SFBG: Did you collaborate on the concept – how did it develop?

KG: Well, I sort of came up with a theme that I could build these loosely structured songs on, which come out of improv. We haven’t made the music yet. We’re going there for four or five days beforehand to actually just play together and kind of create it. It’s kind of like a residency they have there. We’ll create the music and then do a concert.

SFBG: You recorded with Ikue in the past, along with DJ Olive?

KG: I had a quartet for a while and we put one record on SYR – that was DJ Olive and Ikue and me and Jim O’Rourke, although Jim doesn’t play on the record. He mixed it. But then he went on to play with us during live shows. Then I had this other project that was a film that we did a live soundtrack to. It was a collaboration I did with this artist Tony Osler and filmmaker Phil Morrison – where I wrote this script based on car ad copy. Phil directed the actors, and they were on one scrim behind us. And then in front scrim there were all these backgrounds that Tony gathered and I gathered and Phil gathered. And then the musicians played in the middle of these two screens. That had this sort of 3D effect, kind of. Anyway, we did a bunch of performances – all in Europe, pretty much. It was called Perfect Partner. And there were cues and we had different sorts of feelings, different parts in kind of songs - like a soundtrack but not anything like a conventional pop song. This experience might be a little bit like that.

Match game: Perfect Partner.

SFBG: What draws you to working with women?

KG: I think of the women I play with foremost by their personality. You immediately have a different role as well. Bass is usually more of a…supportive instrument, even though it may be the most important! [Laughs] But I’ll probably be playing guitar. I usually play guitar and do vocals when I do improv things. That immediately has a different kind of energy to it.

SFBG: Do you prefer it?

KG: Ummm, it’s just different.

SFBG: Why do you think the bass is the most important instrument?

KG: Well, it’s kind of like the glue in between the drums and the higher end. Y’know it’s really right in the middle and it plays melody and rhythm. I mean, believe me, I don’t even consider myself a bass player. I don’t even think of myself as a musician, really. [Laughs]

SFBG: But you’ve been doing it for so long – surely you qualify…

KG: Yeah, but I was never trained as a musician. I just fell into it in the post-punk spirit of do-it-yourself. I mean, when I moved to New York City I was inspired by a lot of the no wave musicians – a lot of them actually coming out of art, also. And it was more expressive and kind of more along the lines of how new music composers might work. Where it’s about the idea or something. Everyone can execute it, sort of. The difference is it is more expressive and it is kind of based on people’s personalities and how they play.

I mean, when I used to see Ikue play with DNA, she was amazing. She was such an inspirational drummer.

SFBG: So today how does artwork dovetail with music for you?

KG: I don’t really think about it. I tried to keep it separate for a long time. I do a lot of installations and collaborative work with this one artist in particular – she also plays music – Jutta Koether. We haven’t actually played together that much, but we’ve done a few collaborative installations and exhibits.
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SFBG: The works tend to be pretty personal, right – like “Kim’s Bedroom.”

KG: That came about partly to solve the structural part of the show because it was a space that had windows on both sides. So the designer and I came up with this idea of doing a big, long wall that eventually went into a room. So there would be art along the wall and the room we decided to make into a bedroom and have a video there by different people. It was a show I curated. And uh, I called it “Kim’s Bedroom” because I figured a lot of people would be coming to see it because of who I was. It’s hard to escape…that sort of interest. Although I’d like to. [Laughs]

SFBG: Why?

KG: Oh, I don’t like it when people come to an art show with CDs for me to sign. It’s not about that. I don’t know. Anyway I’m not going after a music audience with my art shows. I don’t want people to like the art because they like my music. I want it to stand on its own. Y’know, I don’t want it to be an accessory.

I went to art school. I get asked all the time to be in shows with other musicians, like David Bowie and Devendra and Bjork. I don’t even know what their art’s like! Group shows are not so great…and it’s a strange reason, kind of arbitrary reason, to put people together.

SFBG: What about all these bands coming out of art school of late, and informed by it? Do you think it’s partly because the music industry is in such bad shape and musicians are giving up on being popular or commercial? Or are people more interested in indie music as fine art rather than popular art?

KG: Yeah, in a way, I wouldn’t say indie music – I’d say experimental noise music or something. Indie music has a big audience - there are some indie bands that sell lots of records! [Laughs] I think there are some interesting people who do that. It seems like such a subgenre of underground - even though bands like Lightning Bolt are pretty well-known. They have shows, and they’re pretty well-respected artists. And yeah, they came out of art school.

SFBG: Are you more interested in underground or pop culture right now?

KG: [Laughs] There’s certainly a lot of TV shows that are good right now. Well, more HBO-type things, obviously. I still love Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which I watch with my daughter who sort of got me into it. It’s very interesting. Very campy - some episodes are incredibly surreal. And yet it has this kind of realism about high school and how banal and boring it is. Gossip Girl is not as well-written. But it’s eye-candyish. There’s this new BBC show, Skins, that’s pretty good.

There’s nothing in mainstream pop music that inspires me. But my daughter likes all these bands – y’know it’s catchy like the Kooks, or MGMT. I’ll be like, “This sounds like Sparks.” And she’ll be, “Oh, no! I’ll never listen to them the same way again.” She knows her dad really likes Sparks. [Laughs] They’re not nearly as hysterical as Sparks, but they definitely have that imprint going on. There are people’s records that come out like Lucinda Williams’ - I really like her - but nothing else.

SFBG: The New York Times recently had a short piece on your clothing company, Mirror/Dash. That’s the same name as your music project?

KG: That’s true. I don’t know - I had to come up with a name that had some meaning but was kind of obscure. I mean, I couldn’t use a Song Youth song title or something. I just named to name it after this experimental duo that we have. Because we don’t do very much with it. [Laughs]

We did this jacket – it’s kind of a limited edition one-off thing. The drag was when the article came out in Times, they put the wrong Web site. Now it’s all functioning. Anyway, I’ll see what happens with that.

SFBG: Do you still do X Girl?

KG: Oh no. We sold that to the Japanese so long ago - eight years ago or something. I think they do something there called X Girl. But it’s nothing like what we did.

SFBG: So why jump into fashion or design?

KG: I know, it’s a really bad time, too! [Laughs] I don’t know - for a long time I felt like, “Oh, yeah, why do anything at all?” But it’s still kind of challenging to try and come up with things that are…everyday-type clothes that aren’t too trendy. But they’re sort of edgy. There are people in Europe that do that more than here, like Isabel Marant and APC.

There’s, like, a gazillion designers. When we did X Girl there wasn’t a lot going on downtown. And we were really trying to make clothes that were affordable. By the time we did them, designers were springing up, and now they are just so many designers… so you think, yeah why bother.

SFBG: What about Free Kitten’s reemergence?

KG: Um, Yoshimi wanted to come visit. [Laughs] And Julie’s youngest was getting older and she felt like she was ready, able, to do it. But I didn’t want to tour. It’s just too much. [In the past] we did a Japanese tour. We did a very small East and West Coast tour, and we did an English tour when Coco was about seven months old.

SFBG: What’s it like working with Julie Cafritz – is there something unique that happens between you two?

KG: We’re just old friends, y’know. And I kind of like to encourage her. She’ll do something if you get her going. [Chuckle] I don’t know - I just wanted her to get out of the house. [Laughs] She has so much to offer the world.

So what I did to get her going was say, “OK, Yoshimi’s coming. [Chuckle] Can you play these two or three days?” And we played and recorded a bunch of stuff and then edited and shaped things and overdubbed over the summer slowly. And then we mixed it. Maybe we’ll do another record.

SFBG: You and Yoshimi have worked together a lot.

KG: I love to play with her. She’s really easy to play with – and y’know I definitely relate to her: she’s a mom, and she’s in a band, and she has side projects. She has also a crazy life - busy and crazy. She doesn’t speak a lot of English, but it’s easy to communicate with her. She speaks enough English, and she understands a lot.

SFBG: You two also came from same generation of noise and post-punk bands.

KG: It’s interesting because Ikue was also an influence for her! And the Boredoms were another band that were influenced by no wave. It’s interesting that there’s that connection: New York/Japan.

SFBG: Why has no wave become gotten much more attention these days?

KG: I don’t know – it was so radical and extreme that I think it took this long for people’s ears accustomed to that sound. The influences dribbled out from it over the years. When we started playing music, to be called noise music was considered [Laughs] a derogatory term. Y’know, things have changed.

SFBG: My Bloody Valentine is coming to San Francisco – how do you feel about all these reunions of ‘90s bands. Sonic Youth has been going, playing and making music, for so long – do you feel unappreciated?

KG: Yeah, I’m sure there’s that. But one doesn’t dwell on that. [Laughs] I probably wouldn’t make any music if I worried about what other people thought. Or worried about it so much. I mean, I do worry about it, but I try not to.

SFBG: You live in Northampton, Mass., a college town. Has it had a big impact on the music you make.

KG: Yeah, well, you tell me. There’s a pretty healthy scene up here of music, of experimental music and I actually think there’s more music I could go out to see here. But, oh, well, I don’t go out that much. Thurston goes out a lot, and occasionally I’ll venture to a noise basement. [Laughs] .

SFBG: Can you see Coco ever forming a band or playing music with you?

KG: She had a band briefly. We all loved it and thought it was brilliant. But I think she and her friends got discouraged because it didn’t sound like any of the music that she liked. It basically fell apart. She’s not so interested in playing music now - I think, because we play music, she doesn’t want to. She’s more into making art and that sort of thing. She’s a real good writer.

SFBG: Speaking of boy’s clubs earlier, do you think there’s still a bias against rock moms?

KG: I don’t think so. There are so many young, hot actresses who are moms now. [Laughs] I think it’s hard for women who are artists and musicians to also be moms, but I don’t think people are necessarily prejudiced against it. I just think it’s really hard to balance, to feel like you’re kinda home enough and away enough to do things. It’s especially hard up here because we’re always traveling to New York for things. Moving away from the city – it’s not like we retired. It made things, in a sense, more complicated.

But I’m really happy we did for her – it’s such great place to raise kids here. It’s also a kind of unique place here. It’s kind of a liberal bubble we live in and people really care about the environment here and different things, y’know – it’s a good community.

New York is such a place where you go and take what you want. Not that there aren’t communities there. But I think it’s harder to have your community.

We have an apartment in New York still, which is downtown, and I’m just like, “Who are these people?” On the street. I’m always there at the worst time, on the weekends. And it’s always like…I don’t want to say - the more I talk, the more, what a horrible person I am!

But it’s just changed. You walk through the East Village, which we don’t even go to that often. But it’s all these NYU frat boy types – it’s kinda crazy.

KIM GORDON MEETS PHANTOM ORCHARD
Fri/26, 8 p.m., $15–$55
Montalvo Arts Center
Carriage House Theatre, 15400 Montalvo, Saratoga
(408) 961-5858