PENultimate Collides with Rick Moody and Wesley Stace

Photo by Beowulf Sheehan/PEN American Center

Not to be lost in the holiday shuffle, author (and member of music group the Wingdale Community Singers) Rick Moody joined musicians Sufjan Stevens and John Wesley Harding (who publishes novels under his real name Wesley Stace), Monday, December 17 to discuss the "cross-pollination" of music and literature. PENultimate Lit, the second in a series of events put on by PEN, an international human rights and literary organization, the evening, hosted at Southpaw in Brooklyn, took the form of both an intense discussion of the subject and performances by the musicians. Prior to the event, Moody and Stace spoke with SPIN.com about this mixing of form and the ways in which music influences them.

What is the aim of the PENultimate Lit event?

Rick Moody: I think what PEN is trying to do with this series is define ways to make contemporary literature sort of collide with popular art forms. Tonight's event is the event in which literature and indie rock or contemporary music collide with on another. I think that there are a legitimate spots where these two mutually influence each other. There are a lot of bands that are using writers to write the lyrics -- like One Ring Zero -- and then there's a band like the Decemberists that's clearly very literary and the singer's sister is a novelist.

Wesley Stace: And Jonathan Lethem just wrote all the lyrics on the new Silos record.

RM: So that's the idea -- that these two media are having a renaissance of influencing each other, and we're going to try and map out how it works. I think indie rock is so far out of the mainstream as it were and literature, especially at this moment, is not at the top of the ladder in terms of popular arts. So we're two idioms that feel like the glare of the public lights are not upon us and it's easy to want to make a common cause of such a moment.

For someone who writes both literature and music, do you think they come from the same part of your brain?

WS: I didn't go to writing school, although I do think there's a good school in writing 20 years of song lyrics -- taught me how to trust words on the page and let my mind go free -- but ultimately I feel that my lyrics have always been subject to criticism and praise for being literary. In rock music, especially when I started out making it, that was criminal. People didn't want to hear that. I do have say that for me, though, they do come from a very different place. I couldn't do them at the same time. They are so different. It's different mechanics. Although this is coming from the person who turned one of his songs into a 600-page novel.

Do you listen to music while you're writing?

RM: I do, although often music without lyrics. I find if the music has lyrics that it's intrusive.

WS: I barely can listen to at all while writing and the thought of listening to music with lyrics is explosive to my mind. Maybe a little classical music, but generally nothing.

RM: I used to find that the best thing for first drafts was Big Black or Hüsker Dü, but now I'm getting too old for that. This morning I was listening to McCoy Tyner playing John Coltrane compositions. Jazz and classical, or super avant guard stuff like Sun Ra.

How do you find out about new music?

RM: The last thing I do in the mornings when I get the paper is read the book reviews. Instead I go to the music reviews section and I read it like it's a religious text. I'm always up for what anybody says is the new interesting act.

WS: I don't read music stuff, but I am incredibly good at taking advice from people on what to listen to. Rick just told me to listen to the Battles record today.

What was your favorite record of 2007?

WS: My favorite record of the year was the Robert Wyatt album.

RM: We both like that record. I think that album is awesome. I like the Animal Collective album too, I think that's really good.

What are both of you currently working on?

WS: I just finished an album with the Minus Five and that will come out in the New Year. And I'm in the middle of my third novel. It's about music though, oddly.

RM: A new novel. You will maybe see it in 2009. It's not done.