Slint to play new songs at ATP? Is that what Pajo is saying..

I couldn't help but sneak a peak at the current ATP thread, so I thought I'd chime in. I try to keep myself out of everyone's hair so discussions can roll freely on this forum, but I found this thread most interesting.

so here's what's been happening behind the curtain.

we've been holding regular meetings regarding ATP since the idea first came up last summer. these meetings go on for 7 - 10 hours, for days at a time. Slint is a very detail-oriented band and this event is no exception. we've spent hundreds of hours reviewing music and discussing current bands. from these discussions an approach was formed, which we are doing our best to stay true to. we joked about making it a renaissance fair with jousting and fair maidens (complete with yankees playing irish music!). we thought about hooking up all our louisville musician friends that never get a chance to expose their talents to anyone outside of louisville (sometimes not even in louisville!). we thought about asking older, more established artists, like the meters, the skatellites, willie nelson, suicide, rambling jack elliot, sinead o connor, charlie feathers (uh, he's dead)... I thought to myself about making it a straight-up metal festival, in an attempt to revive interest in a genre that is quickly dismissed by most intelligent listeners.

I'm sure you're relieved to know that our current lineup did not adhere to any of those thought-trains! Slint is not a unilateral band, so all our ideas had to be fused. that's how the songs were written -- differing viewpoints compromising to everyone's satisfaction. however, a true compromise involves a degree of personal dissatisfaction. so maybe we all agreed to be equally unsatisfied. I'm digressing...

we agreed on an approach and it was insidiously simple:

create an enjoyable, positive event.

simple to type, yeah. tedious to actually assemble.

there are many talented people we chose not to invite because of their reputation for misanthropic or confrontational tendencies. they could enhance the event or take away from it -- we didn't want to be dependant on anyone's mood swings. it's supposed to be a good time, remember?

also, the three of us haven't kept up with new music too much, so we had to crash course on a lot of stuff out there. hundreds of hours, cigarettes, and cd's were burned; critical listening, assessing, and trying to imagine how a band would fit into the box we made. we printed out the band lists from all past atp's and discussed. we tried to see bands live, or talk to people that had. we figured out which bands would be better to open single shows and which bands would be better at atp.

we had to pick 29 bands.

the point I'm trying to make is -- as curators we probably worked harder on this than any other band. every single aspect of the festival was thoughtfully considered.

let's jump ahead.

so finally we came up with more than 29 bands. now what?

cancellations. bands declined. some bands were recording. some touring. some bands wanted too much money. some were baffled by the event. some were scared of flying overseas. some couldn't decide and had to be given deadlines. we added more as quick as we could -- but remember, we're still trying to dust off the cobwebs and get the music together. we didn't want the music to suffer because we got too distracted by the festival itself. at a certain point we had to wash our hands of it and get down to the nitty gritty: Slint.

£120 is nothing to laugh at, and if anyone paid that much to see your high school band again, fourteen years later, wouldn't you put aside your day job and start practicing? this band is precious to all of us -- if anyone's gonna disrespect it, it won't be us gol-dangit.

at any rate, we ended up with 24 bands and we had to come up with five more. after further discussions and listening parties we finally realized that we couldn't pad out the event with bands we ourselves wouldn't be totally psyched to watch. I know all of us don't want to miss a single act. it dawned on us that we made our choices a while ago, and anything else would be a cop-out.

so we decided to keep the bands we had and stop looking. we have so much work to do as it is -- we can't possibly keep working on atp and have it continue to cut into our much needed rehearsal time. I'm not kidding when I say we work on this Slint stuff from the moment we wake up until we fall asleep. doing things diy on a large scale is much more time-intensive than anything I've ever done before. besides, would you rather hear a new Slint song or see a band you probably heard before? I didn't say that.

I hope that explains the band drought at atp. I also hope you'll understand the difficult position we're in. this reunion business will never happen again, we only have one crack at it. we want to do it right.

my biggest concern right now is the sequence of bands -- our band choices are only effective if we pick the slots and times that they perform. we're trying to make it flow with consideration towards the attention span, stamina, and interest level of the average listener. we're working to get our list confirmed and not leave it up to atp organizers, who have no idea what the eff we're thinking, but I'm not sure if that crosses curator boundaries. fingers crossed...

before feeling ripped off, why don't you attend the event and then see how you feel? we really are working hard to make it worthwhile for you. and I'm not trying to win your sympathy or favor -- it's the way it is.

man, I'm beat.