American Football - The One With The Tambourine

You're listening to Song Exploder where musicians take apart their songs and piece by piece, tell the story of how they were made, I'm Rishikesh Herway. Just a heads up, there is some explicit language in this episode. The band American football had a short lifespan originally. They formed in 1997 and broke up in 2000. In that time, they released an EP and an LP to a small but passionate fan base. But over the years since, more and more people found their music. 14 years after they broke up, they re-issued their LP and booked some shows. The LP ended up being a surprise hit, landing on the Billboard charts and their tour dates sold out. I asked if they'd do a song from the LP for Song Exploder, but here's guitarist Steve Holmes. This is how unexpected that anyone would give a shit 15 years later. We don't have the master tapes, they don't exist. After we recorded the actual album, we left them at the studio, can't find them. Don't exist, probably lost or thrown out. So I happened to keep the single. So in this episode, the very first song recorded by American football from their debut EP. It's called The One With The Tambourine. I'm Mike Kinsella and I play the guitar and sing in the band American football. And I'm Steve Holmes and I also play guitar, but I do not sing. Mike and I were 20 to 22 when this was a band. It was sophomore through senior year of college, basically. So Mike was in a band with Steve Lemos before this band and that broke up. As soon as our band broke up, I said, "Ooh, I'm going to steal Steve Lemos as my drummer and start playing with him." And then I think the idea to have Mike join was because the previous band, if anyone's heard of it, The One Up Down Stairs, the guitar playing that band was ridiculously good. And Mike and I thought the two of us together would be as good as him alone. So that was the plan. Steve would go practice with Steve Lemos. He'd come home when he had a cassette. He was like, "Oh, this is what we're working on." And it was this song. I was like, "Oh, that's a cool riff." Mike and I discovered alternate tunings and it all took off from there. You've messed around a tune this up or I'm trying to hit a note that, "Oh, this will be much easier to hit if this string is half a step lower or half a step higher." And you play until it sounds good. This song happens to be a big E major seven chord, which I don't think I knew at the time. It just sounded cool. It's E, B, D sharp, G sharp, B, E. That's what I'm in. Mike is in a slightly different tuning. So stupid. It's so stupid. The challenge of it is you're now stuck in that key, which you can't write 10 songs in that key because they'll sound ridiculous. But it sounds really cool for one song. My name is Steve Lemos and I'm the drummer in American football. I was teaching myself drums at that point. My father had a drum kit when I was a kid and he had these 60s era books kind of teach yourself different beats. Bossa Nova was one of the beats that I was trying to teach myself. And for whatever reason, it sort of fit with the riff that Holmes was playing or at least the main part of it. That was the name of the song until we went into the studio and actually recorded it. We called it the Bossa Nova because that was the drum beat. I think Steve's drums in particular make these songs jazzy and unique. We said like if I was the drummer of this band, nobody would care because it would sound like every other band that exists. That riff and a lot of the American football stuff is me kind of stealing from the C&K. That was a big band for us at the time. That was my version of jacking the ball off the first C&K record. It doesn't really sound exactly the same but sort of the feel we were going for. I do think that the idea not to rock out was intentional. I think going into this band we knew what we wanted to sound like and we'd been in loud bands and we were kind of done with that. We were so young and naive. This was the first song in this band and sort of ever I recorded vocals like I was a singer in a band. By default by the way I don't think I joined to be a singer or anything. But now I'd be like well let's drop that song like six steps so I can hit some notes. But at the time like well the song is there I got to hit those notes. You're never going to just play my vocal part are you? No you're not. I should have made you sign a thing. It was just like high school journal shit all of it you know I mean like every I mean they. Even going to record all these songs are just like oh I'll be a singer and I guess it needs lyrics and so. The memories of spending 17 with you. And at the time I was like 18 I was like I remember spending 17 with you last year. Mike has a natural ability to write around other parts much much better than I do I think. Parts I would come in with would be you know a lot of times a high new to Lee part and then he would add the low end to it. A lot of the shit he played is like stupid like if you heard like that's not a thing. It's true I heard it and I kind of heard work and going there was no structure. So I was like okay I'll put a structure on it I don't know it made sense to me. So there's only there's the two parts right what would be a verse and the chorus I guess and then a verse and a chorus. The second verse Mike does not sing and I don't know why. I don't know that it was a cognizant decision but in that second verse it's just instrumental and he changes his riff to this polyrhythmic thing going on. The second time we go through that man boom boom boom boom boom. Mike starts doing this patterny thing over it that's in a different time but like accents things and moves things back and forth. Every time I hear that to this day I'm like man that's such a great part. Towards the end of the song Mike plays a guitar solo he recorded it using something called an Ebo which is a little handheld battery powered device. It vibrates the string so it rings and it's like a drone and you can just move the note as you move the note like it bends between them and stuff. There's a cool harmony that comes in the second time. One of the things that makes this band interesting is the fact that we were kind of learning our instruments for myself and Mike was being a frontman for the first time and Les Moss as he mentioned had been playing drums for maybe two years before this band started. I think we were just doing the best we could with our limited resources and talents and I think part of the stuff that sounds unique is because we didn't know any better. It just came naturally to us because we were novices in some respects. And now here's the one with the tambourine by American football in its entirety. I think we were just doing the best we could with our limited resources and talents and talents and talents. Those red strings are its guarantee of everything. [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] You can find all the past and future episodes of SongExploder at SongExploder.net or on iTunes, Stitcher or wherever you download podcasts. Find the show on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram at SongExploder. SongExploder is a proud member of Radio Topia from PRX, a curated network of extraordinary story driven shows. Learn more at radiotopia.fm. My name is Rishi Keish here way. Thanks for listening. [Music]