still wanted to do music and sorting out how to make that happen from Berlin. That meant deciding to put our record out on vinyl to keep us motivated (www.zulupearls.bandcamp.com), which led to us signing to Cantora [Records] and continuing to take steps forward.
W&F: I know you’re a big fan of classic rock and roll. If you’ve ever seen the Cameron Crowe film Almost Famous, you may recall a scene where Jason Lee says, “…That means that rock and roll can save the world.”
To me that sort of brash attitude was prevalent in 70s rock, but your viewpoint seems much more pessimistic; some of your songs actually seem like a reaction to how far music has drifted from those days. I think of the line in “Two Thousand Whatever,” where you sing, “I waste my breath on rock and roll and ain’t nobody gonna save my soul.”
ZVH: Well that line actually doesn’t have anything to do with the music industry in particular. I think it was more of a personal comment I was making to myself about how much my life revolves around working on the band, but I couldn’t not work on it even when I thought I’d set it down completely when I moved to Berlin.
W&F: How do you feel about the music business in general these days?
ZVH: I can’t say much about it, as I don’t actually have that much experience, but obviously it’s changing all the time and has been for a while now. All I know is this: I probably wouldn’t be able to still be doing music if we didn’t exist now at this moment in time. The entertainment industry in general has never been something to hold in high regard, but there are plenty of good people working within it right now.
W&F: What is it like making rock and roll music in electronic-centric Berlin though?
ZVH: Working in Berlin is actually great. I really enjoy that we’re somewhat isolated and that aren’t distracted by whatever tons of bands are doing, simply because there aren’t that many around.
W&F: Let’s talk about the record. Tell me more about the title of your record, No Heroes No Honeymoons. What does it mean?
ZVH: I came up with it and it was cynical enough for me at the time. I was very much a different person then, it was long enough ago. I was and still am tired of seeing society make all these advances only to have pop culture hit the depths it has over the years.
W&F: Did those negative feelings about societal advances juxtaposed with the depth pop culture has sunk to contribute at all to the delay in getting this record out in the world given how long ago you wrote some of the songs?
ZVH: No like I said, it’s just the pace I’ve had to go at pushing Zulu Pearls along essentially by myself for so long. Luckily since I’ve been here I’ve met some great friends/members of the band who have been holding it down with me consistently over the last couple years.
W&F: I know you’ve got a band lineup together at this point. With respect to recording NHNH, how did the songwriting process work considering it took place over so many years? Who else was involved?
ZVH: Recording NHNH was essentially me writing over the same batch of drum tracks for some years, through revolving band members and a lot of time passing. Nick Anderson produced/engineered/mixed that record off and on for those years. My friend Jake Cregger played those drums and the next large batch of drums I’ve been writing on/editing for a while now. I’m excited to write with the band I have now all in the same room, because it’s been too long since I’ve done that.
W&F: How do you imagine the process of creating your next record will differ? Will you do any recording at Inner Ear Studio again?
ZVH: The next record is different only in the fact that I’ll probably just finish it all over here now. Waiting to take a trip back to the US to lay down some material for a couple days out of the year isn’t an option anymore. It doesn’t make sense, plus there are great options over here. The drums were recorded in Inner Ear/The Bastille (front room of the bldg., different studio) but most everything else has been recorded DIY style outside of the studio. Here in Berlin and at home in the US.
W&F: Reportedly a lot of the record was reportedly recorded between “throwaway jobs” in both D.C. and Berlin. Are you “all in” at this point with the band? Do you have any plans for a full-fledged US solo tour anytime soon?
ZVH: I’m all in. I don’t know exactly when we’ll make it back to the states but I’m sure it will happen eventually. We were there three times last year, albeit only in a few spots.
W&F: I don’t want to say that the record comes off as completely pessimistic, but some of the lyrics, especially on “Hard & Young,” “Two Thousand Whatever,” and “No Heroes No Honeymoons,” reminded me of some of the concerns that artists expressed during the original industrial revolution, circa 19th century turn, when there was a worry technology would swallow art whole. Is love dead? Is rock and roll dead? Is technology the culprit?
ZVH: I was younger and more cynical when I wrote this record. I try to just do the best I can and ignore all the noise out there. I eventually went with the static for cover art because I felt like it summed up how much white noise is out there, getting louder all the time. It’s easy to get excited where you are coming across technology you never imagined before, but I feel like you have to make sure it serves a purpose rather than just being another source of distraction/entertainment. Being entertained in every moment is such a big part of our world now, you would hope the effort going into providing the entertainment would be held to a higher standard. At the end of the day you have to hold the person responsible for what they put out there in terms of art and how they navigate life. You can’t use technology as a crutch or scapegoat.
For better or worse, I’ve never been in a rush to put things out there, but because of that I always try to make sure I’m doing the best I can with what I’ve got. I’m happy when anyone else can get down with what we do.
