AN INTERVIEW with Omar Rodriguez, the Mars Volta leader!
"Nothing is really decided when you’re making art, music or whatever. I mean when you’re making something real and it comes from your soul you don’t really decide on things. Just like you don’t decide to fall in love."
The conversation with Omar Rodriguez, the Maes Volta leader, one hour before the show in Stodola turned out to be very inspiring...
I read some interviews and you said couple of times that you love Poland. My question is – why?
I don’t know. Loving something is intangible. Like I love my girlfriend but I’m not sure why I do. It’s just a feeling. I know that when I’m here it feels really great.
So it wasn’t just a thing to say to a Polish journalist?
No, please! I am opposite of that. I wouldn’t say something like that. It’s a very common and boring thing for bands to do when they go “oh, I love this! Oh, I love you!” You know it’s like filling the blank. A part of it must be that one of my favourite filmmakers is Kieslowski, and Kieslowski was from Poland and I like Roman Polanski also but more than anything it’s that we played here few times and it has always struck me. It’s always strong.
I’ve heard about the concert that you played few years ago with At Drive-In in Wroclaw for 40-50 people and it was really amazing. All those 50 people that were there bought the record straight away and they still talk about it. Actually now more that 50 people claim they’ve seen the concert Do you remember that performance as a special moment?
Yes, but again, I remember every concert here in Poland as a special thing. Not a lot of bands that I know come all the way to Poland to play or to Croatia, Slovenia, etc. And we were here with At Drive-in and with another band called Perfecto and now we’re here with Mars Volta and each time sticks out.
And your favourite film by Kieslowski?
Without a doubt it would be the “Short film about killing”
Do you know any other Polish artists: authors, musicians, etc?
Not that I can think of from the top of my head. Of course Polanski. He’s great. A lot of people think he’s French for some reason.
I guess because he lives there.
Yes, and he’s also so popular because he went to America and he decided to make the American-type films.
I wanted to ask you about Red Hot Chilli Peppers. You went on tour with them and John (Frusciante) and Flea played on your first album. How did it come to this?
We just became friends through music.
But they’re not like people you meet on the street everyday…
For me it’s much a lot like what happened. It was much like meeting them on the street or a concert and than you start talking about music. I’ve never been a fan of the band. The fact is that when I first met John I didn’t realize that he was in the RHCP. I never listened to them before. So I’ve met him and it was pretty much like two artists, two musicians meeting each other. We met at a concert. We were both watching a band and than John came over to me and he goes “do you like this film? Do you like this book?” and I said “of course and I like this and I like that”. First we started talking about films than we got into books and then into music
So sounds like a casual friendly meeting…
It’s exactly what it was. It’s a way that you meet people. I never thought of it like “oh! I wanna meet the guy from Chilli!” or something. That’s why it’s really strange when people go: “How was it to work with them?” or “How did you get them to play on your record?” People assume that we offered them money or something and it was just organic and we became very very close friends. John from the very beginning was the very huge fan of the Mars Volta and he always talks about it so he helped in that way.
The Mars Volta new album “Frances the Mute” - I was thinking about the title song. Because there is a song called “Frances the Mute” like the record but it’s not on the album. There are the lyrics though. Is there any special edition with this song or something like that? Where can we hear it?
You can get it on vinyl. It’s a single on vinyl and I think soon it will be on the cd also. It’s kind of confusing because the album is called “Frances the Mute” but it doesn’t have the song on it and there’s an actual record that says just The Mars Volta – “Frances the Mute” and that’s the only song on the single.
The album is very, I’d say, different. There are “only” 5 songs on it but it lasts 75 minutes so that’s pretty unusual. Was it a decision that you want to do it that way or it just happened in the studio?
Nothing is really decided when you’re making art, music or whatever. I mean when you’re making something real and it comes from your soul you don’t really decide on things. Just like you don’t decide to fall in love. Making music is the same way. You follow your heart and things start to happen. Things start to unfold and manifest themselves and the universe comes to your aid and things just happen. The songs on “Frances” are long because that’s the way they came out and it takes a long time to say what we’re trying to say. Like right now in this interview I could easily answer to most of your questions by saying “yes”, “no” or “I think so” but I just feel the need to express myself now. I wanna give an answer that makes me feel like I’m coming across with my ideas and it’s the same thing with making music. Music is just an extinction of our personalities.
And the same thing with the concert tonight, right? Noone knows what will happen in an hour.
That’s right. It can go any direction. It’s just like a conversation. It’s something people don’t understand sometimes. For some bands – pop bands – it’s not a conversation. It’s very much just a planned thing.
Just a technical show…
Yes, it’s just a show where they go out and say “Oh good evening Poland! Good evening Germany!” and it’s the same thing everyday. For us every night is different. Even though we play the same songs. We have lots o improvisation. We’re a group of 8 people traveling around and we go on stage for two hours and we have a conversation. So some nights our conversation isn’t so good and it’s kind of broken up and not fitting and other nights we have a fit conversation. It’s just human dynamics.
What about your relations with Cedric. Because, you know, when there’s 2 people and such strong personalities spending so much time together, working and traveling together as you do I’d assume it must be difficult sometimes.
For us it’s not. We do argue sometimes but arguing for us is not something dramatic. I think people sometimes make it like “Oh my God!” and make tension when for us both an argument or a problem means only a new solution that you wouldn’t have thought about on your own. If life was without any arguments or problems you would never have any perspective and new form of thinking, you would never evolve. So we welcome these things and see them only as opportunities for us to learn something new about each other. And particularly we just happen to have some strange relationship that neither he or I try to question or analyze or intellectualize. We just let it be what it is because it’s so powerful and so beautiful and so strong and so organic that we don’t want to ruin it by asking too many questions about it. It was like love from the first sight. We’ve met when we were 12 or 13 and then we’ve been living together for 11 years and have been on a road together for even longer and playing music together for about 13 years.
I guess that’s what is special about the Mars Volta because people can feel it when you’re on stage that there are the two people, the two personalities connected and they give so much to people.
Yeah, playing is our sex. We are like a couple. We’re always together and we’re always exchanging ideas and music is our way of having an intimate exchange that transcends what we experience in every day life.
Talking about friends - what do think about Sparta? (the band created by the former At the Drive In members)
They’re horrible! I find them utterly boring. But it’s just my opinion and it doesn’t mean anything. It only means I’m a very peaky person when it comes to my art and my music. It doesn’t do anything for me, it doesn’t speak to me, it doesn’t give me pictures in my head, it doesn’t make me emotional…
What does?
Many things: traditional music of Russia, the folk songs of Iran and Iraq. The films of Kieslowski, Federico Fellini or Paolo Passolini (tu accent!), the paintings of Peter Carlo, Heronimus Bash, the writings of Carlos Castanieda, the films of Max Ernst, the revolutionary thinkers, Frederic Douglas which was the first black man who thought himself to read and write. These are the things that really inspire me and just everyday life, the people around me – my family, my friends, my friendships, my enemies, my hatery, my love. Things that are strong and have no apology.
Sparta to me is like most pop groups. It sounds like someone who’s kissing ass and apologize all the time. Everything there has to be pretty. For me life is not so pretty. There’s lots of dark sides about life. I need the dark things so I know what the light is. There has to be a perfect balance. There has to be murder and has to be healing. And it’s all beautiful and it’s all connected.
Sounds like a good title for a new album – “Not so pretty”…
Yeah, it does!
I know you go on tour soon as a special guest of System of a Down.
System of a down are great people and we also know them for a while. They’re very fun to be around. They’re very good people. It will be just 2 months in America and I’m concentrating on recording our next record so that’s the main thing to do now.
And when is it going to be out?
I don’t know. Who knows?
the interview by Olga Tuszewska
