Music, musings and miscellanea

If Baltimore is known for anything these days, it’s the gritty drug culture so eloquently showcased in The Wire. But recently, the northeastern U.S. city has birthed a diverse group of bands. That includes the duo of Victoria Legrand and Alex Scally, better known as Beach House, whose lush dream pop can be described as anything but gritty. CHARTattack had the chance to speak with Legrand while Beach House were on a recent break from touring in New York. We talked about the origins of the band’s intimate music and how they translate their tunes live.

CHARTattack: What are you doing in New York for the meantime?
Work stuff. It’s very fascinating. Our touring’s been pretty consistent since the beginning of the year. There’s like a week interval between each tour.

Your sound on record seems, to me, very intimate. How do you transfer that to big, outdoor festivals like the gig on Toronto Island?
Sorry can you repeat the question? I was watching a guy do a one armed push-up.

Well, I’ve never seen you live, so I was wondering how you translate the band’s intimate sound to a large audience?
We’ve evolved a lot since the beginning. The live show is important to us. So much of Teen Dream is a reflection of what we’ve learned by touring a lot. Being on stage and playing large venues, what that taught us about our sound. I think it can be a different experience [than on record] still. But I’d like to think it’s also very personal for people. And I think it can also be a big wash. Our sound is not small. We’re definitely a live band. I think people may have thought in the past that we’re not capable of playing a festival, but the music has evolved and we’ve grown. It’s not that way anymore. We’ve definitely gotten more intense.

You said that Teen Dream is the culmination of everything you’ve learned. How so?
Well, it’s not a culmination; it’s just an evolution. It’s not an ending point. Every record we’ve done has been a gateway to the next one. Then the touring after each record is another gateway. It informs us of the next path in some very abstract way. Teen Dream has a lot of the intensities and energies that were in us for a certain period of time, and then we put them into a record, basically.

How does the songwriting dynamic between you and Alex work?
Alex and I write… the songs are all composed together. We’ll write together as well. Someone will have some chords and bring them to the table and then we work on it. If we believe in it, we keep working on it. I’ll have a melody and some chords or Alex will have a melody and some pieces and we start from there. It’s never the same way every time. Every song we’ve ever written has come together in its own way. Some took longer than others. Lyrically, I’ve always been the lyricist. But it’s just the two of us. It just goes back and forth constantly. We support each other. It’s not super analytical or intellectual, it’s very instinctual and basically what sounds good to us. We’re lucky that we both agree when things are right and when things are not right.

To me it seems that the vocal melodies are what propel the sound.
I think the way I think about music is through word melodies, and I think that’s a big part of our sound. I’ve actually just started realizing that. I think it’s a good point. I think that the music and the voice work together. When we’re writing, one melody can very simply and naturally construct the path of the song. I also think that a few chords can birth a melody. Melody is something that’s really unpredictable.

You’ve said that you think of music in a very visual sense.
Yeah, I can see things sometimes, like melodies.

Is that very common amongst your songwriting peers? Do you even have conversations about songwriting with them?
I actually don’t. I guess sometimes I’ve asked other bands how they write and most of the time they cut and paste. Grizzly Bear, they write separately and then they paste it together. They have a system. It’s kind of scientific. And I think that’s what happens when you’re in a band that has more than two people in it and you all write your own parts.
Alex and I, it’s like we’re a band and we each have band members inside of us. It’s an interesting topic. I guess at festivals and everybody’s running around I don’t have time to have a conversation I’d actually be interested in having.

Well, I don’t mean to read too much into it, but your uncle [Michel Legrand] is a film composer, and I thought maybe that had something to do with it.
You know, he’s a relative. We share the same family name. But I’ve had no interaction with him since I was four. So if it has any effect at all, it must be genetic. I didn’t think that I’d be a professional musician when I was young. Music was part of both Alex and I’s upbringing; arts in general and a lot of other things. What you do in life, it kind of finds you. It’s like something really obvious that’s been there all along and you’ve just ignored it. That’s how it came about. It was never one person having a major say. But [my uncle's] career is pretty intense. I think he’s scored over 150 works. I think I read that on IMDB.

You had done a theatre degree prior to moving to Baltimore?
That was my liberal arts concentration. I did that and music my whole life. Then I went to Paris after school and studied at this professional school. It basically churns you out to be in experimental theatre. I wanted to take it as far as I could, but there was something unresolved. So I just said screw it, I don’t want to be directed by somebody else, and I also don’t want to recite someone else’s text. I want to make my own. That was the decision.

I picked Baltimore because I had a friend in school that I had been in a band with. I just went there because he was there. At the time, Baltimore, what has since been called a scene, it hadn’t had that sort of national attention. It was brewing. I feel like I took the fortunate risk and ended up finding something that is my life. Without a doubt.