FROM: Brooklyn, NY
RIYL: Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Dirty on Purpose, The Pixies
mp3: Uninhabitable Mansions - "Do You Have a Strategy"
At one point, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Dirty on Purpose and Au Revoir Simone were considered three of the best up-and-coming bands in New York. Clap Your Hands Say Yeah's career represents the current state of indie music within blog culture, blowing up with the band's debut and then fizzling out a bit, eventually deciding to take a break in 2009 to work on side projects. One of those side projects is Uninhabitable Mansions, and the band's debut, Nature is a Taker, justifies the break.
Combining the talents of CYHSY's Tyler Sargent and Robbie Guertin, Doug Marvin of Dirty on Purpose, Au Revoir Simone's Annie Hart and guitarist Chris Diken, Uninhabitable Mansions is a local indie-rock supergroup.
The collaboration goes beyond just music, though. With the formation of Uninhabitable Mansions the band also came Uninhabitable Mansions the art collective. The bands members along with a few other artists have been participating in art fairs, publishing books, drawing comics and even scoring a dance piece.
Opening for The Antlers at Bowery Ballroom on Dec. 15, the band will be one to watch in 2010. Guitarist Chris Diken, who also plays in Radical Dads with Robbie Guertin, took some time to talk to us about the origins of Uninhabitable Mansions and the many talents of his bandmates.
New York Press: Where does the name Uninhabitable Mansions come from?
Chris Diken: I read it in an interview with an architect—someone from the era of Walter Gropius, although I don’t recall his name. He was asked about his family and whether he considered them to be part of his oeuvre, and the architect said, 'Oh yes, my children are my little uninhabitable mansions.' I have no idea what it means.
What led to the formation of the band?
In college, Robbie and I were in a band called The Glorious Nosebleed. The band broke up when we graduated, but fortunately we made a (nose) blood pact: Someday we would play again. Five years later, we reconvened in a suburban basement, next to a massage table. At first all we had was the name, some guitars and the table, which loomed in the shadows and made no sound. Then we decided to get serious and become an indie-rock supergroup. Fortunately we had numerous friends who were in bands of excellent repute.
Which idea came first, Uninhabitable Mansions the art collective or Uninhabitable Mansions the band?
The band came first. Shortly thereafter, we were asked to contribute to an art exhibition in Chicago, and we needed to call ourselves something. Surely our real names wouldn’t do. We decided to forgo imagination altogether and use this name that we were already using for something else. Really, Uninhabitable Mansions makes sense for any application. We’re opening an accounting firm next year.
How has your past work with bands like Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Dirty On Purpose and Au Revoir Simone affected your approach and ability to book shows and get people to listen?
I think it hurts us because people expect us to be as good as those other bands and we’re not. Thankfully we can use the excuse, “We’re an art collective, what do you expect?” and wave around strange objects as a distraction. Name-dropping doesn’t work as well as some might think. It turns out that your songs have to be semi-listenable as well. If only we’d known.
Music collectives like Elephant Six, Black Mountain, and Broken Social Scene have generated many great bands who have shared musicians and ideas. Is this the direction Uninhabitable Mansions is headed?
Yes. Ideally we’d like to absorb those groups into Uninhabitable Mansions and become a supercollective. If that were the case, I think we’d also build a supercollider and conduct terrifying subatomic experiments.
How do you balance having multiple songwriters and singers?
It wasn’t easy at first, but we eventually came up with a solution: songwriting boots. If you’re wearing the boots, you can write the song and decide who gets to sing and play what parts. But if someone wrestles the boots off you mid-song, you’re back to strumming idly at boring rhythm guitar chords. Some vigilance is required, but it’s very fair.
>Uninhabitable Mansions
Dec. 15, Bowery Ballroom, 6 Delancey St. (betw. Bowery & Chrystie St.), 212-533-2111; 7:30, $15
