Bitch Magnet: the interview

As band reunions go, it's not exactly on a par with The Stone Roses. All the same, aging US indie fans might have been tickled by the news earlier this year that North Carolina three-piece Bitch Magnet were getting back together again, over two decades after they split up. Formed in 1986 by bassist/vocalist Sooyoung Park and guitarist Jon Fine, then students at Ohio's Oberlin College, the group would subsequently recruit drummer Orestes Morfín, whose prodigious talents helped them move beyond the predominant hardcore sounds of the era and lay the foundations for what would become post- and math-rock.

Like contemporaries Slint, Bitch Magnet have been regularly namechecked by some of the acts who came in their wake – not least Battles, who have invited them to perform at the All Tomorrow's Parties-organised Nightmare Before Xmas festival in England next month. And with Brooklyn indie label Temporary Residence about to reissue their entire back catalogue, the group seem due for a reassessment.

Tokyo audiences will be getting an early glimpse of the reformed band when they perform here on November 7; coming on the back of a Seoul date a couple of nights earlier, it will be only the second time that the original trio has played together since 1989. Park and Fine took time off from rehearsing to answer a few questions by email.

When were you last in Tokyo?
Jon Fine: I was last in Tokyo with Coptic Light in May of 2005 – the second time we came to Japan. I'm a huge fan of Tokyo, so I'm really excited to be coming back – rather sorry it took this many years. Orestes has never been.
Sooyoung Park: I was last there about ten months ago, visiting friends and hanging out with my brother.

Bitch Magnet haven't had as much retrospective love as Slint did, which I guess begs the question: why reform now? How did it all come about?
Sooyoung: Just cuz.
Jon: We had been approached by Jeremy DeVine of Temporary Residence to reissue the records. We had an unreleased session lying around that we needed to mix for the reissues, so we all went to Dallas to mix those songs with John Congleton (ace dude, by the way), and all rather enjoyed hanging out with each other. It had been the first time we'd hung out in 20 years. So I guess we started talking about it vaguely then, but didn't pursue it until Ian from Battles asked us to play All Tomorrow's Parties this December. When we got a generous offer from ATP, we suddenly had the impetus to get together – and, more importantly, it gave us a deadline and made the whole thing possible. We currently live in three different countries – I'm in New York, Orestes is in Canada in Calgary, and Sooyoung is in Singapore – so just getting together for practice requires logistics and some significant air travel. But it's been just great playing and hanging out together again.

Was it an amicable breakup in the first place, or did you have any bad blood between you?
Jon: No bad blood. I was disappointed, both that Orestes left and that it didn't work out with the drummer who replaced him for our last tours in 1990 [Pete Pollack], but no bad blood. Actually, 'disappointed' is understating it. I was pretty sad to see the band end.

There's a real violence to some of the old Bitch Magnet songs, which I imagine makes more sense when you're in your late teens/early 20s than when you've reached your 40s. What's it been like coming back to this material? Are you trying to stay true to the original versions, or reinterpreting them?
Sooyoung: To be honest, it's been like starting over from scratch and re-learning the feeling for the songs – in both a physical way (cadence, odd meters, stuff like that) and also emotionally. But somehow the emotions are still there, even after all these years. It just took a lot of time in the practice space together to get them back.
Jon: From my perspective, I've always wanted to play music that involved the brains and hips and guts – that is, some intensity. I like the physical aspects of a loud and immersive sonic experience. This is true for all my bands, including Coptic Light, with whom I was performing into my late thirties. Coming back to this material is like revisiting an old flame and feeling the old spark: a spark you thought might have gone away in the decades you've been apart. We are not substantially reworking the old material.

What do you think people who went to your gigs back in the late '80s will make of Bitch Magnet 2011?
Jon: We would not be doing this if we thought we'd suck, or if any of us had lost half a step. It still feels as powerful to me.

With the album reissues, how much has changed in the remastering? Was there any record (or song) that you were particularly keen to tweak?
Jon: We got some more grrr into [1989 album] Umber, which I am very happy about. Also, we got a bit more kick in Orestes' kick [drum] in a couple of songs. So, you know, like it always was but better! And there is an alternate mix of 'Motor' with louder guitars that I'm totally happy to have found.

Jon, you've played in a fair few bands since Bitch Magnet – Vineland, Mothra, Don Caballero, Coptic Light… If you were forced to pick a favourite, which would it be?
Jon: They are all my children and I love them all, even if some of them dress badly, act peculiar, or chew with their mouth open. That said, Bitch Magnet was my first, and you don't get to have a first band twice.

The reformed Archers of Loaf are also due to play at ATP this year. Are there any other North Carolina indie bands who you'd like to see get back together?
Sooyoung: Although they weren't technically an NC band, I'd love to see Breadwinner play again. They spent a lot of time down in Chapel Hill and were an amazing live act that pretty much blew me away every time I saw them. I think one of them went on to play in Labradford.
Jon: Honor Role and Breadwinner. Breadwinner! Breadwinner!

Bitch Magnet play at Shibuya O-Nest on Nov 7