Band: Jean on Jean
From: Brooklyn, NY
Sound: lo-fi chamber pop; or, a folk-rock orchestra for the melancholic
Similar Artists: Judee Sill, Kristin Hersh, The Shangri-Las, Beat Happening, Colin Blunstone
Listen Now: “Tonight”

Three years after the breakup of dance punk standard-bearers Out Hud, one of their members is back with an entirely different approach and a batch of songs as likely to melt your heart as they are to get stuck in your head. The new band is called Jean on Jean, the debut album is out on Tuesday, November 11th, and the former member of Out Hud is cellist/vocalist Molly Schnick. The music, however, is not what one might immediately expect from an Out Hudder. Instead of the sharply visceral Devo meets Cabaret Voltaire dance punk of the aforementioned band, Jean on Jean wanders into intimate and emotional folk rock territory, forever anchored by Molly’s wispy vocals and layers of cello upon cello.

The production on the album is carefully minimalistic, the mood it captures is one of contemplative reflection. It’s a dark and pensive “alone” record that plays out as a glimpse into a friend’s diary might; yet, somehow the lyrics never veer into obsessively personal territory. Here are songs made specifically for your bedroom, for your lonely walks at dusk. The melodies and multi-tracked vocal harmonies resonate immediately, whispering by on the wings of familiar ghosts raised by a seance of shared experience. If there’s a more perfectly timed release for 2008, a record that exists as an ideal score to the seasonal transition from autumn into winter, we haven’t heard it yet.

To find out more about Jean on Jean, EAR FARM arranged for an afternoon meal, interview, and adventure in New York’s Chinatown with singer/songwriter Molly Schnick. Things began over tea and lunch at New Yeah Shanghai Deluxe on Bayard Street before we ventured out to the markets, food stands, butchers, and Hello Kitty vending machines that make an afternoon spent in Chinatown so much fun.

EAR FARM: So how’s everything going with Jean on Jean right now?

MOLLY SCHNICK: Pretty good, we’ve played two shows so far.

EF: You’ve played at Cake Shop and…

MS: And then we played a CMJ thing at what used to be Galapagos, it’s now Public Assembly. The bands were playing from 4pm-2am. Luckily we played at 5:00. It was weird though because we’re pretty quiet and there was a band in the other room that was really loud, so every time we’d stop it was like… “AHH! Crash crash boom.”

EF: That was one of the things I was going to ask, was how different you’re finding it in terms of, say, a venue like Cake Shop where your old band would really own that space, is it difficult, different, weird now?

MS: Well, to be honest, I was really nervous to play a show. Like really nervous. I thought I’d never be able to do it. I was nervous to play my songs for anyone in the first place, and then once I did get over that I was still super nervous to play a show. So when I finally got over the nervousness I was like “okay, I’m ready to play a show!” and then it was so hard to get a show and no one cared. (laughs)

EF: Really? (laughs) So how did you hook up with Friction?

MS: My record label knows the guy who books Cake Shop and they happened to be putting on that show, but the Friction people were really nice.

EF: Yeah they’re awesome, I love them.

MS: So then, that show was really great, it was a really great first show. And the CMJ show, it was a good show. I think we played well, but those things are weird. Now, Jean on Jean is just trying to get more shows. And, of course, the record comes out on Tuesday…

EF: But it’s been out on eMusic for a few months now, was that a record label decision, was that something you were really into… ?

MS: That was me… I have a really old friend who works there and I played the record for her, even before it was mixed or anything, and she really liked it and wanted to release it exclusively on there. But I wanted it to come out physically, so I put it out with Kanine.

(food arrives)

above: soup dumplings and tea at New Yeah Shanghai Deluxe

MS: Wow, I was very hungry when I ordered…

EF: This looks great.

above: stir-fried baby bok choy and mushrooms

MS: Oh! That’s a good picture.

EF: You know, it’s so much more rewarding to shoot food than it is concerts…

above: Moo shu pork

(eating begins)

EF: So, what got you from Out Hud to Jean on Jean?

MS: I think Out Hud got me to Jean on Jean because I was so, um… I just decided I didn’t ever want to be in a band again. I was really traumatized by having spent so much of my life doing that… Out Hud started when I was 18 and lasted until I was 28. So, ten years of my life and, in the end, having nothing to show for it. Except for hurt feelings and no job skills. Feeling I was left behind both by the music side of stuff and by, like, I always joke that I should’ve just been a lawyer. I’m still not that old, but at the time it seemed really like the end of the world. So I started writing these songs when Out Hud was still together, but things were pretty bad.

EF: And you were doing it entirely alone at that point?

MS: Totally alone. And, I always listened to music that was more like Jean on Jean than Out Hud… I mean, I would go out dancing and listen to stuff like Out Hud but at home it was always more folky stuff.

EF: Like, what kind of stuff?

MS: When the Jean on Jean project first started to get going I was really into Judee Sill, like how a teenager gets into something. And, Colin Blunstone and the Zombies and the Beach Boys… Fleetwood Mac… other folk-based stuff. Then I started recording my stuff at home on my computer, I have Digital Performer and I was learning how to use it as I recorded, and there were a lot of songs that came before the ones that are on the record. My boyfriend, who was in a band called Supersystem, he listened to the songs and he said “these are really good but you’ve got to finish them” and I was feeling so proud of myself for just getting these halfway done songs done, but he was like “no, you gotta do it“.

EF: And what was the first song that made it onto the record that you wrote?

MS: “Tonight” I think. Yeah, that’s from an earlier batch of songs and everything else is quite a bit newer. But I kept going back to that one.

above: an amusing cookie… Molly’s fortune: “Fresh ideas are not always the best ideas.”

EF: So are you sick of that song yet?

MS: No, actually I just shot a video for it and… well, I’m not sick of it yet but I did have to lip sync it over and over again.

EF: I really love that song. When I first listened to it, my initial reaction was “man, this really goes right to something within me”… that, well, I grew up a massive fan of The Smiths, and that notion of listening to a record all alone in your bedroom, this album of yours does that same thing… scratches that itch for me.

MS: Well that is good to hear because that was definitely my inspiration… I was going through such a hard time in my life and I would just come home and just rock out by myself in my room.

EF: How much of the material is autobiographical?

MS: All of it. I don’t know how not to… I think that’s my next step, my next challenge. I guess there’s a Nick Cave quote that goes “what do you do the day after your record comes out? you start your next record.” But I haven’t been so good about that. I want to do different kinds of songs but I can’t write from a perspective that’s not totally my own.

EF: Yeah, I can imagine. But, well, do you have a car? (implying that part of the lyrics on the record that speak of driving might not be autobiographically accurate…)

MS: I DO have a car! (laughs)

EF: Damn. I thought I was going to get you there. Catch you in a lyrical lie! (laughter)

MS: No, I have a car.

EF: Well then nevermind.

MS: Yep, I have a car and when I first gave my record to my friends who were ex-members of Out Hud and some other people from California, they would all listen to the songs and they would call me up and be like “who’s this person, who’s that person?!” and, I mean, I have answers for it. It’s not like the songs aren’t about my life. And the good thing about what I wrote my songs about, to me at least, is that the level of drama and stuff that I was writing about is really high. And I think that’s why I feel a bit of writer’s block at this moment because things are going really good for me. I’m so glad that Out Hud broke up, I have a really nice boyfriend that I really love… sometimes my job’s not so great, but that’s okay.

EF: Well maybe that’s some inspiration?

MS: There’s a bunch of songs on there about my job as it is. But, I’d really like to get to a place where, I don’t know… some people write about past experiences too, I think.

EF: Yeah, but it probably gets really difficult to look back the longer it’s been… but that’s a theory I’ve had for a while, maybe not mine per se, but that old, formerly great, musicians…. it’s not that they suck, it’s just that they’re happy.

MS: Yep, mm hmm.

EF: They’ve found happiness, and lost the inspiration of misery or something.

MS: (laughs) Definitely… one of the members of Monty Python went through therapy, and wasn’t funny anymore. But he was like “I’m okay with it, because I might not be funny but I’m happy.” But that’s okay, because there are so many great songs about being happy too…

above: happiness is a new Hello Kitty something or other

EF: I guess. Are there?

MS: No!

EF: Right, I was going to say… if there are, they’re written by idiots.

MS: Noo. There’s, you know, like happy love songs. No?

EF: Like “Happy Together” by The Turtles?

MS: Well, there you go. And like… (a pause)

EF: Yeah, like ‘happy love’. But, you know, have you ever tried to make a mixtape about love? Most of the love songs…

MS: There’s some notion of strife.

EF: Right, something. There’s like, unrequited love, or starcrossed love, or love that’s gone, or… I don’t know.

MS: I really love that Zombies song “It feels so good to know two people so in love” (“Friends of Mine”), that’s a good song. And, the music I like to listen to is about feelings and it speaks to my feelings. And the music I was making with Out Hud, while it was incredible to play live - like, it was this feeling that I’ll never have again in my life, it was amazing and that’s the thing I miss the most about it. It was this visceral feeling.

EF: Well, I was thinking that… that once you played live shows with this band it might be the complete opposite. That it would get you in the head the way maybe Out Hud did physically.

MS: Yeah yeah! Hopefully… I tried to do a 180 of being like, Out Hud wasn’t about sensitivity at all it was about getting to dance and have crazy times. And this is trying to be something different. But, you’re right. As I get more comfortable I hope that that’s the case.

EF: I’d think it will be. Shoot, it’s been the case for me as I listen to your record more. And, maybe I’m forcing this, but I think it kind of sounds like California in a way… do you miss home at all?

MS: I miss it in a lot of ways. And I think about it all the time. I’ve been in New York for basically twelve years, off and on in the early years because I was going back for Out Hud, but I will always be a Californian. It just is in my… people from California are different from other people.

EF: No, there’s no question about it. So, do you have goals or things you’d really like to do with Jean on Jean?

MS: I would love to play on the West Coast and in Europe and in Japan. Those are my places to play goals. And then I just want to keep making records. Now it’s just me so I don’t have to worry about anything. All of the songs were basically all written by me… my boyfriend Rafael wrote some of the stuff, so he can help me too, and it’s just mobile and I can do it from wherever I am and write about whatever I’m thinking about. It seems like something I’m just going to never stop doing, and that’s a great realization, so I just want to make another record as soon as this one really, you know, does its thing. And, growing up in California, I grew up in a punk scene… I was twelve and a half when I went to my first show, and I went to Gilman every weekend, both days, and you know, worked there and got banned from there for drinking in the bathroom. I was on Lookout and I really have a DIY ethic, I still feel punk on the inside, so I’m just going to keep doing it and I don’t have any commercial aspirations. I feel like once you put that in, once you start expecting things, it turns dark.

EF: Sure.

MS: So I’m going to try my best not to expect that stuff. Although, it is really nice to… I mean, I would’ve put the record out myself, but it’s really nice to be able to have someone put it out for you. So, I guess my goal really would be to have a record label to put out my records, and that’s about it.

EF: Right. Sheesh, you’re answering a lot of my questions before I can even ask them. What else… oh! How about the election… where were you??

MS: Oh man. Well, it’s really cool because I was driving out to Montauk and I knew Obama had won. I knew he had Pennsylvania and Ohio…

EF: Right, me too, but I didn’t believe it.

above: Red Pitaya, aka Dragon Fruit, at a Chinese fruit stand

MS: Yeah I know, but I was like “okay!” I was starting to get used to the idea and then I arrived at the house where we were shooting the video and they announced it as I had parked and was walking up to the house. I got in the room and everyone was like “OHHH MY GOD!!!” and then I believed it. But then the next morning I woke up and turned on CNN just to check because I was like “oh maybe they took it away”… but they didn’t!

EF: I know, I honestly can’t believe it.

MS: It’s so incredible.

EF: It really is.

MS: And then also, when McCain spoke, I knew it was over.

EF: Definitely, yeah.

MS: And I thought his speech was pretty classy I’ve gotta say.

EF: Yeah, but you know, it should be.

MS: Yeah, it doesn’t make up for what he did.

EF: No. And I always thought he was a classy guy, a good guy, I always liked him… up until this election. I think he sold his soul to try and win, for whatever reason.

MS: Yeah he did. I kinda feel sad for him.

EF: So… do you think you might write any songs about it?

MS: I don’t think I’m qualified. I mean, I followed it like anybody else but…

EF: Well, how about an Out Hud reunion song?

MS: Like the Mr. Bush song?

EF: Yeah! To send Bush out in style…

MS: (laughs) Maybe. All of the !!!ers (ED note: that’s !!! as in Chk Chk Chk, the band) are around the world though, so I don’t think we could do it. I mean, I would love to write a song about it that would actually mean something but I don’t think I could. I know it can be done, I like Ted Leo… I’m sure he’s writing something. But I don’t know. It might be a good experiment just to try and do it. But then, the day after the election I got sad about the Prop 8 thing in California. I just think it’s disgusting.

EF: I agree.

MS: But I’m still pretty high from the Obama victory.

EF: Yeah, I am too. And I try not to get too angry over the Prop 8 thing because the country gave me something…

MS: You’re right, yep.

EF: I’m like “sweet, alright!” and then I start to think that a little bit at a time, step by step, is fine. Which, it’s not really, but what are you going to do?

MS: I know. It’s still hard for me to believe that, Americans who I’d lost all faith in, have restored it in this way. Even the right wingers… I thought they were just going to be like “yeah, whatever, he’s going to be a bad President” but all of them took a moment to say these things and it made me think that the country doesn’t want to be as racist as it is.

EF: Right? I’m shocked that my home state, North Carolina, has turned blue. Never in my life did I think that would be the case, honestly.

MS: I know! And Virginia, which is so amazing because it was the capital of the Confederacy…

EF: It’s just a different landscape than it was four years ago.

MS: It’s really great. I should try and write a song… but what if it’s really bad?

EF: Nobody has to hear it if it’s bad. But if it’s like your other stuff, people might really like it. Like I said, I love the record… lots. And I just hope other people will listen to it because they’ll love it too.

MS: I don’t think they will.

EF: You don’t??

MS: Listen to it? I don’t know, it’s just one of those things. When I recorded the first songs I was so excited and was like “ohh I just recorded these songs!” and all I can hope is that people like it; but it’s never going to mean as much to other people as me, so I just have to divorce myself from that notion entirely. But I also think that there’s just so much music out there.

EF: Yeah but, you know, what this record really has is this timeless perfection to it. I could listen to it over and over for, say, a month or two. And then a few years later it’s going to be the perfect ‘frozen in time’ record.

MS: My friend Molly said something like that too… that’s really awesome.

EF: Well, like I said, it’s got that ’something’ that I love to find in music, and I know there are plenty of other people like me out there…

MS: Well that’s what my mom says (laughter)… she thinks it’s going to be a big hit.

above: Jean on Jean adventure in Chinatown slideshow (created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR).
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Listen: “Tonight”

Buy the album Jean on Jean on Amazon: CD/MP3.

Visit Jean on Jean on MySpace.
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See the list of bands recently featured as EAR FARM’s Band of the Week HERE.