Tetragrammatin. Tetragrammatin. Tetragrammatin.

So weird, because in tripping Daisy, I was thinking about the polyphonic spree. Like, later in my life, this would be something I'd do. This is an old man's band that I would do. I would create this sound, and this is what I want to do, and that would be what would happen.

Tell me from the beginning, what was.

The idea tripping Daisy towards there at the end? We. We were an experimental kind of psychedelic rock band, pop band, but very much kind of experimental in our sounds. And I think a lot of that was birthed out of wanting to hear symphonic instruments and other things. So you take these other instruments as far as you can, and you manipulate, and you make them what they are. It started back then. That's when I'm like, wow, I wish we had a flute here. I wish we had strings. This part, I wish we had this. But not having it at our toolkit, that's where it kind of started. And then I was like, man, what would it be like if I had ten people singing that current? What if those harmonies are coming through? And then you've got all this texture with instruments that can almost tell a story on their own if they're just played by themselves. Similar to the Walt Disney Storybook records I used to get as a kid, another big influence. So that's when I'd start thinking about it, but then I'm like, okay, tim, you're about to go back into music again.

What's it going to be? And I would hear these songs that I was writing and thinking that maybe it's time to do this. That was going to come much later. And so I kind of started talking.

About, how would you write the songs? Did you play guitar?

I play guitar and piano, and I'm not very good at either one of them, but they're tools for me. I use them to songwrite on, and I can navigate pretty well on it, but I'm not a very accomplished guitar player or piano player, but I would have these songs that were finished, songs arranged, and I could hear what would be nice to have there.

Do you remember what any of the first songs you wrote were for polyphonics free?

Yeah. Well, all the songs you hear on beginning stages were the.

Maybe I'll give you a guitar and you can play me one if you're up for it. Do you want to.

Oh, remember to play them, experiment around. Really? Oh, my gosh.

Curious to see where.

No, I just told you I'm not very accomplished.

No, it's not about being good. It's about. I want to see the process of getting there.

Okay.

I just want to see how you found it. Like what?

Wow. Okay.

Process.

How it started. I was just messing with it like this. This is light and day. And see, I'm only using one string, and because I'm not accomplished in the way that I'd make chords, I would do things that were different than other people.

You found a simple way to make the sound that you wanted to hear.

Exactly. So I do it. I'm playing, just playing three strings, but for me, I could, like, find something in that, and it would promote a melody just like. But it's so simple, and so I just did these things, and that's how light and day was. I don't know, but I play real simple. But I can hear things that I want to get out of.

So much emotion in it, though. It doesn't have to be hard to play for it to be good.

No, well, I just do what I can. I've found my world that I play in, and it's really only three strings and occasionally a fourth string.

And then you would sing along to it melodically. Without words first?

Typically, no, with words. And that's how I ride, is I sleep with the guitar by my head, and I don't play it that often, but I have a real interesting way of my life as a writer and musician and all that, and then my life as a father and living in the everyday life. They're kind of two separate things for me. And the guitar is something I'll pick up just like you handed it to me. And I started playing this, and it either promotes something or it doesn't. Sometimes I'll just go, it doesn't really happen. I'll just set it down. It's really just like that. And sometimes I pick it up, and all of a sudden, I'll close my eyes and I'll just start singing, and I see where I'm at, and I sing it, and it's all coming out, and I'm just playing it, and maybe I get to a verse and a chorus, and it just kind of ends. And if I'm recording at the time, then I've got a little snapshot of that, and I just stock it away. And that's how it was with this particular record. With salvage enterprise, I would have these little moments where I'd dip my toe in the muse, and if it's there, great, and I pull something out of it, I'll go, oh, God, that was good.

Or I'll feel it. Like, really feel it. And I'm like. It's like discovering something that you hope that you find that place. Best feeling, isn't it? It's just the best feeling.

And it's so magical because it comes from the blue. It's not there, and then it's there, and you can't believe it.

I know. I love it. That's the best part about life, is that you get to discover, have those moments. They're so special when they happen. And I had some of those things happen, and I would just put them aside. Didn't really feel like going back and working on them, so I just knew they were there. And then there was a time, a long period of time where I'd pick it up and nothing would happen. Life had kind of. The chaos had taken over. My life was. I was in a depression, and it was tough. Everything just kind of turned off for a long time.

You think it has to do with outside forces that impact whether or not you can get there or not?

Yeah, I do. I think it has a lot to do with all that. Everything that's around you, everything that you take in, it's a tricky tightrope when you get into that space of falling down into that world. And even when you know, like, I know, because I know in my heart that you can always make it out of that. I know that. But even when you're in it, sometimes it's hard to find it. And I was in that space for quite some time, and it affected everyone around me. And it was rough. Covid happened, and I'm okay. Here we are now. It's really strange. And after living in this space and not being able to write songs and I'm thinking is over, I think. I guess I'm done, man. My well is finished. I don't have anything else to give. Even the ones that I'd liked and I listened to, they were really great. I loved them. But nothing was happening. It was like a big void. It's a horrible place to be. And we have a rehearsal space, triplex. And decided to go there by myself and just kind of learn how to record.

So I bought a logic. I've never been an engineer. I'm not very good with the technical side of stuff. I've always had people around me that can help me get there. And I decided, fuck this. I'm going to learn how to do logic and record. So in the process of learning it, which was really hard for me, because I don't have a brain for that kind of stuff. ADHD is kind of all over the place, but I was able to do that. But in the process of learning how to record, I had to record something. So I'm by myself and I'm picking up the guitar and lo and behold, something starts happening where I'm like, oh, my God. And I'm also recording, and I'm getting this good recording, and I'm like, shit, man, here we go. And I'm in it. And I wrote four songs rather quickly, within five, six days, and I hadn't experienced anything like that in some years. And I'm listening to these things and it's a world of places I'd never been before. Musically, for me, melodically, melody is such a I love melody, but you tend to have your melody that your tool belt gravity melody that you kind of got in your head where, you know, it's like a weird thing that you've got.

It's almost like your sound or whatever. This was me singing stuff that I'd never touching melodies in ways that I'd never done before. And lyrically, it was where I was at. And I'm trying to come out of where I'm at with my stories and things that I'm just improvising. I'm actually coming through the process of where I'm at and growing out of it. While I'm making this record by myself, I'm doing this stuff. And it was like, holy shit. I wrote four galloping seas, which is the first song on the record, and it just started to unfold and I'm like, and then give me everything was a song that just kind of came out and these words was, I'm experiencing where I'm at, and then I'm experiencing working my way through this, through lyrics, through the vision of the song. And it just happened. And it was like then I was like, getting my strength back again. It's like I'm like, oh, my God. Okay, here we go. And then I'm like, I'm going back to these songs that I'd had socked away and then finding out that they're in the same world as this.

And then it was like, oh, my. Was. It was pretty amazing. Julie started skimming through these songs and listening to them, and she's like, this is great. This one's good. And we're listening. Like, this is great. So I'd go back and craft the lyrics more to where I could finish the songs. And it came out as a body of work. It was like, holy shit. It was something that, like I said, it started in the process of how low I was and trying to get someplace that I knew was there. And then hearing the process of that happening for me was overwhelming. And being at my age and like, holy fuck, man.

Sounds really healing. Sounds like the music healed you.

It did exactly that. And that's what is so amazing about that process in music and that in general, of what we're capable of, which I've always known this stuff. I've known this. But when you experience that and to be able to have it recorded and be able to make that record, this is such a special man. I can't say enough about it. I know people say that about their stuff.

Can we listen to the first song together?

Sure.

Great.

Love that.

Do you have it? Do you want to play it up your phone?

Share.

Sarow of the times evacuation causes light to breathe resting thoughts provide the food we need plow the fields we've got some truth to see swinging ladders on the ship counting millions on the cliffs decide if calculations make the news exist find the wind stretch the wind and quit close through the galloping sea hold your head high in the storm what you lost it seems you left me for hold on through the galloping sea they'll come around, they'll come around hold your head high in the storm what you lost it seems you left me the shyness runs away through the sea the screen fall upon the ocean floor the waves collide with the fears we survived the sun makes it clear that we know on our own.

We.

Can be ready again close yourself above the storm keep the faith you're getting warm again you're on your way hold yourself above the storm keep the faith you're getting warm again

hold yourself above the storm keep yourself alive yourself above the storm keep yourself above the storm leave yourself above the way you you find you've turned around.

Thank you.

So how did that one come about? Just in those first days?

So there's kids at the beginning, at the outro chorus, and then they slowly get older towards the end. And you hear everybody. That's the idea. We all go through it. The kids are hearing it first and saying to themselves, hold yourself above the storm keep the faith and then the next course gets a little bit older and then older. Then we have older people, and then it's everybody. I love it.

There's a way that you use repetition in songs that really speaks to me. I think back to the together wear heavy album, which I listened to a million times.

Wow.

Yeah, a million times. I love that album.

Wow.

And there are some songs that could be a long six, seven, eight minute song that might have four lines repeated over and over. It's almost like, through the repetition, it builds and changes and the story unfolds. Even though the words aren't changing. Yeah, it's an amazing thing.

Wow. I've never really thought about it, but a lot of the words and the lyrics are born out of improvisation. And I feel like the natural cadence that comes out of something so improvised. Tends to be more fluid, like, and more part of the music that it wants to be repeated. And it works, as opposed to having this. And I need to write this reoccurring theme and try to make this lyric work. I don't know. I'm just kind of, like, thinking outside. Like, what makes that happen?

The majority of the writing happens on a subconscious level.

Oh, without a doubt. Yeah. All of it, pretty much. And then the basic core of the lyrical idea is there. And, of course, I'll go back and I'll flesh it out. But the actual melody of verse, chorus, or the core of it is completely improvised. The music, the melody, and it all happens at the same time. That's what I was saying. It's either I stick my toe in, it's going to be there, or it's not going to be there. I don't wear my band hat and my music on me at all times. I don't live with holding a guitar and playing it. I'm not that guy. I have this ability to dip in. And if it's there, I have the ability to let it channel. And I kind of just go with it.

Did you have the name polyphonics breed from the beginning?

That's an interesting. It's a funny story. So, no, I needed a name. I put this band together with my wife and Chris and friends and family in three weeks.

The original polyphonic.

The original polyphonic spree. They basically forced me to. And that tends to be a lot of a reoccurring theme. I'm going to be pushed out there to make it happen. And they said, you've got three weeks to get this together. I've booked you an opening act with Granddaddy at the gypsy tea room in bright eyes. And I had three weeks. So just started going to family members and friends that I knew that they played symphonic. I played strings. Do you know anybody that does this? I'm looking for this. And you have to be able to.

Improvise, so you had already made the first album at that point.

Yeah, I've made the first album and probably completed the first album. A couple of weeks prior to this, I had enough songs to do a show, which was about nine songs. What you hear on beginning stages was our first set, and that record was a demo. It wasn't meant to be. Spent five grand on that at Dallas sound lab that I had some money left over, and we borrowed from a friend and we went in and made this record, and it was meant to be a demo to try to get a deal and try to find.

To make a real record.

To make a real record.

Right.

And it turned out that I needed the record to get gigs and do this and that, to explain to people, because they were like, what? You've got 20 something people? That's fucking nightmare.

What are you talking about, you.

Lmnt element electrolytes have you ever felt dehydrated after an intense workout or a long day in the sun? Do you want to maximize your endurance and feel your best? Add element electrolytes to your daily routine, perform better and sleep deeper. Improve your cognitive function. Experience an increase in steady energy with fewer headaches and fewer muscle cramps. Element electrolytes. Drink it in the sauna. Refreshing flavors include grapefruit, citrus, watermelon, and chocolate salt. Formulated with the perfect balance of sodium, potassium, and magnesium to keep you hydrated and energized throughout the day, these minerals help conduct the electricity that powers your nervous system so you can perform at your very best. Element electrolytes are sugar free, keto friendly, and great tasting. Minerals are the stuff of life. So visit drink lmnt.com tetra and stay salty with element electrolyte. L mnt.

How many people are on stage for the first show?

28.

So tell me about that. Who were the 28 people?

So they were friends and family. My niece was 14, Andrew was 16.

Who played anyone who you knew who could play anything?

I didn't know any of the symphonic players. I knew the rock people. My bass player, Mark Piro, is in the spree, and Brian Wakeland was playing the drums from tripping daisy. And then going out to find the symphonic people was the biggest challenge because I didn't know anybody wasn't in that world. It was from the rock world. And I would go, this dude that was playing at the mall that was playing cello is like, would you like to? I didn't know. I lived 40 minutes from UNT North Texas, which is a huge music school, but I didn't think anything about it. It's got amazing musicians, which a lot of them inadvertently became spree members. But I was just going to anybody to get, do you play? And that's when I also realized was that just because they play those instruments doesn't mean that everybody improvises. I thought everybody that played an instrument can improvise, and that's not a very common thing. Especially people that are classically trained. They read music and they play to charts and things like that. And when I would find people, do you improvise? They're like, well, I don't know if I can do it.

What do you mean? I'm like, well, I'm just going to play something, and then I just want you to play along with me. Just follow me. Whatever feels good, just play. And I found a couple of people that had never done that before, and they had this thing like, oh, my God. I didn't know I could do that. Just real proper. It's like they just stumbled on something, and I was like, that's it. That's all it is. And that's great. You'll work. This is fine. I'm like, oh, good. Okay, cool. And so that's basically how the band was built. There was twelve people in the choir, and it was just, how do you.

Get the choir members?

It was all people, friends and family. Do you sing? Can you hold a note? I didn't really care. It's like I just wasn't looking for.

The energy of a bunch of people singing together.

Yeah, exactly. And just kind of, like doing my best. Also, we're talking, like, three weeks to form the polyphonic spree, which is a task, but it was done. And that first group was so. It was so special. It's something else I learned about the community of that many people playing music on stage and live performance. There's a whole nother aspect that I never thought about. And originally, I wasn't even going to be in the band. It was, my idea was to put it together. I was going to be in the audience, watch it, maybe somewhat, conduct it, hand signals here and there. But I just wanted to hear the sound. I wanted to experience this thing I've been thinking about. But in order to express the songs, the dynamics of the songs, the emotion of the song, I found that I had to be, ultimately, had to be a part of it. So I was playing guitar in the beginning of polyphonic spree, and eventually I handed that over to someone else because my old self kicked in. It's like, I need to be expressive. I need to engage with these people. This guitar is holding me back.

Like I said, it's just a tool to write. I don't use it to perform and play and all that. And so that's where it happened. But that feeling that you get with that community of different human beings playing music, some that have only been air tromboning in their bedroom or air violinning in their room, and are now in a rock band on stage playing for the first time. And there was nothing like it. That feeling that I wasn't even thinking about. I'm thinking about the music. Well, what about this whole nother spiritual side that happens when human beings get together and all land on the same page? And they're all like, we're all in the current together playing this music. And then they're dealing with their own feedback that they're getting from it. And that gets kind of addictive. And you want to kinetic, and all of a sudden you're just this force, and it's just like, holy. That's where it came about. It was like, my God, there's something else going on here. It's much more than the music. There's something that's being conveyed and people picked up on it. Yeah.

What did it feel like the first show? Tell me about the first show.

Partly it was nerve wracking, because it was like, I'm playing the songs live and it's the first time, and it is so different, what we were doing. We're wearing white robes.

Tell me about the robes.

Well, there again, my idea was to. I knew I wanted to close the band because I thought the street clothes of 20 something people would be way too distracting. And people are so quick to judge and sum people up by what they're wearing and see this and that. And I wanted to spell that, neutralize everybody totally. And I thought if we could cover the band, and I thought the robes would be covered from head to toe. It's something inexpensive, and we can achieve that.

It's something choirs do.

Exactly.

Tried and true method.

Yeah, it was an image I saw, too. And it's like, I just see this beautiful image, but at the same time it's like, so we're white and I can project images on it. So the first show, we were projecting images on the band. It was more of my love of film and art and texture being shot on us. And ultimately that kind of faded away because the band became the visual and became all you needed. But that's where it happened.

And how'd the audience respond?

They freaked out. I think they were like, what the fuck is this? I know they were. And then it's kind of something that at the end they liked it. It was really well received, and it was special because it's like I didn't let anybody know in the industry or anywhere that I had previous band, tripping daisies. Purposefully, I kind of alienated everybody. My fan base and everything from tripping Daisy. No one knew I was doing this. I didn't mention that band to anybody when I was trying to get gigs. That was another reason why I was using the music and the merit of that, trying to get me in there. I didn't want to use previous. I wanted this thing to be on its own. Wasn't very smart because I alienated a whole fan base of tripping Daisy. A lot of them don't like the spree, and a lot of them came along and did, and a lot of them discovered it later. But it was my way of, I wanted this to have its just a fresh start, fresh start. I wanted to have its own thing, its own identity. And so I think a lot of people were confused because had known me from tripping Daisy.

And now all of a sudden, they're seeing me do this thing in this weird cultish band with robes on. But to me, it felt so new and special coming out of a post grunge world. Nothing like that was going on. And to me, I thought, this is such a beautiful image, and the music's beautiful, and I'm so glad I'm in this band. And I just kind of worked.

It makes me want to cry. It's a very emotional story.

Yeah. Spree is a very special band. It really is. I'm so fortunate to have the people that I've had around me that decided to jump in and be a part of this thing.

What happened next?

Well, we played shows in Austin. And did what? We played south by south. We didn't make south by Southwest the first time. The second time we got one show and they had us opening the keynote speech in the banquet room at 08:00 in the morning. Okay. It's Robbie Robertson's keynote speech. So we're like, fuck it. We'll take whatever we can get. It's the only show we had. So we get there, it's super early. We're literally in a banquet room with fluorescent lights. It's the worst possible place you could possibly be in to play music. It just screams. It's sterile and not cool, and it's not good. But we're like, man, I'm just talking to everybody. This is our thing. We can just turn this into our. Let's just rock these people and take them with us and give them a little ride. Guy went fired up, and we go out there and we just do this thing. And it was kind of like that same deal where we finished, and there was silence, and then the place erupted, and everybody was standing up and just going nuts. And this guy runs up to me and he goes, I'm John Peralis with the New York Times.

You realize what you just did? And I said, what? And he goes, you've got every journalist in the country in here on their feet. That's David Fritt over there. And I'm like. He's pointing all these different people out. He goes, look at this. And I'm like, I had no idea. I thought they were just, like, industry people. But it turned out to be a whole room of every journalist because they were there for Robbie Robertson's keynote speech. So they just immediately blitzed it out to everybody. And then we started getting gigs. We played nine shows at that south by southwest.

Wow.

Word got out, and so we were playing in people's yards. We were playing a restaurant. We were playing in record stores at Waterloo. Everyone kind of wanted to have us, and so it just kind of happened. And at that time, that was in 2002, bands weren't playing multiple like they do now. They do it. Everyone does it now. But back then, you hopefully had one that we played eight to nine of them, and it was just. And the polyphonic spree going through Austin, south by Southwest, with all his instruments and all of us getting navigating. You know what that place is like. We made a huge splash at that south by southwest. It was amazing. So back to that gig. What seemed like to be the worst situation for something to happen and grow, turned out to be the best thing that could have ever happened for us, because in every newspaper the next day, they were talking about the polyphonic spree right there with Robbie Robertson all over the country. It was just, like, unbelievable. You couldn't believe it. And then from after that, like, two weeks later, we get a phone call from someone in David Bowie's camp who?

David Bowie wanted us to come to the UK to play his Royal festival hall. Festival. He was curating, and we're like, wow, okay. They paid for us to come over there to play this show. A lot of people in this band had never even been outside of Texas before, much less go to the UK. Some people had never even flown before and then we're going, the python excrees going to the UK.

At the request of David Bowie.

At the request of David Bowie, yeah.

And then you end up doing a whole tour with David Bowie.

Yeah, that happened later. We ended up playing two festivals he curated with a Highline festival in New York. That was much later. But after that, then he was doing his reality tour, his last tour, and he had us on that tour, and then I was doing a duet with him on a nightly basis. It was crazy.

It's so surreal.

It is. And it's just all those things. This band has always had that kind of, like, the banquet hall deal and playing the Royal festival Hall. We're in the middle of this show. It's the biggest show. I'm thinking of our life. And the power goes out in the middle of the set and we're like, standing on stage, there's this lone light just focused on me because all the lights in the stage went off. The power is off. And we're like, what do we do? The choir, everyone's so nervous. Nervous energy. You had a full festival hall and everyone's just kind of, who is this band? Really kind of summing us up, like, what do you got? It was deathly quiet. There was nothing. I felt like we hadn't really connected with the audience and the power went out. And after a few moments of kind of nervous energy, I just turned to them. I said, I'm just going to sing acapella, hold diamonds off of together. We're heavy. Don't fall in love with or something. Yeah. And I just start singing it. And then I asked the other guys that are playing violin and handheld instruments to just join in.

And then the choir, just to sing. It was more like a campfire Dylan hoping they could hear us. And I start singing it and I'm feeling so alone, but I just closed my eyes and just owned those words and sang it loud and just was feeling. And then people started to trickle in and they kind of got their confidence up and we were doing it, and it's really quiet. You can't hear anything in there. You'd hear someone kind of cough or sneeze or something, but you just hear these human voices and this human expression going on. And I kid you not, man. On the chorus, right where the chorus kicks in, the power comes on and everyone's already playing and it just hits and it just like, boom. And it couldn't have come in at the perfect time. And it just hits and it's the most emotional part of the song and it just boom. And that place goes crazy. They stand up, start cheering, and it's just like we had them and just rode the rest of the song out, went to the next one and it was amazing. And that's all anybody talked about after that show was they thought we did that shit on purpose.

And it was like, no, man, that was a complete accident. You almost shit myself up there. And they're like, that was da da da. But it was like those kinds of things happen. The banquet room, all these big moments of things that just seem so, like the worst thing could possibly happen turns out to be the best possible fertilizing of where I need to be going next, where this is going to happen. And it pretty much dictates we had every label in that country wanting to sign the band. And that's pretty much what happened.

Let's listen to diamonds.

Oh, cool.

Based on the story do you want flip?

Don't fall in love with diamond rings or tragedy will somehow find its way in all that you hold true keep them amazed with your mild devotion to majesty and some milk quoted space and all that you hold true.

What would.

You do if it all came up to you and love had a new place to play today holding on holding on sunshine keep the light on in your soul on your own, on your own the rest is good

what would you do if it all came out to you place your place what would you do if it all. I feel.

There'S some tremendous power, that music. It really gets to me.

Yeah. In that part, that dun dun see, but the whole. That's where it happens.

There's so much emotion in it and it transcends the words. There's some energy current in it that is so overwhelmingly powerful to me.

That's awesome. I'm so glad you receive it, man. I know.

I'm soaking wet.

Thank you so much.

Oh, my God.

I feel it. It's like. You're right. It's a current that you get in, man. I feel that thing and wanting to convey that in a live sense when you get with these people and you're like, I want you to feel that. And I just feel like. I kind of.

I feel like you're channeling it and we get to experience it through your channeling of it.

Yeah, man. It's so awesome that it happens like that, that I was able to. I don't know, man. Be a part of that. It's cool, truly cool to tap into something like that.

Tell me about making that album, because that really was the breakthrough.

Well, was it? We had beginning stages, and that's pretty much the one that kind of put us on the map with everybody and got everyone excited.

How did that one come out?

Beginning stages? Yeah, well, we just put it out on our own. It was. That demo ended up becoming that. But over there, Warner Brothers six, seven, nine picked us up, signed us on that record, and they released it. The one that was meant to be a demo was the first record of the band. So they did it. We came out with together, we're heavy, and they didn't like it.

Really?

Yeah, they didn't like the record.

The label.

The label? Yeah, the label didn't like it. So then I'm like, without a home. And then since Warner Brothers didn't want it, there was kind of a stigma that it wasn't a good record. And so no one wanted to put the record out. And so we found some guy that was willing to put some money into it and act like he had an imprint, wasn't a label label. And so we put it out over there, came back over here, and we hadn't really played the States. The band broke over there first, so anything you heard was coming from over there. Over here.

Welcome to the House of Macadamias. Macadamias are a delicious superfood, sustainably sourced directly from farmers. Macadamias, a rare source of omega seven linked to collagen regeneration, enhanced weight management and better fat metabolism. Macadamias art healthy and brain boosting fats. Macadamias paleo friendly keto and plant based macadamias. No wheat, no dairy, no gluten, no g mos, no preservatives, no palm oil, no added sugar. House of macadamias thy roasted with namibian sea salt, cracked black pepper and chocolate dips. Snack bars come in chocolate, coconut white chocolate and blueberry white chocolate. Visit houseofmacademias.com slash tetra.

Before you went to the UK the first time, had you played other places in the country.

Or just basically never? We didn't play anywhere in the states prior to going to the UK. That happened over there, and we pretty much. They were ready. Like, we want you to start touring and go. So we spent three years.

It's also easier to tour there. You don't have to fly.

Exactly.

Everything is just a couple of hours away.

Yeah, it's expensive still, because at the time, the pound was, shoot, $170.70. But as far as traveling, it was pretty easy to navigate. But we lived at the Columbia hotel over there, and my kids were with me because Julie was in the band and my kids were on the road, and we stayed over there.

Did you say it was a family band? It sounds like a family band. Family and friends.

Yeah, it was very much like a family band at first, especially at the beginning, because my niece was in the band. She was 14 at the time, and my other nieces, they were part of it. And kids grew up on the road with know, I had Stella, Oscar, and Julius. Felix wasn't born yet, so Stella would be singing in the choir with her little robe on and, know, protecting her ears, Lily's ear, muff things. And she'd be with the choir up there doing her thing. And then Oscar would be kind of running around using sticks to play on something. Or I'd look over and he's sleeping in a harp road case down there in the middle of a rock show. They would just kind of go until they just would collapse. And Julius, who would haul a guitar around wherever he was going, would be playing a guitar while the show's going on. So it started with friends and family. At the beginning, it was kind of like whoever you could get in the choir, it was like, can you sing? And we're singing in unison at this point, and if you've got the spirit for it, you could be a part of it.

So at the beginning, you're just kind of starting to grab whoever you can get. And my kids were. I have four kids, and so it's like they were the first to be a part of it.

So cool.

Yeah.

So you make that album.

Yeah, make that album. And then we come back over here.

Songs came the same way, like, totally unconscious.

Totally. That's just how I write. I'm not very good at all about, oh, that's a good chord progression. I'm going to write a song, or I've got these lyrics I want to talk about. I'm going to write to that. I can't do that. It's got to be completely improvised, and I've been doing it for so long now that it's just my go to in the studio.

Or do you improvise to get the song and then you bring that into the studio?

So most of the time, I improvise to get the song. I'll craft it when it's time to go and think, I'm going to go make a record. I'll do a pre production while go and record and kind of work on arrangements and get that. But I've got the core, the essence of the song there, and then we start kind of working on it. It's almost like that demo. I kind of do those kind of demos sometimes. I sent you some stuff a long time ago. You didn't really like it, and I was searching. I was not even doing what I was supposed to be doing. And it was in between. It was right after together, we're heavy. It was on the heels of that, and they're kind of, like, pushing me to make another record and forcing that kind of thing, and I'm like, I just would get in there and start jamming with everybody and improvise and jam. A lot of fun and some good stuff you would stumble onto, but nothing of, like, this is a good idea. This will turn into something. But when I went to do together were heavy, it was the same thing.

There was no pressure between beginning stages and that one. I'd been living with beginning stages, so we'd kind of write live. I'd write in a sound check, and I would do this, and it would either be there, it wouldn't be there, or I'd kind of be off on my own. And then I'd come in up, I've got this thing, we'd work on it through sound check, and we kind of came up with the record.

When you would work on it, would you work on it with 28 people? Would you work on it with a small, low group?

So sometimes if we had the time to be able to, like, I'm just going to mess around here, and let's just see what happens. Sometimes that would happen. But most of all, it was just me kind of off on my own by myself, and then coming in and saying, I've got this idea going to play, and let's see how we can build on it. I encouraged everybody in the beginning, back in those days, to kind of. It was almost like a kitchen sink. I listened to that song diamonds. I hear me, I'm trying to get everybody in there, and it's like, out of me feeling like I need them to be able to. I don't want to leave them out. I want them to be able to be on the part of it and come up with something and going down looking at the list to record, oh, we don't have this on there yet. We need to just kitchen sink. And it was all about trying to make people feel inclusive and be a part of it, democratic. And it's always kind of been like that. And then I would have some regrets sometimes when I'd go back that I wish that hadn't been.

I wish I had created a little bit more space and not just done that to kind of placate a situation. Not that those songs are great and everything's fine about them. I just hear personal stuff that I would have made different choices. And that's what's so different about this record and the previous stuff is that made a conscious. There was an overwhelming feeling that this record needed to be very specific musically, and so it became completely different. Like, you'll hear songs on there. It's just acoustic and maybe a flute. That's it. And maybe an upright bass, but that's it. And just rather than the old time, oh, everybody's not on there. Find your space. Even if it's, like, here, like that. But this very different experience.

Do you have a favorite song on the new album?

If I told you this. But when I finished the album, I wanted people to hear it as a whole. So I did these listening experiences where I got rented a sprinter van and rented a sound system like twelve QSC speakers on tripods, and I traveled around doing pop up listening experiences where I had moving blankets. And I came out to the west coast for a month and just traveled around and found a spot I could possibly do it that I didn't think I'd get busted. And then I'd tweet, I want to be here at this time. If anybody sees this or wants to be a part of it, come on out. It's free. And it was my way of wanting people to hear this record as a whole. Very real self indulgent there. But I thought, if I've got a captive audience, I can make that happen by I'll just kind of force them to do this. I'll set the sound system up under the stars.

How were those experiences?

They were incredible. People loved it. Every experience was different.

Such a cool idea.

Some people would get up and start doing yoga while they're listening to it. Some people would just have these emotional experiences. People are coming out of COVID being outside, being away from that, being away from your phone for 45 minutes, forcing yourself to just look at the stars and take a break from life. Mixed with that music accompanying you through this process. Yeah, it would have some overwhelming aspects on people. People loved it. Like, oh, my God, you don't know how bad I needed that. And it's like, not just the music. Put the music to the side. Just taking a break from life and laying down on the ground and just looking at the sky for 45 minutes and not having to think about anything that in itself, when you just choose to do that, is an experience that everybody should. It's going to have an effect on you. And I think that is just as much of what was a success as much as it was the music, navigating that process. But it was awesome. I loved it. I'm going to continue to do them. I'm actually taking a step further. We're making a film for planetariums where been working on this for about six months now, but it's going to probably come out in February with my friend Scott Berman, who did visuals for us before.

We're making different animators and live action creating film to the record. People come to planetarium, look at the visual while they're listening to the record. So it started doing the listening experiences, and now it's moved to that. And we've lined up, like twelve different planetariums that will move regionally kind of all over the country that'll play the record. And that's kind of another way of my way of playing the record, letting people hear it as a whole, as opposed to diving into the jukebox on there.

Let's listen to the next song.

Okay, so we listened to the first song on the record. Let's listen to the last part. Okay, cool.

We can. We can also listen if you want. We could listen to the whole thing.

I don't want to do that to you, but I'll play another one, then we'll play the last part. I just kind of want to give a general idea. We'll do shadows on the hillside.

Why does it start with section 44?

Those are okay. When I first referred to the songs, I was saying, we're going to go from this. This is the very beginning of the polyphonic spree. They weren't song titles, they were sections. Because it's like, we're going to go from section one, this section, into this section. And I was always referring to them as sections. They weren't even numbered. It was just. That's how I described it. So we're going to go this one section here, and this section never was song titles. So then I was like, then they were. Had a.

Think of the album as one thing, and then the reason you break them into sections is that they're pieces of a whole inadvertently.

Yeah. I didn't realize that I was doing that. And I thought at the time, it's like, you know what? This is the first section of the birth of the polyphonic spree. So that's the 44th section of the polyphonic spree. It's a 44th song, per se, of the record. So the sections in every title on every record I've ever put out.

I see.

That's what it is. But at the beginning, it all came from referring to them as sections. But, yeah.

Close it. Blast all those demons vitamins. Carry me, please. Please. While my heart silently scream fade all those past lives think yourself a renegade just leave

because thoughts only flow when the windows are wide reach out and fall far away finally wish we can fly and dream dreams on the hillside what you found were the wings to go you just set yourself free shadows on the hillside what you see is mile high what you have is what you need what you need you sadly know there's no windows wide reach out and fall far away and finally wish you can fly and dream, dream shadows on your side what you found were the wings to go you just set yourself free shadows on the ground what you lost can be found what you have is what you need.

What you.

See what you see on the ground, on the ground by the way you can call me on ground on the way you can follow me you can fill your finally story reach away and say, you follow me I future always waiting reach away and say you follow me.

So beautiful.

Thank you.

So cinematic. And it takes you to another place. And it's something to do with the sound of the words and the sound of your voice and the choices that you're making. The thing that happens next is never what you expect.

Interesting.

It's always taking you somewhere new, and there's this sense of discovery that keeps happening. And I guess it's what's happening in you when you're experiencing it.

Totally.

And we get to have that same experience. It never gets formalized into a regular song.

Right.

It's like we get to experience your mystical experience.

Yeah. That's awesome. Thank you so much.

It's just so powerful.

Thank you.

And there's nothing like it.

Thank you.

I love it.

Thank you.

I'm so happy you're doing it.

Yeah, me, too. I'm glad it happened.

Yeah.

At a time when you didn't think you had it anymore, it was really scary.

I remember you made an album where you guys looked different, looked kind of more militaristic on the COVID And I remember it felt like the energy was different. It didn't feel like you were connected to the spirit.

That's a fragile army. It was kind of birthed out of political climate. We were in George Bush, the war, and all that kind of stuff. It was kind of had that sense to it, sense of urgency and angst to it in a bit. But at the same, that record, there's a lot of great songs are kind of all over the know, but they're completely different experiences. Some good songs on there, but it's just different. And you're right, it's not of that world. Yeah, this is something different. This is a lot like beginning stages of, I think, as far as the feeling for me, does it feel like.

A new start for you?

It does. Like I was telling you, I've kind of discovered some melody and parts of things I've never experienced before, of feelings and that feeling that you get with melody and song when it's coming through and all that, it felt new to me, and that was what kind of gave me the energy to like, oh, God, this is great. And now I had something to reach for and grab onto. Yeah. And that's really so fortunate.

So much of today's life happens on the web. Squarespace is your home base for building your dream presence in an online world. Designing a website is easy, using one of Squarespace's best in class templates. With the built in style kit, you can change fonts, imagery, margins, and menus so your design will be perfectly tailored to your needs. Discover unbreakable creativity with fluid engine, a highly intuitive drag and drop editor. No coding or technical experience is required. Understand your site's performance. With in depth website analytics tools, Squarespace has everything you need to succeed online. Create a blog. Monetize a newsletter, make a marketing portfolio. Launch an online store. The Squarespace app helps you run your business from anywhere. Track inventory, and connect with customers while you're on the go. Whether you're just starting out or already managing a successful brand, Squarespace makes it easy to create and customize a beautiful website. Visit squarespace.com slash Tetra and get started.

Today.

When you said earlier, when you imagined the band before it existed, you imagined flute playing here or an orchestra here or choir here.

Yeah.

Where do you think those influences came from?

Well, I think they came from what we were talking about earlier, the sunny kind of pop music that I gravitated to as a kid, baroque pop, I think it's called, and just kind of the Walt Disney storybook records.

I had all never heard those.

There's, like, of the movies of, like, Robin Hood or the aristocats or song of the south. Whenever I'd get sick, and I figured this out, like, if I got sick, I'd get a record, but they would give you these in the pharmacy, they'd sell these records that had storybooks in them, with records. So you would listen to the record and then follow the pages of the animated drawings or whatever they've got going on. And those songs always had instrumentation, like symphonic, mixed with little bit of guitar based and drums, but really low, mainly symphonic. And so they would a rabbit brayer rabbit hopping down the trail. You'd hear the flute. You could visualize this stuff. And as a kid hearing that, it gravitated and it made a lot of sense to me. So I think the spree was totally pulled from that world mixed with that seventy s fm pop that was happening at the time.

What type of music do you listen to in general?

I'm really weird listener. Like, I've got this one song that I repeat constantly that I'll just drive around for hours and it's just on repeat. And I stumbled on it. It's called a gape. And it's from the Beal street, the artist. I can't even tell you, but I just stumbled on this song and I listened to it over and over. I listened to instrumental music. Percy faith Montavani. I listen to elevator music. Really like that stuff. There's one song in particular that some people are going to hear this, are going to laugh because they know that this song means a lot to me. But it's Enyo Martacone. It's called the strong. And it's from the good and the bad and the ugly. It's a very short piece of music, but I've probably listened to that music, that song. And I'm being maybe a few thousand times I've heard this song. I play it over and over. I'll listen to it for dad.

Can you play me the first song you mentioned?

Yeah. Okay. It's from the movie called if Beal street could talk. And it's by this guy, Nicholas Britel. I just stumbled on it and freaking love it.

Sa.

Yeah. And the reason why I like it so much, because it sounds a lot like the eno maraconi track that I've just. That song. Can I play it for you, please? It's real short, small piece of music, but it's the same thing. This track resonates with me big time. And this escape song, when I play this, you're going to go, it makes sense why he likes that.

Whatever reason, man, that song just kills me. I love it. Love it. It's a scene where Clint Eastwood, the civil war is going on and all this carnage and stuff. And he's balled up and hid behind a rock or whatever. While this is going, hoping to get through this war, he realizes he wakes up and it's all done. There's no one around. Just destruction and everyone. All the soldiers laying on the field, he's by himself. There's no one around. He's just looking at all this that's going on. That's why you hear the little kind of taps, trumpet kind of thing going on in the background. It's representing what? Soldier side, army and all that and the war and all that. And he's like, just looking at it, and it's so quiet. And so he's taking it in, like, what a waste. And then he finds this lone soldier that's hiding out in this bunker, leaned up against the wall, and he's dying. And Clint leans down and gives him a drag off his cigar. And the guy takes the hit drag off of it and smoke leaves. And the guy dies right there. And you're looking, it's, like, so beautiful.

I just love that one scene. But that song, for whatever reason, it just puts me there. So I would listen to this song just all day. I would leave here today, put it in, and it would be on repeat. And that's kind of how I do music sometimes.

Do you think if you hadn't seen that scene, the music would still have the impact on you?

That's a good question. I don't know if it was.

Does it bring you back to the movie or is it something else?

No, it's something else. I've made it my own. It's a place for me. It's a lot of sadness in that track, but at the same time, there's, like, this kind of lifted up part in it, too.

I get that in your music, too. It's like that combination of, like, there's an ecstatic energy and there's a real heaviness.

Yeah. And that was what's kind of weird at the beginning of the spree was that people were getting this happy clappy surmising the band is that. But those songs and the lyrics were coming from a very different space. It's very melancholy record. But what I was telling you, like, what we discovered as a group in the live setting in the community of playing the songs, there was this certain amount of zeal that came with it. And then it started to exude itself. And then you could take something that was so sad and it would kind of almost be uplifting in a weird way. And all those songs kind of have that vibe to them, you can kind of be there, but there's also a transition of morphing into what's coming and trying to get there. And then once you get there, what that feeling is like. It's more of a treasure map, if you will. This whole record of being specific about how to get to this point, you have to be very specific.

I think that might be a key to what your music does for me, is that it comes from a place of heaviness, but breaks through to this other level. And it's that yearning.

Yeah, man.

I think that's it, because thinking about it makes me cry. So it's probably true.

No, man. It is what I've got to have. For me, personally. Yeah. I never even thought about it. It's like when you're a band and you're doing your songs and you're unfolding these stuff out there and you don't realize what it. You don't really think about what it's going to do. You're thinking, are they going to like this? You reach a point where you don't even care about that anymore. It's just kind of like, yeah, you want them to like it, but you don't really know what their experience of the record was going to be for them, of the music. And then you find out through the process of playing live and speaking to people what it means to them. And then you're doing interviews and you're talking about it, and it's like, wait a minute. This stuff that I'm singing about for myself and what I need to have happen for me, some other people are feeling the same way, too, and they're getting that. I never even thought about that. Seems so naive to not think about that.

I never thought about it either. And I've been listening to you for 20 years. Yeah, I never thought about it.

Yeah.

I just know that the way it makes me feel is very powerful, and I can't think of anything else that hits me in that particular way.

That's great, man. And that's something that's discovered. It certainly wasn't the agenda. It's just kind of like I said, the toe goes in. It's like he's either there or it's not there. And I'm able to. I'm Tim much more, it seems like, more interesting on my music, my output of that, than I am in real life. I'll listen to that. Golly, you said that. Where did that come from? It's like you kind of like, wow. I mean, even on my best day, I'm not able to articulate something like that. That's when you know it's coming from something, let's say mystical. But there is an element of that.

Did you grow up with any kind of a spiritual background going to church or anything like that?

Well, my grandfather was a preacher. It was church of Christ. Very staunch, kind of serious religion. And my mom was always searching for some sort of spirituality, and she still does. I had also weird experience as a know when one point, my mom is into this baptist church in Dallas, and she took me, and it was like, you want to get saved? Or whatever? You kind of buy into it because they would bring you in with this music, and this music was like, it was a big part of the church. It's great band with a choir. It sounds like the spree in a sense, but they would summons you to get you into the spirit, and then they would kind of bring you down, and if you want to get saved or whatever, and it's like, yeah, let's do this. And I'm a kid, and I remember going backstage, and it was a room full of people like myself just sitting at these tables, these kind of guiding preachers that are in there and trying to get the Lord to speak through you. And had his hand on my head and real close to me, and it's like, let the Lord speak through you.

And I'm kind of just listening. I'm kind of weirded out by this, the whole thing. I was intimidated and weird, but I am listening. Some people, like, mumbling, like tongues kind of stuff. So in order just to kind of get out of this situation, I started to kind of mimic that. And then he started to translate what I was saying, and it just crushed me. I mean, that was like, crushed me. I just looked at it as, this is a total scam sham. And I was so young, but I saw through it, and it was crushing. And I looked at my mom differently. How she saw religion, it was devastating. I remember walking out there thinking I saw something, experienced something I wasn't supposed to see. I felt bad that I knew this. I'm looking at this congregation filled with all these people and what they're doing, and it was rough. And so it's always been. Spirituality has always been a kind of a question for me. And so I've found it in my own life and through my experiences of making music and through my experiences observing mother nature do its thing, and I find it in that.

I've talked about this, about the grass that grows up in concrete, on the streets. It's like it's the worst possible environment, but yet there's grass growing there and breathing and living and not even thinking about that shit that's around it. I draw that or the tree that grows and absorbs the chain link fence that it happened to be buried by and just absorbs it and owns it, but it still continues. That's where I started to get it from. And then I found it in my process of creating music and all that. So I'm finding my way, and I found it like that. But organized religion was. And I think maybe it's fortunate that I found it so at an early age for me, that what works for me.

There was another song you're going to play for me?

Sure.

This is the closing song on the album?

Yeah. It's actually three parts that were written that I had to break them up into three different songs. But they're really kind of one piece if you want to do it.

Yeah.

Okay.

Cool.

Calls the other down comes mother the winds of the summer make us feel alive hey. So love, it makes no difference you had it all along with the sun feels like summer

it's so long it makes no difference you had it all along with the moon on the sun feels like summer when the people fly around makes you wonder ear it's a cool flash of sound that I'm under make us feel light.

This is.

The morning sun I am awakened from all of the fire that's born in the sky in the morning sun my dreams are saving the moments have found a part of my life so alive.

So.

Am I yeah in the morning sun the trees are singing humming their sound talking to cloud in the morning sun we hang on the season lift off is the final step to goodbye so alive, so am I so alive yesterday finally moved me I built the stairs tomorrow makes a thousand new reasons I want to share the up and down back and forth feelings gives me a ride smiling at the goddess of evil I learned to fly

I learned to fly the more that I become a new reason I wanna try yesterday finally move me I built the star tomorrow gets a thousand new reasons I wanna share up and out, back and forth feeling gives me. All right. I went out the God of the evil and try.

Beautiful.

Thank you.

This is the soundtrack for the wonder of the natural world.

Morning sun I built the stairs and that's a little nod to eno marconi with the opera voice. That's Jennifer job, which is one of my favorite parts of the whole record. When she comes in. It's just like. Yes. So good. I love it. It's just like morning sun.

I built the stairs. Such a beautiful. Two beautiful phrases put together.

So beautiful was one song we had to. I don't know why, but it plays through, obviously, on the record. Another reason why I want people to hear this as a whole. It's an experience. It's totally meant to be heard as a whole.

So when you play it live, you'll play the whole.

Yeah, like, we're playing album in order. Yeah. Like, recently, we've been playing, like, seven songs just. But we play them from the top down the best we can. And then the idea is to play the whole record. It's 43 minutes and move to the next. It's so tough when you've got 20 years of music prior and you're coming out with a new record. And how do they balance? I watch the stones do what they do, and they're just like, there's no right way.

There really isn't any right way. Do what feels right. If you do the show that you want to listen to and that you want to see, there is nothing better that you can do.

Right? Yeah, no, I know you're right. It'll play out how it plays. But there's something about this record that's just so special for all of us. For me personally, it's one of those things where I go, man. Yeah. My whole life, I've kind of feel like I've been waiting for this one to happen.

We need this.

Yeah, we need this.