Big Bad Wolf?

Talking Fear with Andrew W.K.

2006-07-13

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Big Bad Wolf?

Talking Fear with Andrew W.K.

By Rey Roldan

Andrew W.K.’s sometimes Neanderthal, and often plebeian anthems of partying hard, puking and other frat boy subjects hides the fact that he’s actually a profound and philosophical thinker. So when confronted with an inane interview about the primal and visceral topic of horror, he can become defensive and confrontational, and a wee bit…scary.

Andrew W.K. isn’t sitting still while he’s between record labels. For one, he has recorded the song “You Will Remember Tonight” for the Masters of Horror soundtrack compilation. Musically, the song is trademark AWK—prominent keyboard notes, slash and burn guitars, and gravelly yet gauzy vocals that are part sports fan cheer, part metal growl. He’s also releasing Who Knows?, a DVD compilation of performances from 1992 to 2004 which valiantly tries to bring the man and the music together—but like making crème brulee, if you try too hard, you end up with a messy omelet.

It isn’t fun to poke sticks at a defensive Andrew W.K. When the Wolf feels backed into a corner, he tends to bite.

You have quite a dichotomy going for you... Shock, horror and parties are almost synonymous with you, yet you’re extremely well spoken and eloquent.
Duality? Does that seem intelligent? Maybe it’s the other way around. I’m trying to look at it from two sides: yours, mine. The other meaning could refer more to “what is” and “what else is.” In this case, the “what else” would refer to whatever ideas you have about who, or what, this person is not. In other words, it’s possible that it’s impossible to be anything other than what you are being, unless you decide to be it, and then you are. If the natural world contains us all, then tell me, isn’t it our very nature to be natural? So in that way, when you’re asking me about duality, it seems completely subjective. What one might see as an opposing set of qualities, or contradictions, have no more or less significance to the actual essence, other than it “seeming that way” to one observer.

Is horror a big part of who you are? You are, after all, on the Masters of Horror compilation...
I’m very pleased to have the music featured in the TV series. I think it’s a great idea and it’s a creamed crop of directors… Lots and lots of songs—you can’t lose. I don’t think horror is a big part of who you think I am.

What scares you most?
The idea of ever fully believing that there’s ever a reason to be fully scared is pretty frightening. If I caught his drift correctly, that’s what Jimmy Carter said: “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” [Actually, it was Franklin D. Roosevelt - ed.]

So do you fear fear?
I feel that fear is an emotion that gets confused with an idea, and just thinking about it is making me feel scared, but not in an emotional way—just the idea of being afraid is scary. That’s why it’s an interesting paradox: the fear causes fear causes fear causes fear.

Do you have any irrational fears?
I have an irrational fear about irrational questions. But I was still able to answer this one.

What’s the significance of the track “You Will Remember Tonight?”
The lyrics are weighted towards the linear perception of time. If you look at the title, you can see that it covers all three of the linear expressions of time’s left to right order: “You Will” is predicting an upcoming experience—there’s your future—and in this case that future experience is when you “Remember”—there’s your past—and what you’ll remember is “Tonight”—which is your present. What’s happening in the phrase is essentially the cancellation of time, because in order to understand the meaning, the brain has to be in all “places” in time at once. I don’t believe in linear time, but I’m very interested in it and I certainly use it a lot in day to day organizing, but I don’t believe that it’s the only way to look at time. Time could be said to be constant, not passing and flowing like a river, but maybe more like a solid mass of experiences and events, all at once, in every direction.

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