Before her two first-ever duo dates with long-time collaborator Evan Dando, Juliana Hatfield told QRO that she’s retiring from touring & more. In the conversation, the singer/songwriter revealed & explained why she’s leaving the road, what she has in the way of new plans (for graduate school!), how Evan was able to pull her back into a rock club one last time, why this isn’t another ‘nineties reunion’, suffering for her art, why she did her last record entirely on her own, that rock ‘n’ roll is dead, and much more…
QRO: What brought about the ‘duo dates’ with Evan Dando, September 29th & 30th at New York’s Mercury Lounge (QRO venue review)?
Juliana Hatfield: You know, I’m not sure. I don’t remember whose idea it was, if it was Evan’s idea or mine. I don’t know – I can’t remember. Was it Evan who said, “Hey, do you want to play a show together?” Or maybe it me? I can’t remember.
It was probably Evan, because I’ve kind of retired from playing live.
QRO: You have?
JH: Yeah, sort of – not officially; I haven’t announced it or anything. I get really burned out on touring, and decided I didn’t want to tour anymore. Wasn’t really enjoying playing so much lately. So I think the idea of doing something with Evan makes the idea of playing live much more palatable. It’s something new for us, so I think it could be fun.
QRO: This will be the first time you’ve ever played as a duo – how come? It almost seems kind of odd that it’s never happened before…
JH: It seems kind of odd to me, too. I don’t know. I think both of us have been doing our own things, leading our own bands. It never came together like that. I don’t think our heads were in the right places for us to collaborate, really. We were doing our own things.
QRO: What’s the set list looking like – or do you not know yet?
JH: Well, we’re just sort of trying to figure that out now – old stuff, new stuff, stuff in the middle. Sort of taking from both of our back catalogs, from over the years.
QRO: Are there any songs of his that you have to learn for the first time, or songs of yours that he has to learn for the first time?
JH: There’s probably a few of mine that he has to learn, and a couple… But we’re both really familiar with each other’s material. Maybe I had to learn a few chord progressions, but I was so familiar with his songs that it was like learning something I already knew. And some of the songs I’d played before, when I was playing bass in his band a few years ago. Some of my very new stuff he had to learn, but he already liked the songs, so it’s not something really foreign.
Juliana Hatfield & Evan Dando playing Dando’s “It’s About Time” live at Mercury Lounge in New York, NY on September 30th, 2010:
QRO: How much will you/can you vary what you play between the two nights?
JH: We’re going to do a lot of the same stuff, I think. We don’t have so much stuff that we’re going to have two – well, we do have enough material to do two completely different set lists; between us, we could do hundreds of songs, but we’re probably going to do lots of the same stuff both nights, I think, with a few variations, I think.
QRO: The 29th was added after the 30th sold out really fast.
JH: It just seemed like the right thing to do, since the first one sold out so fast; it seemed like there was a bit of a demand, and we didn’t want to leave anybody out. Something that might not happen again – it’s not something that we’re planning on continuing; we don’t know, we might do some more shows, but this might be it. We’re not planning ahead.
QRO: There’s not any dates planned for Boston or anything?
JH: We’re working on a Boston show; I think that’s gonna happen in early November, but it’s not confirmed yet. But other than Boston & New York, we never really looked ahead of those two dates.
QRO: A lot of alternative music acts from nineties are doing reunions, such as Superchunk (QRO live review) & Pavement (QRO photos in NYC) both just played in New York – do you think this fits in as a ‘reunion’?
JH: No, no… ‘Cause there’s no hype, and there’s no… Does Pavement have a new album out?
QRO: They have a greatest hits (QRO review), but it’s not a new album.
JH: Superchunk has a new album (QRO review). Evan & I don’t have a album. I mean, we both have our own albums that came out months ago, but we’re not really hyping anything in particular; I think we just did it for the ‘hell of it’, really?…
Inevitably, some people will see it like that, but it’s not really a reunion ‘cause we never were together as a ‘musical entity’. We collaborated, sort of, but it was more like we would back each other up from time-to-time, and now this is more like we’re gonna be there together, and do this together, which is something we’ve never done.
Rather than a reunion, I think it’s an experiment, trying to unify the two of us. Or an experiment in trying to blend the two of us, which is kind of a new thing. Yes, we’re going to do old songs, which is kind of revisiting the nineties, in a way, but we’re also going to do new stuff, stuff that we’ve never done.
Juliana Hatfield & Evan Dando covering another nineties reunion, Teenage Fanclub’s “Cells”, live at Mercury Lounge in New York, NY on September 30th, 2010:
QRO: Are you going to have to practice songs that you haven’t done in a long time?
JH: Oh, yeah! But relearning old songs is kind of like riding a bike – it just comes right back to you. Your body has a ‘muscle memory’ of what you’ve done, where the chords are going to go, how to sing it; the songs just kind of come back. And, like I said, even the songs of Evan’s that I never played on, it was easy to learn them, as I was really familiar with them.
QRO: Are there any songs that you out-and-out don’t want to play?
JH: Oh, there’s lots of them, yeah. There’s old songs, we tried a few that just didn’t feel right, or didn’t work without drums or bass. And then there’s songs that make me cringe – and I’m sure Evan has songs that make him cringe, too, that are older, that just don’t feel right to play anymore.
Juliana Hatfield & Evan Dando playing Hatfields’s “Evan” live at Mercury Lounge in New York, NY on September 30th, 2010:
QRO: If you’re not doing this beyond the Boston & New York dates, and you’re retiring from touring, what is up next for you?
JH: Well, I’m writing song requests for people. I’m working on this project, tailoring individual songs for individual people. That’s just completely private; that’s not for public consumption. That’s a really nice thing I’m doing under the radar, on my own.
I’ve been thinking about applying to graduate schools in January. And I’m running my record label; put out another record last February.
Juliana Hatfield & Evan Dando playing “What Is Wrong” from Peace & Love live at Mercury Lounge in New York, NY on September 30th, 2010:
QRO: Your last record, Peace & Love, was written/performed/produced/etc. all solely by you – why did you do that?
JH: The record before that, How To Walk Away, was kind of a big production. I did it in New York, in a studio, with a producer, a lot of different musicians. But it was a lot of work; it was kind of expensive, relatively expensive. I needed to streamline, cut out a lot of the unnecessary expenses. [How To Walk Away] was just so much work, took a lot out of me. I think I just wanted to relax a little bit.
I also wanted to make a record with no help, and finally got the recording set up that enabled me to do that. It was kind of a quiet period in my life; I wanted to just be alone. It was nice to be at home.
QRO: So making a record on your own, as opposed to having people ostensibly helping you, was actually easier?
JH: In a way it was easier, yeah. I could roll out of bed whenever I wanted to; there was no pressure to go into the studio and work twelve hours on the clock. I could work for an hour a day if I wanted to. It just took a lot of pressure off. When you book a studio, it’s expensive, and you have to kind of use the time, and not waste it. But you can waste as much time as you want at home. It’s very nice having my dogs around…
There’s drawbacks, too, I guess. I don’t have access to all the great musicians. My recording set up is very Spartan; there’s not a lot I can do, in terms of effects and things like that. And I only had eight tracks to work with. There’s limitations, for sure.
QRO: Did you ever find it hard to get stuff done without a deadline, without pressure from someone else?
JH: I’ve always been good at self-motivating, getting stuff done, pretty good at finishing stuff. Sometimes I’m a little bit slow about finishing, but I will finish. I don’t need someone to crack the whip. With anything, I think it’s good to kind of step away from whatever you’re working on, if you have the luxury.
If you can step away from it, if you’re not feeling good about it, step away. And you can’t do that if you’re in the studio or with a producer, or else you’re going to waste a lot of money and piss people off.
Juliana Hatfield & Evan Dando playing “Butterflies” from Peace & Love live at Mercury Lounge in New York, NY on September 30th, 2010:
QRO: In general, how does making music today compare with making music twenty years ago?
JH: Hmm… That’s kind of a big question.
Well, bands don’t need a record company as much anymore to get exposure. They can use the internet and try to get the word out that way.
But I don’t know if that’s necessarily a good thing. I think that now, because everyone can put themselves out there, it puts a huge pool of bands & music – that I think it takes some of the fun out of it. Now everyone can do it; it’s not special anymore. Every crappy band can jump into the pool now, and it really dilutes the pool.
It’s just overkill – there’s so much out there now, so much media, that I just really want to turn away. I’m turned off by it all. My senses are so dulled now that I never like anything. It’s really hard to get me excited about any new music; rock ‘n’ roll is so dead at this point. So dead – it died a long time ago. I just don’t care about it anymore.
QRO: So do you have any plans to make a new record?
JH: No plans. Right now, I’m kinda coasting – shows with Evan, applying to school, working on the private songs for private citizens. I’m kind of enjoying a little bit of a lull right now.
QRO: Back when you were touring, were there any specific cities that you really liked?
JH: Chicago, San Francisco – those two were always good. Atlanta was always pretty good; not as exciting in terms of visiting the city – as a city, it’s not the most exciting city – but really good crowds, really good atmosphere. Chicago & San Francisco are more fun and interesting as cities to be there and explore.
QRO: Will you miss that aspect of touring?
JH: No, I’m so burned out on it. There’s a lot of places that I’ll be really glad to never see again.
QRO: Don’t suppose you could name those places…
JH: I don’t want to name them, but I’ve had enough of rock clubs, and I don’t care if I never, ever set foot in one again. Other than these shows with Evan, I was not ever planning set foot even near a rock club ever again.
I’m just tired of the boring highways going through all the boring lands. There’s beautiful places, for sure, but if you’ve gone around the country thirty times, it really loses its appeal, after a while.
You can really tell that I’m burned out on the whole scene, of touring and clubs and do-it-yourself, DIY – I’ve had enough of that; I want other people to do it for me, I don’t want to do it myself anymore. I did that, and I don’t have any nostalgia for it.
I have some good memories, yeah, but I also feel like I worked really, really hard – I suffered a lot for my art, I did. I carried a lot of heavy equipment, and I got sick a lot for my art, and I don’t want to be sick anymore. I really physically, actually – my health suffered from all the touring. I had some good times, sure – definitely had some good times, but I have no nostalgia anymore.
Juliana Hatfield & Evan Dando playing Hatfield’s “Tourist” live at Mercury Lounge in New York, NY on September 30th, 2010:
