Great Lake Swimmers Talk Polaris 2009 Nomination

07/07/09 3:39pm

by Aaron Brophy (CHARTattack)

Great Lake Swimmers have just made the 2009 Polaris Music Prize Short List for their album Lost Channels. They've now got a one in 10 chance of having their album declared the most artistically awesome record made in Canada in the last year.

We spoke to the Swimmers' Tony Dekker and Erik Arnesen earlier today about what this all means.

CHARTattack: So how do you feel right now?
Tony Dekker: Oh man, it feels terrible.
Erik Arnesen: I'm really bummed out by it.
TD: No, it's great. It's awesome, of course.

Y'know, this nomination comes from a very special group. We're talking 180 of the nerdiest, liner note-reading music obsessive geeks from across the country. This is a group of people who listen to a lot of records, so for them to go, "Yeah, this is a good record" means something.
TD: It's intimidating, but it's nice because I'm one of those people.
EA: Yeah, exactly, I'm one of those liner note-reading nerds myself, so it is a huge honour.

What was the thing about making Lost Channels that was most exciting, most fulfilling for you?
EA: One of my favourite moments was Bob Egan putting pedal steel on the record.
TD: For me it was recording in Singer Castle. Taking a boat out there with all our gear to an island in the St. Lawrence River and being able to record in a hundred-year-old castle was pretty amazing.

Yeah, that's a pretty crazy story.
TD: Yeah, if it was fiction... you can't make this stuff up. Singer Castle on Dark Island.

When you saw the castle and you were in there, what was the first thing you thought?
EA: How the hell did we hook this up?
TD: It all came together very well and very quickly in a very limited amount of time.
EA: And it's a full-on castle! Secret passageways, paintings that move with the eyes cut out them...
TD: It was pretty mind-blowing. It was a crazy time and it was awesome just being in that place, let alone being able to record music in it.

If you can't win, who amongst the other 10 nominees would you like to see win the Polaris Music Prize?
TD: We'll go with Chad Van Gaalen.

The Elliott Brood guys just picked you.
TD: Oh, Elliott Brood.

It's too late to change.
TD: Elliott Brood, too. They're buds of ours.

Time to not be modest. Why are you guys so awesome?
EA: Tony's beard.
TD: Yeah, the secret is in my beard.
EA: It's got Samson-like folk power. He shaved it once and we started to go downhill rapidly.

You started making records that sounded like Haywire?
TD: Yeah, actually.
EA: All that delicate finger-picking is not actually him, it's his beard slithering over the guitar strings.
TD: Yeah, that's the extra ambiance, the beard tickling.

What are you going to do with that big $20,000 cheque if you win?
EA: We've already said "van" and "costumes," so we need something else. I know. We'd put an auxiliary deck in the van so we could listen to iPods.

Wow. Thinking big.
EA: That's it.
TD: Yeah, after the van, nudie suits and the auxiliary deck...
EA: ... breakfasts all across America. That's what it's going to go to.