Song Exploder - Neko Case - Last Lion of Albion

Episode Date: August 1, 2018

Neko Case is a singer and songwriter. She’s been nominated for multiple Grammys, and in addition to her own music, she’s a member of the band The New Pornographers. In June 2018, she put out her 7th album, Hell-On, which she also co-produced. In this episode, Neko Case breaks down the song “Last Lion of Albion.” Albion’s one of the oldest names for island of Great Britain, and it was while she was in England that this song first began. This episode is guest-hosted by Thao Nguyen (of Thao & The Get Down Stay Down). songexploder.net/neko-case

My name's Rishi K. Shirwei. I'm the producer of Song Exploder, and I'm usually the host, but for this episode, I wanted to try something different. I'm handing the interviewing and hosting duties over to someone else. Back in 2016, I did an episode with Tao Win from the band Tao in the Get Down Stay Down, and we had such a great conversation, and I thought she really got the heart of what this podcast is about. So I asked her, and she said yes. There's also brand new intro music just for this, made by another past guest, Julian Baker. This episode was really fun to make, and I hope you like it. Here we go. You're listening to Song Exploder, where musicians take apart their songs and, piece by piece, tell the story of how they remained. My name is Tao Wyn.

Niko Case is a singer and songwriter. She's been nominated for multiple Grammys, and in addition to her own music, she's a member of the band The New Pornographers. And when Rishi Keshe asked me to guest host an episode, Nico Case was who I was most excited to interview. I'll be touring solo with her this fall, and I've been a fan of hers for years. In June 2018, she put out her seventh album, Hell On, which she also co-produced. I interviewed her while she was here in town in Berkeley. In this episode, Nico Case breaks down the song Last Lion of Albion. Albion is one of the oldest names for the island of Great Britain,

and it was while she was in England that the song first began. My name is Nico Case. I remember being in England on tour, and, you know, I'm always looking for history everywhere I am, and I, you know, there's lions on everything in England, and it's a pretty popular crest. And I just remember thinking how sad it was that all the lions of England were extinct. Anything really beautiful that's used as a national symbol

is often something that has been destroyed, kind of the signature move of colonialism. I was sitting in a coffee shop in Shortwich, super jet lagged, and just riding some things down. and I think I was just thinking like, oh, what would it feel like to be the last line of Albion? And that just made me so sad.

And I just had this fantasy that all of the lions killed would be just waiting somewhere, biting their time. And then I just started writing little pieces down and then I would leave it and then come back to it. At the same time, my boyfriend, Jeff, was working on just recording little things because he likes to record things. So he just had this really cruddy nylon string guitar.

And he was just making these really excellent sounds because you can really bend the strings on those things. And I said, can I steal that riff right there? I'm like, are you using that? He's like, no, I don't have any plans for it. And there's something about listening to something that you didn't make that brings a level of enjoyment that is even better.

Like, I love that riff so much and I didn't make it up. So there's none of myself in there going, is it good enough? Is it weird? It's like, nah, that's great. I love that riff. Yes. So that was the key element.

Like, that was definitely the heartbeat of the song. It takes it out of the Western scale just slightly. And it fluctuates in and out of tune so frequently and in such an awesome way. Then I just started singing the lines that I had been down. I'll be on, they'll use you for centuries to come, they'll steal your patents for the sun, and you'll feel extinction when you see your face

on their money. I thought about all of the ways in which rich groups of people or colonialists immortalize themselves, like with coins and statuary and buildings. And, you know, I just thought, what would be a good spell? What would be a way to like, send some sort of message to some ancient gods that would bring this lion, this creature back for revenge.

And I just thought of the coin, like the way you'll trace a coin with your thumb or your finger over and over again. I wish I could trace the frowning compass of your mouth. Draw the mercury down down a Roman draught and summon wars. It's so weird that we think of fairy tales and mythology as something that is old. And that, you know, it's set, it's already done. Like, that's what storytelling is. It's not done or dead or historic. It's totally evolving.

So it's so much fun to do that. And the song already had such a beautiful hook to it from Jeff's original guitar part that I thought the hook was good enough to draw people in to this little story about this lion that is dead, but he's not dead because he's waiting. The real big fantasy is that, you know, all those businessmen like Elon Musk and D'Sk

and Donald Trump, who have bought everything already. Like, I'm sure there are people that have, like, deeds to Mars, and, you know, they're thinking about trashing this planet and they're going to go to this other planet where the poor people aren't or something. I just hope all the lions are just waiting there. And when they go down the stairs in their space machines, the lions just devour them.

Laid in the heavens that are already bored, sleeps a red planet in the galaxy, of a lion's thoughts on the surface every tender an intended machine is gonna buckle knuckle kneel on a carpet of lion's tongues The Farfisa is Bjorn Yitling from Peter Bjorn and John That sound is one of the reasons I really wanted to co-produce with him

on half the record I needed to get out of my comfort zone and he has the instinct and the ear. He can totally let his shark eyelids come up and play in a really feral way. It really helped with the desperation part, the grindy desperation. The drummer in our band, Dan, he's such a good drummer, and Barbara Grushka plays some percussion on here. And then Dan, he brought in Kyle Crane to do some counter percussion on Barbara Grushka's percussion.

And it sounds so great to me. Like, I can't imagine what the song used to be before I heard it that way. And then this piano vocoder. That is Björn Yitling again. First, he was like, let's get some mics with the vocoder. I was like, vocoder. All right. A vote coder is normally used to turn the human voice into a synthesized sound.

But here, they put a piano through the vocoder instead of a voice. I love it when people use things in a way that maybe they weren't supposed to be used. Just like some instrument you've always known about, but never think about using. That was Katie Lang, and I'm so glad that she did the backup singing on it because sometimes you can harmonize with your own voice and it works, and sometimes it vibrates too badly in a way that isn't good. Like, I have a really nasal voice,

so I don't blend really well with people, and sometimes not with myself either. So luckily, she swooped in and saved the day. She did it remotely in Calgary. And I was like, can you just be like a dude backup singer on a pop record? Like you're in foreigner or something. Be like you're the dude who sings backup. And she was like, yep.

I tried it a couple times and I knew what the notes were supposed to be, but I wasn't nailing it at all. And she is such a good harmony singer. Last line for centuries to come, they'll steal your patterns for the sun and you feel extinction when you see your face on their money. I like Reaver because it's showing what your human voice is vibrating and how that reacts to the surroundings. Like, how far am I from that wall?

Or is this room made of concrete? Is there a lot of glass in here? Is there wood? I can hear wood in this room. It kind of reminds you that the room is an instrument in a way. Last line of I'll be on. The last of the Mohicans gone. The last cedars of Lebanon.

You'll feel extinction. when you see your face face on their money It took a long time for it to sound like the song And I think it's because we waited for so long Before Jeff put the signature guitar sound on it Because he played the riff But it wasn't on the same guitar

And it needed that same guitar Not specific Nylonstrom guitar And it needed to be recorded in my kitchen where he recorded it to begin with. So it was kind of this little breakfast nook area, and so he recorded it in there and sent it to us. And we were all like, yes, okay, now it sounds like the song it's supposed to sound like.

I'm there for every single second of the making of the record. I think I'm just a control freak, and that's like a very good trait to have if you're going to be a producer maybe. It's not lovely, but I don't think I've ever really done it any other way. Even, you know, on my first record, when I wasn't, quote, unquote, producing it, I still had a lot of opinions and wanted things turned up or down. And by my third record, my dear friend, Daryl Newdorf, who I record with a lot,

and he's kind of my recording mentor, he actually said, you know you're producing, right? And I was like, really? So, yeah, this is what this means. I don't know if I would have understood that, because I just was so ravenous to make something, the roles and the plays, thoughts didn't occur to me. It's listening, having an opinion, chasing a sound, being curious about a sound.

So I can go, yeah, I'm a producer, or I'm a songwriter, or I'm a performer. I can definitely say those things, but it took a long time. I don't know if that's a thing for women, or if that's a thing for people who don't feel like they own themselves in a way. I'm not really sure. I definitely think it took a lot longer than it should have.

But I feel like I know who I am. And I'm okay with that. And now here's Last Line of Albion by Nico Case in its entirety. Visit SongExploder.net to learn more about Nico Case and for a link to buy or stream this song. You'll also find the episode from 2016 where I was a guest and took apart one of my own songs. I have a new album of my own coming out on April 24th. It's been about 15 years since I last put out of full length. and this is the first one that'll be out under my own name, Rishikesh Her Way.

I started making Song Exploder when I was feeling lost in my own music career. And then for over a decade, I've gotten to have these incredible conversations about the process of making music, talking to other artists. And it made me completely rethink my relationship to music and my way of writing songs. And this album is the product of all of that. It features contributions from some of my favorite artists, including some folks that you may have heard on this podcast, like Iron and Wine, Kevin Morby, Vagabon, Fenlily, and the producer Phil Winerobe. I'm going to be on tour playing in cities across the U.S. starting in April, and I'm trying to bring the spirit of the podcast with me.

So every show that I'm playing will begin with a conversation about the album with a different amazing guest moderator in each city. Like Adam Scott, Samin Nasrat, Jason Manzuchas, Josh Malina, Minjin Lee, Ken Jennings, John Roderick, Austin Cleon, and more. They're all going to be my conversation partners on stage. And then I'll play with my band. The album is called In the Last Hour of Light, and the first couple songs were out now. You can listen to the music and get tickets for the shows on my website, rishikash.co.

Or just go to songexploder.net slash live. That's songexploder.net slash live. Thanks. Next time on Song Exploder, Rishikash is back with guest Christine in the Queens. This episode was produced and edited by Rer, Rishi Kesh Herway, along with Christian Coons and intern Olivia Wood. The intro music for this episode was made by Julian Baker. My interview with Nico Case was engineered by Veronica Simonetti of Women's Audio Mission.

Special thanks to Terry Winston. The illustrations for Song Exploder are by Carlos Lerma. Song Exploder is a proud member of Radiotopia from PRX, a collective of fiercely independent podcasts. You can learn about all the shows at Radiotopia.fm. Let us know your thoughts on this. episode, you can find Song Exploder on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter at Song Exploder. And you can find me on Twitter and Instagram, Tao Get Stay Down. My name is Tao Wyn.

Thanks for listening.