Ben Daniels has been present and accounted for in Philly’s indie pop scene for, gosh, about a decade now. First in Lainmeyers, and then Persons, Daniels has finally come into his own with A Sunny Day In Glasgow. Fronted by his twin sisters Lauren and Robin, ASDIG released their debut late last year to heavy acclaim, Pitchfork and otherwise. That album, Scribble Mural Comic Journal, was one of the boldest debuts of a Philly-based band in quite some time. Amid laptop noise and all manner of psychedelic fog, A Sunny Day do what they can to breathe new life into two forms desperately in need of an update: shoegaze and twee. And yeah, they do a lot. The group is just wrapping up the tour for Scribble with a show in Philly tonight, and another in New York tomorrow. After the jump, we catch up with Ben Daniels to rap about nügaze, unplugging, and what in the hell is up out in West Philly.

Hello sir!
How’s it goin?
Good. I see you guys have the new EP on the City Paper “Playa,” so named because of Philebrity’s apparent ownership of the word “Player.”
So it is up there. I wasn’t actually sure what was happening with that. I’ve been in a tour related communication black hole the past many weeks.

Is that a good thing or bad thing? Sometimes it seems like going on the road might be the only way left to unplug from the telecom mess.
Definitely a good thing. I spend way too much time on computers. The bad news is my sending texts went up a lot.
What kind of shows have you guys been playing? One of the things that’s really gotten me hooked on the band lately is how it exists in this simultaneous shoegaze/twee/noise world, which is a rarity. Most bands that have any of those elements are usually just one, and pretty stringently at that.
Shows have been either in bars or art spaces. We’ve generally been paired with more “shoegazer” type bands on this tour, no twee or noise really. I think that live we sound more aggressive, so it kind of makes sense I guess, but I would have welcomed some more “twee” or noise type shows. Most “shoegazery” bands are super duper boring.
Yeah, it’s funny how that medium — bands like Mahogany notwithstanding — is now kind of frozen in time like rockabilly or goths.
Yeah, even bands from back in the day that would get called “shoegaze” or whatever, I find alot of it really boring. Like they stopped at a sound someone else had already done without trying something different.
Top 3 shoegaze cliches: Go!
Um…. I dunno, maybe singing about “suicide,” owning like 10 pedals, comparing everything to My Bloody Valentine…
OK, we’ll stop picking on the shoegazers. Or the nü-gazers. Tell me this: This music seems pretty ProTools-heavy: How do you do it live?
Yeah, when I recorded the record I didn’t give any thought at all to the live versions of the songs. Most people we’ve met on tour have commented that it defiinitely sounds different from the record. The interesting part is seeing which people like this or dislike it. But the live versions are alot simpler and I think alot more agressive. I think the more ambient parts of the recordings are probably not really there at all. If we had an 8 person band, or even 6 people maybe, we could probably get it closer to the record. But i don’t think that’s important. A live show and a record are two very different things in my mind.
I agree – what do you mean by more “aggressive,” though?
Where maybe on the record certain songs are alittle more laid back or something, live they are a lot louder and more intense. I feel like “Lists” is a good example of this. Maybe “C’mon” too?
Stock Philebrity question: Do you still live in Philly, and why are we talking to you if you don’t?
I’ve spent the past year in Montreal but moved back just before tour. Montreal is wonderful but i am happy to be back in West Philly.
OK, since you’re out there, talk to me a little bit about West Philly music and why so many bands out there have trouble connecting with the rest of the deodorant-using world.
West Philly music is my favorite music from this city. As I say, I’ve been gone for a while, but i think my favorite bands from philly are the Bad News Bats and Tickly Feather. Also, the Danger Danger house was the best place in this city to see or play a show. I was really saddened to learn it was shut down. I think that deodorant is powerless against awesome house shows.
But stank is powerless against L&I. Hakuna matata, dawg.
Touché.
But I think the Danger Danger situation got to the heart of the West Philly music scene brain cloud: As fun as it is, you can’t just have shows at your house, have them advertised and listed all over the place and expect not to have problems. Just like you can’t expect to have your band’s whole presentation to mired in some vague 1990s anarcho-undergrad-vegan steez and expect to be taken seriously anywhere on the other side of the Walnut Street bridge. I am sure that sounds kind of obnoxious, but it is what it is.
I agree about advertising house shows, but they were around for a couple years i think. And when you’ve got something that good, who cares about being taken seriously east of the bridge
Because unless we’re all just gonna give up and say that the West Philly scene is a regional folk music with no connection to the outside world, it’s a self-defeating, self-ghetto-izing thing. Which, last I checked, is not really why people get into music, to do that kind of thing to themselves. I just want these kids to get it together, I guess.
I’m probably the worst person in Philly to discuss the Philly music scene with as i seldom go out, but i don’t think of West Philly as isolated from a wider music scene. Maybe just from the rest of Philly. I’m not trying to play up some rivalry-type division within Philly because that probably does not exist, but i do think bands from West Philly sound diffrerent from those in the rest of the city. Actually, we did this session and interview at the university radio station in Minneapolis and the interviewer specifically asked me about the “West Philly basement scene.” It made me really happy. I don’t think West Philly is ghetto-izing itself, it’s just got lots of good things going on that are maybe not as accessible as the bar venues. Or maybe the rest of the city isn’t interested? I don’t really know, but I do love the “west philly basement scene.” Gotta run now, see you at the show?
Yes indeed! Have a great afternoon, and thank you for taking the time!

A Sunny Day In Glasgow play Johnny Brenda’s tonight with My Teenage Stride and Brown Recluse Sings. For more info, check our listings.

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 5th, 2007 at 2:52 pm.