Kiwi Jr.’s Blowin’ Up

For years I’ve been on the lam, waking up in a cold sweat from nightmares where I’m extradited to Canada. My crime is heinous, but in my estimation not my fault. While packing up my stuff to return to New York, my final request to my ex was to return my library books. He never did. My last connection to the city is the twice-yearly calls I get reminding me of my replacement fees. I count my lucky stars the Toronto Public Library system has no jurisdiction stateside. Or anywhere, really. 

The entire time I was there, I was oblivious of one of the TPL librarians: Jeremy Gaudet, frontman of the endlessly charming Kiwi Jr. I faced my fears and sat down to chat with him about their upcoming album, Blowin’ Up.

PT: I came across you because “Pure Michigan,” I believe, was playing on WFMU. I went home, watched the music video, and loved it. Dove into your older songs. Then you sent me the new album. With people I’m interviewing I like to listen to a whole discography before I look at anyone else’s opinion on the music but I ended up reading a Pitchfork review of an older album and I disagreed with most of what they said.

JG: Yeah, I remember that review. It was kind of negative.

PT: It was kind of negative and the weirdest part to me is that everyone's saying “oh yeah it sounds just like Pavement.” Like, are we listening to the same music right now? And a part of me is thinking that on Chopper maybe they get tricked because you have those moments where you do the Stephen Malkmus thing where he talks a line or two and has clever lyrics. If it sounds like any Malkmus project though it’s Jicks, not Pavement.

JG: I think it's a weird comparison. First of all, I love Pavement. But yeah, I used to get kind of annoyed at the constant Pavement comparisons. We used to get them more but not so much lately. It was there for a while and it used to bug me–not because I don't think Pavement's great, I think they’re fantastic, but just because I personally didn't really see it and that wasn't really what we were going for. Then I just realized, “hey, people love Pavement so that's a good thing.”  We actually got to open for Pavement in New York City in like 2022 or ‘23. Once that happened it was almost like, “any and all comparisons are invited, that's great.”

PT: What other comparisons have you gotten?

JG: We get The Strokes a lot.

PT: I was playing your stuff out loud and my buddy started referring to you as “if The Strokes had more imagination.” 

JG: I mean it's great, these aren't bad bands to be compared to if you had to pick. I'm really pleased, if it were bands I couldn't stand then it would be an issue.

PT: I’m digging the songs y'all picked to be the singles from the new album. “Blowin’ Up” obviously makes sense–I was watching the music video on my phone, which is bad, it's so small on that screen, but I still noticed “oh the headstock on his guitar looks weird but I can't see well so whatever.” Played on a bigger screen later–is that a 12 string?

JG: Yeah, when we first started playing together as Kiwi Jr. we were a three piece. It was before Brian joined the band so it was just guitar, bass, drums. I didn't own a 12 string guitar at that point, it was just a Telecaster that I had. I remember it was hard to really fill the sound out as a three piece with just one guitar and I just had the idea that I should buy a 12 string. I didn't really research it or, you know, overthink it. I just saw one at the store and I thought it would be really great for Kiwi. There was no mission statement about what the intention was with it like “ooo this is going to add a janglier sound” or like, “this is going to make people compare us to The Byrds” or anything like that. It was just that I thought it would be really cool so I bought it. 

I remember the first time we played in rehearsal and there was a “oh yeah this is it, this just makes such a difference.” When there's only three instruments it's hard to hear guitar above drums in the best of times. That 12 string tilts it on its axis a little bit and it's a little more unconventional sounding. I've been afraid to play anything else for the most part now since I liked it so much.

On Blowin’ Up I did use a lot of six string guitars on the album but live I still use the 12 string.

We were in the studio and there was this really cool Gibson Les Paul. I'm not a Gibson guy by any means, I'd never played one. But there is a decided effort in recording this album to just do things that were a little uncomfortable, y’know. It's our fourth album, we didn't want to be reaching for the same toys over and over again. As soon as I picked up the Les Paul the guy in the studio told me it used to be owned by Joe Perry from Aerosmith and I was like, “that’s so funny. Okay if this is Aerosmith's guitar we 100% have to use it.” I don't even love the sound of Gibsons but it just gave it a different kind of feel. And, I mean, the fact that it was Joe Perry's guitar.

PT: Besides the comparisons other people have given you, what would you say that your actual influences are for when you're creating music?

JG: I'm mostly influenced by the songwriter side of things. Once I take a song to the rest of the band, that's when it really starts to sound like a Kiwi Jr. song. But when I'm writing a song I'm a big Warren Zevon fan and Lou Reed, kind of the usual suspects that you would expect of a guy like me. It's usually on the lyrics side of things that I'm more influenced by.

PT: I love your lyrics and the way you sing them. On “Night Vision” especially when you're like, “I'm late for the party, that's good for the party anyway.”

JG: I like your delivery there by the way.

Note to readers: my sung delivery was actually not good but for the sake of my ego revise in your mind’s eye that it was

PT: Ha! Thanks. I don’t know, your delivery, though, on that and so many other lines brings you in. It feels like you're in on a joke. Everything about what y’all are doing is extremely charming.

JG: And I think it’s true, y’know, that if you're at a party and somebody comes in late that's good for the party, right?

PT: Absolutely, and I mean “Night Vision” is one of my favorites obviously because it exemplifies your sense of storytelling in these cool little vignettes really well. Super visual with the dead deer, the petrol can, the car.

JG: What kind of car do you drive?

PT: Oh shit. Guess. And prepare for me to be offended. I have that terrible American car culture trait of thinking that people can be accurately judged by what type of car they drive.

JG: I don't know anything about you but I'm gonna just think of popular cars. Maybe, uh, maybe like a Honda CRV?

PT:  Kinda close. I drive an ancient Subaru. It was a dependable car but now the transmission is kicking it.

JG: Well it's funny, my girlfriend and I were noticing the other day that our neighborhood in Toronto is a Subaru neighborhood.

PT: So obviously a superior neighborhood. Where abouts? 

JG: We're in Parkdale, but the Subaru side of Parkdale.

PT: I used to walk to the Parkdale library all the time when I lived in Toronto because I liked their layout. I lived on Lisgar, so not too far from y’all. You aren’t originally from Toronto though, right?

JG: I'm from Prince Edward Island but I've lived in Toronto since 2014. I was in Montreal for two years and then after school I came here.

PT: Tell me about growing up all the way out on PEI. 

JG: They didn't build the bridge until I was like eight years old or something and it's crazy to think that you had to take a pretty long boat ride to get off of the island to get to the rest of Canada. Even when they did build the bridge it's like 50 bucks every time you want to leave. When I was a kid anyway the internet was not what it is now, it was a little more isolated. It's not Greenland or something but it was a little isolated culturally.

PT: Do you think that isolation affected your taste or your musical inclinations at all?

JG: I think so. If I wanted to find music the only place I could go was the one used CD store and just pick things up and ask the guy who owned the store “is this any good?”

Like picking up Elvis Costello's CD because he looked cool on the cover and the guy's like, “yeah you'll like that.” I learned so much about music that way. I don't want to be the old guy saying things were better back then but I do think that was a much more real way to discover new artists. Not just music but just books and things like that. You had to search and actually talk to people. You had to work a little bit harder to get access to the cool stuff so when you got it, it paid off a little more.

PT: I've been talking about this with my friends a lot, about how the algorithm is destroying people's taste. We were talking about taste as a skill you have, not a collection of records or a collection of books. It's not what you already know, it's about if you’re able to apply that. Being able to tell if you like something or not. 

When I was growing up it required a lot of paying your dues to a scene. When I was in college, music, especially local music, still was not as algorithmically-dominated. If you wanted to go to a cool show you had to know someone who was going to tell you where the cool basement show was happening and the way that you'd get that information was by being an active part of a community. Being friends with folks or willing to be the person who's like “hey man for like five terrible shows I'm going to show up and bring a case of beer and help you break down equipment.” 

JG: It also screws up the order in which I'm used to learning about artists, right? Like there was such a path for me to go down. Like what I just said. I’d pick up an Elvis Costello album and then maybe I’d see Nick Lowe produced it then I’d get a Nick Lowe record then I'd say “oh he also produced The Damned.” Then it's not too long before you're listening to some lesser-known British punk stuff. Now it's like, you've got people who aren't really that into music but know there's, like, an Elliot Smith song with like 10 billion plays so they’re just kind of skipping the line and going right to the cool stuff. Do you know what I mean?

PT: Absolutely. It’s a freaky thing and a very aestheticized and surface-level way to interact with culture. Which surrounds not actually interacting with people. Have you been reading or watching anything lately? 

JG: I went to see that new Steven Spielberg movie and after the movie somebody told me that the girl in that movie is Bono's daughter. I just love going to the movies. It's just something good to do when you leave your house. I end up going to the theaters a lot even if I don't love the movie or anything. I just like sitting there.

PT: Like what? Are you just enjoying the building, the architecture? 

JG: No, like, sitting there. There's some theaters that have really good chairs. There's one in Toronto that has these beautiful lazyboys that have an electronic, like, situation. You press a button and they recline and stretch out and stuff and I'm buying a ticket just to go sit in the chairs.

PT: I appreciate that response, genuinely. How about other media? Any books you’ve been reading?

JG: I have a huge stack of books in front of me actually, give me one second… One of my favorites is Tortilla Flats, Steinbeck. I also love any west coast noir. Anytime there’s a detective story that’s set in sunny California it just clicks for me . It’s cool when you pull the rug back a little bit, especially in movies. Visually. Like in Night Moves or whatever. Or even The Big Lebowski. I’m a sucker for it.

[…]

JG: We were originally trying to be a little twee with it. Super minimalistic. We were really K-Recs-focused at the time. But we added more instruments and it got more obvious that the direction our band was going towards was more rock. And now, ten years later, we’re signed to K Records.

PT: You’ve been signed to other labels though, so how did that journey happen?

JG: The administrative side of being in a band is this whole side of things that most people don’t care about but it’s the stuff that takes up most of your time. I try to not let it influence the creative side of things but it’s important to find a label and people you want to work with who will champion your music. It’s our third label and I’m over the moon to be working with K Records. They are all great people and they maintain this DIY feel. They totally punch above their weight.

PT: Totally, before I was chatting with you I scoped out their roster at the moment and it’s impressive stuff.

[...]

PT: You’re playing at Tubby’s soon, right? That used to be one of the go-tos when I was in college.

JG: We played Tubby’s once before a few years ago and, y’know that huge theater right across the street? Well we went to go unpack our gear and eat and we came back and there’s droves of people walking around wearing band t-shirts and stuff wand we’re like, “woah is everyone coming to our show?”

No, they were all going to see Fleet Foxes across the street. So we didn’t have a great show. And it’s funny cuz we were on Sub Pop at the time and Fleet Foxes was also on Sub Pop so it was like, “woah our own label mates are hanging us to dry.”

And y’know who else was going to Fleet foxes? Don Draper from Mad Men. Like, Jon Hamm. Our friend saw him and I was like “you gotta convince Jon Hamm to come to our show.”

Kiwi Jr.’s upcoming tour dates can be found here

[…]

JG: With our new album, we let ourselves go a little longer with the songs. We opened the sound up a bit. We used to be really ruthless in the past, like, “we can only have two choruses in the song.”

We recorded this with all four of us live in a room together with minimal overdubs. That was inspired by listening to a lot of Neil Young before recording the record. With a lot of those mid-70s Neil Young records I like that you can hear where everyone was in the room. And with a lot of newer stuff coming out, you have all this amazing recording technology where everyone can have Pro Tools in their bedroom. But a lot of people use it in a way where you lose a sense of space. 

I think about it in terms of movies, too. I was talking to someone who I think was talking about Spielberg. Y’know, cuz I just watched Bono’s daughter’s movie. And they were saying how even when there’s a really chaotic scene in an action movie and there's aliens or pirate ships or whatever all around, a good director will make sure you know where you are in the scene. You don’t question the space you’re in. I don’t mean to talk shit but I feel sometimes when you’re just throwing guitar after guitar and keyboard after keyboard tracks on there and then fixing it after in the mix you’re left with a sorta collage of all these pieces. You have trouble tracking the parts through the song. I like the sound of feeling like you’re listening to a real band.

PT: I totally feel that. And it’s getting really common in mainstream pop stuff especially where you can immediately tell no one was in the same room and it’s all just session musicians. I mean, session musicians aren’t new but at least, like, The Wrecking Crew tended to play together. I think music dorks often will immediately recognize that lack of cohesion and go, “oh that’s what was bothering me.” But even for people who aren’t super fluent in noticing that stuff, they subconsciously pick up on that and it’s uncanny and unsettling.

I’m just hyped to see a band that seems to be really having fun out there together. My only real critique is that according to your Pure Michigan video you seem to be Canadiens fans. 

JG: I think being a Habs fan is allowed!

PT: I can’t talk. I follow the Flyers. It’s a fun video though.

JG: We filmed so much hockey stuff for the video that didn’t make it. Mike, who plays bass for us, put that video together. We could’ve made a whole hockey video. 

PT: Well let Mike know that I do need a directors cut. 

Conversation trimmed for the online edition. Get your tickets to see Kiwi Jr. live this fall, get ready for the new album.

Cover photo by Colin Medley,