Catching up with Fenster

The first time JJ Weihl and Jonathan Jarzyna met, they ended up playing around a friend’s kitchen table late into the night. And from there, things just started falling into place, including a window, which shattered on Weihl’s head during the whirlwind eight-day recording process, earning the Berlin trio the name Fenster (or “window” in German).

Here’s an interview I conducted with Weihl an Jarzyna about the early stages of their music and their debut album, Bones. Pieces of this interview made it into my Song of the Day write-up for Fenster’s “Oh Canyon” for NPR Music, so be sure to check that out, too.

How did you guys first meet and what made you decide to start making music together? What were the early stages of the band like?

JJ Weihl: The first night Jonathan and I met, we ended up in someone’s kitchen playing music with a bunch of dudes til dawn. It was a pretty natural collaboration. First we started busking together – playing Johnny Cash covers in bars to save some money and build up a studio. We started showing each other song ideas and found we really liked each other’s stuff.

Jonathan Jarzyna: We started playing together more frequently, writing new songs and arranging older song ideas together. In January of 2011, we decided to ask our friend Tadklimp to come record us. That’s when things became more focused and serious I guess.

What made you guys decide to settle in Berlin over Brooklyn?

JJ: We all live and met in Berlin and it’s the city where Fenster began.  It was never really a question. I’m from New York City but I’ve been living in Berlin for the past three years.

Jonathan: I grew up in Berlin, and Rémi [the band's drummer] and I had never even been to the US before this last five week tour of ours which just ended. I mean, we loved New York but it’s not the easiest place to survive as a musician. We have a great and extremely inexpensive studio here and it’s where we’ve kind of grown up together as a band. We have plans to go back to the states, but Berlin is definitely a good base to have.

“Fisherman” by Fenster:

Is “fenster” German? Where does the name come from and what does it mean to you?

Jonathan: Fenster means window in German. We liked it because it’s sort of empty – just a view or portal to something. And a window fell on JJ’s head and shattered during the recordings of our first album, Bones.

JJ: I guess it’s something you usually ignore; it’s benign yet dangerous, apparently…

Could tell me more about the song “Oh Canyon”? The lyrics are kind of muffled, and once I saw them written out, I was surprised. For a song that sounds so upbeat, it’s kind of dark! What’s going on? 

Jonathan: “Oh Canyon” is about a loser with nothing to lose.

JJ: While the music sounds fairly innocuous, the lyrics beg to differ  ”I’d stop the world to watch you fall/I love it when you’re low/ I’d hold the knife that cuts the rope/ I love it when you’ve broke.” The contrast between the music and the lyrics is meant to accentuate the song’s Schadenfreude - like, let’s have a party while we watch you suffer.

Where do the lyrics come from? What inspires you guys in the songwriting process?

JJ: I think we’re inspired a lot by dreams and cities. The way sounds collide with the unconscious – ghosts and traffic and the way some stories only make sense while you’re sleeping- but if you write down those fleeting images, you can still make them walk around in the daylight. 

Is this the first album for both of you or did you have previous musical projects? What was the recording process like? How did recording so quickly shape the sound of the album? Do you wish you had had more time in the studio?

Jonathan: I’ve been in lots of different bands over the years – some bands that toured and recorded a few records and some bands that fell apart before they really got started.

The recording process of Bones was super intense. JJ and I took a month before the recordings even started to make pre-recordings of all our song ideas – like little maps or sketches with musical arrangements and low-fi recordings. We asked our producer Tadklimp to come record the album, but we only had 8 days so we knew we had to be fast. We barely slept, and when we did sleep it was mostly in the studio, but we knew in advance what we wanted so it didn’t really matter how sleep deprived we were. Of course there is always room for happy accidents to emerge like small riffs, or outside noise infiltration – and we wanted it all to be included in the album.

JJ: We like imperfections and errors, so with the skeletons of the songs firmly in place, we allowed ourselves a bit of ornamentation.

I think the fact that we knew we would have so little time made us do a lot of preparation, and to distill our aestehtic at a very early stage in the recording process. Having too much time to prepare or re-work things can be a trap – it seems that things get better or evolve, but really initial ideas and instincts can just get muddier. So I think it was fortunate that we gave ourselves constraints and deadlines. Excess for us often leads to confusion, while limitations can ultimately grant us clarity.

“White to Red” by Fenster:

Listen Up!: 2012 So Far

The weather is just starting to warm back up again, but much of what I’ve been listening to so far this year has been a bit on the glum side. I’ll start with those and work my way to sunnier territory.

Perfume Genius – Put Your Back N 2 It [Matador]
Mike Hadreas continues to wow me with his sophomore album, which proves to be just as harrowing as his debut. Though Hadreas often covers dark emotional terrain (suicide, identity issues, addiction, homophobia), he does so with amazing grace. When he sings, Hadreas seems to somehow cleanse both himself and anyone within earshot.

“Dark Part” by Perfume Genius, live at the Mercury Lounge 4/2/12:

Orcas, s/t [Morr Music]

Given the backgrounds of its two members – hazy ambient dream popper Thomas Meluch (Benoît Pioulard) and post-minimalist composer Rafael Anton Irisarri, Orcas sounds a lot like you might expect, and that’s certainly not a bad thing. Good ruminating music. Someone get this for me on vinyl.

“Pallor Cedes” by Orcas:

Grimes – Visions [4AD]

Grimes was one of the only artists to literally make me stop in my tracks at SXSW last year… or as one friend put it, “I want to stop listening, but I can’t!” Thanks largely to her Muppet-like voice, Claire Boucher’s strange, experimental music feels both cringe-worthy and addictive. But whether you take it or leave, Grimes’ sound is as uplifting as it is infectious.

“Oblivion” by Grimes:

Fenster, Bones [Morr Music]

Fenster, meaning “window” in German, is a whimsical pop trio from Berlin with a dark side and a pension for Schadenfreude. For weeks I didn’t listen to any other album. They have the sparse lo-fi quality and male/female vox that made me fall in love with The xx a few years back… but they also have a warmth that the latter seemed to lack. I just interviewed founding members JJ and Jonathan. Look for that in the coming weeks.

“Oh Canyon” by Fenster:

Sitting down with Sóley

Before writing up Sóley for a post on NPR’s Song of the Day, I decided to get in touch with her to ask a few questions.

Sóley (photo Sigfús Már Pétursson, artwork Ingibjörg Birgisdóttir)

Here’s our discussion:

I’ve seen you play a few times since I’m a Seabear/Sin Fang fan. Are you still with these other projects or are you exclusively focusing on your solo career now?

Seabear took a break after last year. We were a lot on the road so it was really important for us to take a break but I think we will try to start meet early next year and start to compose some new material. All the members are just working on their own project or in other bands now. 

I just came back from Sin Fang/sóley tour few days ago. We were in Europe and it was awesome. I opened up for Sin Fang and also played with Sin Fang. Very nice.

Can you explain what made you decide to start writing and recording your own music? Has it always been something you wanted to do?

It just happened. I was not thinking about it when I was asked if I had some songs to send Morr Music because they wanted to see what I was doing. Then I was in school and as soon as I got the opportunity I jumped on it and made some new songs to send them. I´m really really happy that it happened because in my dreams this was what I wanted to do!

How has the transition been for you? Did it come easily? How do you feel about being in the spotlight now?

It´s nice. I like being on stage and being the front. It´s nice.

Where do you typically get inspiration for your songs? Do you sing about things that happen to you or are your songs more like stories?

The songs are more like stories yes. I don´t want to talk about my daily life in my songs. For me, my solo project is my escape from being myself and becoming the other sóley who thinks differently and lives in my mind. It´s another world which I try to make up in my mind, kind of a dreamy world. It does not exist in the real world.

Me: From the first time I heard “I Drown,” I loved it. What can you tell me about this song? What story does it tell? Who is the man in it? What did you use to get the muffled tapping noise that runs through it?

Sóley: This song is a kind of a love song but let´s say in a surreal way. As I visualize the song and the story it´s about an old man who lives alone in this house which is far away from everything. Somehow this girls (who is telling the story) is at his house, no one knows how she got there. So it´s kind of about their relationship there. The album title (we sink) is sung in the end of the song so I guess now you know what happens to them!I used a lot of “percussion” that isn´t really percussion, it´s more like my fork and some stick I found outside. This song is the first I recorded for the new album and I think it´s like a sweet homemade pie. I can hear my old apartments sound there.

Is it just me or are their dark undertones to this album? Where does this come from?

It all comes from the other world. From the other sóley who makes up these stories. It´s dark and dreamy and scary but still it has a bit of humor in it. It´s funny because it could not happen anywhere else than in your mind. Our mind is so weird and crazy so if you want you can make up really strange and surreal things in your mind.

Do you have help on We Sink or are you playing all the instruments? How long have you been playing the piano?

I played everything except drumset, bass in some songs and electric guitar in some songs. But most of it I did myself, piano, organs, guitar, percussion and voice.

I started playing piano when I was eight! That is almost 17 years… wow…

Then, just out of curiosity, what Icelandic artists would you recommend?

Sin Fang, Kimono, Hudson Wayne, múm, Ólöf Arnalds, Prins Póló, Fm Belfast, Gus Gus, Kippi Kaninus, Mr.Silla, Mugison, Ojba Rasta, Prins Póló, Samaris, Snorri Helgason… I think I am forgetting something…óó

To read the piece and hear the song “I Drown,” head over to NPR Music.