‘You can’t escape the feeder mind’

Dave Pen Interviewed

Life Inside The Feeder Mind is the second solo album from the vocalist and guitarist Dave Pen who is one half of BirdPen and co-frontman with the experimental trip-rock collective Archive. Interview by Pete Harvey.

LTW: The work that you do, particularly the solo albums is very dark, personal and confessional.

DP: It’s like sonic therapy. The first solo album (Abran Wish & The Light Party) was more conceptual, more a character in my head whereas this one isn’t. This one is a lot of personal feelings, fears, worries and anxiety.

How is your solo process different from collaborating with BirdPen and Archive?

I like to set myself a target. Right, I’m going to try and write an album in five days. I’ll go into the studio with nothing and I’ll pick up the guitar and probably record the first thing I play.

How long did Life Inside The Feeder Mind take?

I had over half of it for a long time, for probably a year and a half. I did a couple of EPs in between, which I put out on Bandcamp. Then I thought I’ve got to finish it because that lead track, was too good for it not to be an album track.

That lead track, No Hiding, really builds

I love space in music. I love a build. Nothing better than a two chord build. I can do it for fifteen, twenty minutes, I don’t care. If I can hear layers, what I love is that patience, you know, one note even and it builds and builds. It’s taking me somewhere. I remember being so buzzed when I was doing those wall of noise guitars parts.

How many studio guitars do you have?

Three, a Gibson 355, not a 335, the neck’s slightly smaller. A Telecaster Deluxe which I bought in Hamburg years ago and a Epiphone Sheraton which I bought off a friend. It’s really bright and fizzy and it feeds back. If you put it through real fuzzy pedals it wails and it’s amazing. Oh and I also have a really nice acoustic from Auden.

The second track was the first single from the album Life, Life, Life, Life. It’s the most uppy piece of music I’ve heard you produce. But then when you dig into the lyrics, you find somebody dying in a chair.

It’s a peaceful death though, at the end he smiles.

Falling into a never ending hole.. It feels like the death of hope.

He’s just like, I’m done, sat in a chair. I think we’ve all felt like that sometimes.

Track eight is Fear, Worry, Faith, Hope. What do you mean by faith?

I do have a lot of faith, but it is secular and comes from energy and positivity. It’s about being a better person for yourself and believing there is a better way, that there are more good people than bad people on the planet. I have to believe that. I need a positive outlook because I’ve been in that place where I thought, we’re fucked, and I can’t do it. I’d just curl up into a ball and do nothing.

Where do you get your news from?

I only look at the news in the local paper. I subscribe digitally and I scroll down. When I was younger, I was absolutely petrified of the news, because I thought the world was going to end. There’s a brilliant website called Reasons to be Cheerful and it’s just got good, positive stories. Great inventions, health things, breakthroughs, nature things. I fucking love it. I can’t avoid bad news altogether, sometimes I have to say shut the fuck up your doom stories are going to give me a panic attack.

Which brings us back round to sonic therapy.

Yes, exactly. My vent. Yes.

Life Inside The Feeder Mind is like a primal scream.

It’s getting all of the bad feeling and frustrations out. The whole feeder mind thing is the constant drip feed of the world. You can’t escape it. We all have to go up to that poisonous little hamster feeder for something.

Vocally, you sound comfortable in the higher range.

I think I discovered that from doing harmonies. I’ve always felt comfortable singing in a higher range. It suits this material, because it’s kind of wailing and mournful. I like to be able to express myself and experiment with my voice.

The chanting, the repeated phrases, what’s are they based on?

I got quite inspired by Michael Jara and Swans and some of the pagan-esque ad-lib vocals he does. I’ve also been a big Mike Patton (Faith No More) fan for years. What he does with his voice has always just completely blown me away. His voice is such an instrument.

Where did that startling cover picture come from?

That’s me coming out of the sea in Majorca many years ago.
I had a GoPro underwater and as I came out someone called me. I was watching the footage back, and I pressed pause, and that is what was on the screen. It was amazing so I took a screenshot. I think if you asked people what sort of music do you think this is? They’d say, that’s definitely death metal. That’s a metal album, it’s got to be.

What is the genre?

It’s been called Doom Groove, because it sounds like music for the end of the world that you could dance to.

Nice. Shuffle from left to right

Or just, nod, nod away.

Life Inside The Feeder Mind is out on Bandcamp now

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All words Pete Harvey. Live photograph by Alexis Berg, all other images Dave Pen. More writing by Pete on Louder Than War can be found at his author’s archive.