Beautiful Supermachines Interview: SXSW 2010

Posted on Mar 13th 2010 7:30PM by Casey Jones
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When one hears the name Beautiful Supermachines it may bring certain imagery to mind. Whether it be the futuristic urban dystopia from the movie Metropolis or that new cell phone you just purchased, the complexity of these devices and their intricate gears, chips or mother board mirror the woven melodies and lyrics brought to you by David Williams of Beautiful Supermachines. The Austin local spoke with me recently about past SxSW Festivals, fears of his youth and what brought a man with such a diverse background back from behind the mixer and to the front of the stage.

In your own words, what do the Beautiful Super Machines sound like?

Fractured indie rock... fairytales.

What is your secret to making machines not only beautiful but super as well?

Beautiful Super Machines refers to the beauty you can find in failed systems. Freud, for example, has no therapeutic use anymore, but it's beautiful as a kind of messed up literature. So to analogize that to my music, there is a bubble gum pop nerve or whatever you want to call it, I cant get away from it. I create the system and the system failure. Every mission is a Power 13 for me!

I read you've been doing music for a while now. Lots of projects in your past, but how did you get this group together?

I was writing a bunch of songs that gelled together, at least to me, and the Kadane brothers were putting the New Year back together, getting out on the road together. They said, "Hey we got these songs, are you coming ot town? Yes? How bout we put a band together and open for you?" It's just been rolling ever sense. To some extent you can thank or blame Bubba and Matt Kadane of the New Year.

What do you draw upon for influences?

Well that's one advantage for being older in the game is that I don't have an anxiety of influences. Every thing is kind of equal. I can identify things that are clearly from other places and I do it quite intentionally. I like classical, jazz, you name it. I'm too old to say I'm such a big fan of so and so that you can hear it in my music anymore. It's truly me, which is a great place to be. Whether or not you think it's a great place to be, that's a different question.

To each his own, I'm sure.

When I was younger, I used to freak out because something like an Elvis Costello album would come out and I would freeze like a deer in the headline because everything is going sound like the new album by who ever. I'm over that. I'm just a guitar and I write songs.

Are you an Elvis Costello fan?

I was until Get Happy came out. Emotional Fascism was the original title. He's an amazing talent, but I'm not a follower anymore.

What is BSM's biggest vice?

Umm... Wow...If you take the average age of this band, it would probably be coffee...

Hah, My next question was going to be what do Super Machines run on, but I guess you answered that one.

We run on our biggest vice (laughs)

You live in Austin and probably have several SxSW notches in your belt, so what is in your survival guide this year?

Go ahead and print a list, a check list, ready, and do day shows. You can completely survive at SxSW on free parties and day shows. Also don't listen to any out-of-towners about the best places to eat. Find somebody who lives here, who doesn't want to give you food poisoning so you don't move here.

Who would you consider was your first celebrity crush?

Actually it would be Charlotte Rampling as she appeared in Zardoz (laughs) with Sean Connery as Zed. I remember her in somebody's penthouse quite clearly.

What is your musical guilty pleasure?

I have thousands of them! Celeste Banks, Walker Ray Renee, and I'm all over the original the Australian X, but they are probably too cool to be considered guilty. Pre-comeback Roxy Music would be my biggest guilty pleasure.

Are you a Beatles or a Stones fan?

Beatles... Stones... There is no way you can pick one over the other...

It's been done.

I know, but they both have great songs and they both have their way of hitting a stride of pop music and then ruining it for 30 or 40 years. You know? Ask me again in 30 minutes and I'm sure I will have a different answer.

What's the craziest thing you've seen or done on tour?

We haven't toured in the past year.

Anything happen there in Austin?

It would be so incriminating, there's no way I could do it. Not incriminating for me, but the other parties.

What about in your travels?

Lets say... wait no, we can't do that one. I've lived in New York and LA and I have moved in interesting circles. I have accidentally had a lot of well known friends... and Ill leave it at that.

You don't want to give me any dirt on some well known friends?

Ya know, it's about getting high and being knocked down...

When machines rise up and rule the world, will they be kind and gentle rulers?

Not if they are designed in the visage of their masters. We can only hope they are better and kinder than we are.

Casey Jones is a contributor from Seed.com. Learn how you can contribute here.