(SOUNDBITE OF THIS IS LORELEI SONG, "BILLY CAME BACK")
SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
You never know what you'll get from a song by Nate Amos - folk, country rock, electronic, dance. All are a part of his music. He is in the experimental band Water From Your Eyes. His solo project is called This Is Lorelei.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "BILLY CAME BACK")
THIS IS LORELEI: (Singing) Billy doesn't need to watch the screen 'cause he knows most every word and what it means. I always thought that Billy had the knack, and I always thought that Billy might come back.
SIMON: "The Singer In My Band" is the newest album from This Is Lorelei. Nate Amos joins us now from Brooklyn. Thanks so much for being with us.
NATE AMOS: Thank you so much for having me.
SIMON: Your father's a bluegrass musician - in fact, plays with your sister, both on this album. Is that the music you first heard and grew up with?
AMOS: Yeah. I would say so. Probably some combination of bluegrass, classical music and, like, the Beatles. But bluegrass was the earliest music that I experienced in a cultural sense, seeing live music and people gathering around it. So it feels kind of the most fundamental to what I do now in a lot of ways.
SIMON: So we hear that in your music?
AMOS: Yeah. I think so. Especially on this album, I think. I kind of - sometimes I have to - it's a very comfortable space for me to work within, so sometimes I have to keep myself from sliding into it. And this time, I kind of just let it slide.
SIMON: (Laughter).
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "THE SINGER IN MY BAND")
THIS IS LORELEI: (Singing) She said, you got a city, boy, and you should understand that you can't belong to Texas when you're from Chicagoland. She's trying to shoot the moon and stars. She's pretty bad at cards with her suitcase full of crystal and her pistol in her hand. She's saying, Lord, I'll look for your good light. If I don't find it by the morning, then I'll fight it in the night.
SIMON: I gather you wrote most of these songs on the road.
AMOS: Yeah.
SIMON: Do we hear that, too? Is that part of the experience?
AMOS: In a way, I'm sure. You know, it must be because, like, I had - you know, when I was first showing people the album, that was something that people clocked and pointed out to me. And it's funny because I didn't really think about it. Traveling and touring is just - it's an awful lot of time when you're just, like, in a van, staring out the window, watching things go by. And that kind of - I feel like, when you sink into kind of a passive state but continue to allow yourself to be stimulated by movement and new things that you're seeing, that encourages a wandering mind that's a little different than the one that emerges from daydreaming while stationary.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "THE SINGER IN MY BAND")
THIS IS LORELEI: (Singing) Leave.
SIMON: Let me ask you about the song "Watching Heaven Fall." Let's hear it for a moment.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "WATCHING HEAVEN FALL")
THIS IS LORELEI: (Singing) Do you remember my friend, the rider dressed in red on the train, telling truths about his love?
AMOS: It's a series of snapshots. I wouldn't even say that - the individual moments aren't really complete tales. They're kind of, like, three partial things that create a vaguer whole. I've been thinking a lot about "The Martian Chronicles" by Ray Bradbury, which was, like, one of my favorite books as a kid. And I think, weirdly, that kind of approach to storytelling worked its way into this album.
SIMON: Well, I mean, taking a cue from Ray Bradbury, you don't have to come up with the end of the story. You just - we finish that, don't we?
AMOS: No, exactly.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "WATCHING HEAVEN FALL")
THIS IS LORELEI: (Singing) Do today. God, forgive her. She didn't care at all, watching heaven fall.
SIMON: I want to ask about the deluxe version of your last album.
AMOS: Yeah.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "DANCING IN THE CLUB")
THIS IS LORELEI: (Singing) I lost your love today in a lovely summer breeze. I was dreaming all my dreams. Yeah. I'm my own worst enemy.
SIMON: Because you had a number of different artists re-record your songs from it. You had Jeff Tweedy of Wilco. You had MJ Lenderman - not to be confused...
AMOS: Yes.
SIMON: ...With BJ Leiderman, who writes our theme music. You had Tim Heidecker. What did it mean for you to get these artists to - I don't know. What do we say? - reimagine, reconsider your songs?
AMOS: That was the first time I'd ever really experienced hearing other people put their own spin on something that I had written.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "DANCING IN THE CLUB")
MJ LENDERMAN: (Singing) I lost your love today on a lonely summer breeze.
AMOS: The whole thing kind of happened on accident because I just asked Jake if he would be interested in trying to sing that song over the existing backing track for fun.
SIMON: And that's Jake Lenderman of MJ Lenderman, we should say?
AMOS: Yes. That's Jake Lenderman. At the time, I was peeved at myself. I thought I had kind of overstylized the album version of "Dancing In The Club." I wanted an excuse for there to be a more straightforward version of that song out there. And then Jake suggested that we actually just, like, rebuild the song.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "DANCING IN THE CLUB")
LENDERMAN: (Singing) And I know it's only fair that I should end up all...
AMOS: But yeah. And it just kind of snowballed from there, and more people got involved. So it was kind of a happy accident. But it ended up being just - I mean, just such a cool and weird thing to hear your own songs reimagined. I had just never even really thought about that before.
SIMON: You're so incredibly prolific. Is there always a song going on in your head?
AMOS: Usually. I've always kind of been like that. Even before I had the ability to record myself, when I was a kid, I was just, like, walking around singing all the time.
(SOUNDBITE OF THIS IS LORELEI SONG, "I WILL EAT MY HEART IN THE MORNING LIGHT")
AMOS: If I don't get a chance to record for a long enough period of time, I get, like, grumpy.
(LAUGHTER)
SIMON: Aww.
AMOS: It just begins to bother me until I get a chance to do it.
SIMON: Well, work is you.
AMOS: Yeah.
SIMON: Nate Amos. He records as This Is Lorelei. His new album is called "The Singer In My Band." Thanks so much for being with us.
AMOS: Thanks so much for having me.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "I WILL EAT MY HEART IN THE MORNING LIGHT")
THIS IS LORELEI: (Singing) Morning light. I will eat my heart in the morning light. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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