Since 2007, Emil Amos has had a hand in 15 records released across six different bands and eight labels. (There may be more, I don’t know.) Prolific doesn’t even begin to describe his game, and when you take into account the sonic and thematic diversity between his three main groups—Grails, OM and Holy Sons—you begin to see that each outlet reveals a very different part of Amos’ creative subconsciousness. Though he’s most often credited as a drummer, Amos’ abilities extend far beyond percussion, and he’s become a master of the kind of low-fi sturm und drang that would make Tom Waits jealous. We chatted with Amos about his latest album as Holy Sons, Survivalist Tales!, and how it lines up with the rest of his recent work.

Holy Sons – “Slow Days”

Splitting your time between (at least) three music projects means a lot of time recording and touring, which means a lot of time reading and watching late night television and movies on the road. Does touring for one project ever inform the way in which you approach another? Does it sometimes feel like you’ve started a ball rolling that never really stops?

Emil Amos: My life’s become a bit like that scene where Harrison Ford switches out the Ancient Statue and the ball comes rolling down after him, but the ball is my career and I’m trying to get the fuck out with the jewels while destroying my body (and) everything that surrounds. Is the point of life to trade your health for the most fruits life will give? I’m still deciding. The three-band nexus is a challenge to see how long I can hold up—dying soon—and there’s a certain sense of destiny about it all. I spent so much time isolating myself and sabotaging opportunities, so it was time for a change. In terms of down time, there really isn’t any. Anytime I get back to the hotel after a show I have another deadline to meet for new mixes for another band or a new video to finish up.

Despite the relative affordability, portability and increasingly better fidelity of digital and laptop recording, there’s something inherently tactile and unforgiving about tape and 4-track recording. It seems to be a bit of a lost art. Then again, I spent my entire weekend reading magazines and newspapers, so I could be in the minority.

Emil Amos: The process of making anything is important for sure, but I think most of the world is often too caught up in the process rather than the result. For me, the point of making art should remain the resulting art itself. I know everyone loves that “life’s the journey, not the destination” bullshit, but I’m trying to get somewhere, bitches! Seriously though, if art was more about technique or the how-to procedure then I might as well be a botanist or a tennis player. I really don’t care about what I’m using or how I’m doing it. I only want to hear my imagination realized.

There’s a lot of punk influence on the record, as well as a lot of dark “troubadourian” vibes, but a song like “Reckless Liberation” has a very soft soul vibe. Almost like it could have been a Bread tune from the early ’70s. Then there are tunes that have almost a Celtic feel to them.

Emil Amos: Totally! About five years ago a Bread tribute came out with a James Griffin cover I did on it, and I think he may have heard it right before he died. I had a major Bread phase. Around 2001, Holy Sons regularly covered “Baby I’m A Want You” and “Guitar Man” at most shows. David Gates is a relatively under recognized producer, but I guess that’s hard to say about someone who’s world-famous. He actually produced the first two Captain Beefheart singles and wrote one of the songs. In terms of the Celtic aspect, I had an early interest in Richard Thompson’s guitar style when I was a kid, and I think it got blended with sitar-sounding bends because I found Country and Western guitar styles too difficult to imitate. I also had a pretty massive obsession with Charlie Rich some years ago, and that might’ve been where the idea to record some really glossy piano ballads came from. My Gary Stewart phase is yet to come.

I know you released Drifter’s Sympathy and Criminal’s Return in between, but Survivalist Tales! seems like it has thematic elements within it that are almost a response to Decline Of The West. Do you view a thematic connection between the two records at all?

Emil Amos: Growing up I was usually drawn to a record because I wanted to understand more about the person behind the curtain of “the product” and the surface of entertainment. I was never really interested in “special effects” or anything remotely “impressive” about music. I was only concerned if the person behind the sound was interesting themselves. So I got addicted to the idea of hearing a songwriter at home in their rawer form, dashing off their more psychotic ideas, (like Lou Barlow’s) Sentridoh. I didn’t really want to listen to studio-made music in between ’91 and ’01. So Drifter’s Sympathy and Criminal’s Return are designed to be collections that reflect more about the daily life of a songwriter, whereas Decline… and Survivalist Tales! are supposed to be more sonically coherent and presentable statements. So I think you are right about there being a relationship between those records.

Since Holy Sons is almost a personal litmus-test-on-record for what you may be experiencing at the time, do you find it difficult to not bring too much socio-political commentary into your music? Is there a balance for how you react and respond to those stimulus, versus other personal issues?

Emil Amos: Alan Watts once mentioned that there’s an equation basically stating that Happiness occurs when you align yourself with the laws of the greater universe, and I think that’s part of the Holy Sons long-term plan. I mean that the basic lyrical subject matter is generally always intended to be from the monk’s perspective of pursuing the reconciliation between the universe and yourself. Socio-political commentary could be part of that equation, but in general I think it can represent a lot of the arbitrary bullshit in life, and could be part of what distances you from the bottom-line truths that actually create real results in life. That being said, the monk perspective is classically accused of ignoring a lot about the world surrounding it, and I think there is a downside to not acknowledging certain political realities. But the Phil Ochs/early Dylan topical songwriting approach doesn’t really work for me. For example, when Eddie Vedder sings about the inner thoughts of a dyslexic little girl, it strikes me as pretentious, boring and too abstract of a lyrical mode to be relevant or moving to me.

Words by Rich Thomas.