People don’t connect with palatable: the OBGMs' Densil McFarlane on pushing punk and pop to extremes
Photo by Amanda Fotes (IG)
I spoke with The OBGMs’ guitarist/vocalist Densil McFarlane earlier this month for Northern Transmissions to learn more about the Toronto trio’s punk-infused sophomore LP, The Ends. McFarlane wrote the album after taking an extended hiatus from the group—not to mention from his guitar. Normally, he’d track a dozen guitar and vocal hooks per day on his phone, but several months went by before he’d pick his Strat up again, and even then he had to ram through hundreds of bad riffs before rediscovering his voice. A flash-fried jolt of hardcore aggression and pop savvy, with bongos for days, The Ends is proof positive that the group are back on track. The album sees release October 30 through Black Box Music.
While I had Densil on the phone, I managed to sneak in a few guitar-specific questions for Gut Feeling, with our conversation touching on the fabulous twang of Fenders, wild card chord choices, and the simple pleasures of a cranked RAT pedal.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
When you’d taken that hiatus from the band, did you put your guitar away throughout those months, too, or were you playing the whole way through?
Densil McFarlane: I put the guitar away for at least half of that time. I didn’t pick it up; I didn’t make any voice notes—coming from a person that normally makes 20 a day. Yeah, man, it was stagnant. It was like limbo.
Being that you’d been going hard with the band since 2007, what was it like to physically not have that that guitar in your hands?
D: A large part of who I am is based off the guitar. I picked up a guitar to have a cool new way to make friends, as a way to segue into conversations with people I didn’t know. To not do that? I kind of lost a portion of who I’d built my life around being: the person with the guitar, the person who could play.
It was weird, man. It’s weird not to have your building block. I’m definitely always holding a guitar now; I want to play it ‘til the riffs fall out. I need to find a way to stay creative and stay grounded. People need creative outlets. If you take a step away from that...honestly, it just becomes a boring life.
When you did pick it back up, did you approach the instrument in a new way?
D: I hated it! We rent a rehearsal studio, and I would go in 4-5 times a week for like six months, about six hours each time. I would just sit there with the guitar until an idea would come to my mind, or I would work with whatever voice notes I had. I wouldn’t leave until I put something down, but I was putting down things I hated. It was all trash.
I’m my biggest critic. The bar is super high for me. When I picked it back up and wasn’t making magic, it was disheartening. It makes you question if you can do it. How are all these amazing musicians making amazing songs? Why is PUP always able to make an album that sounds like a greatest hits album? I want to do that! As I kept going, it was like working out. I was flexing that mental muscle, and eventually [playing] guitar felt normal. I was becoming myself. And I started making good music.
A lot of my issue was that I was making music for the wrong reasons. I was making it to be popular, as opposed to making what [naturally] came out of my body. I was making it to become palatable, but palatable is disposable. People don’t connect with palatable. By the time you record something that’s palatable in 2019, it’s not going to be palatable in 2020. That’s old shit! As soon as I became honest with myself, I started making great music.
Is there a riff that brought it all together, in terms of starting this next phase of The OBGMS?
D: “Outsah” is the best riff on the album. That’s why we play it the whole song!
What was your go-to guitar through all of this?
D: I used a lot of guitars, but I would say the main ones I used were my Fender Strat, and I used a Jazzmaster a lot. I also used a baritone guitar for the first time, a Fender. I used a Gibson SG as well. I love the twang of Fenders more. I really like that twangy type of guitar, just the way it cuts through.
Any secret weapons, tone-wise?
D: We keep it simple. We ran everything through my Vox AC30, which gives a lot of warmth to our sound. A lot of it was amp distortion, but I use a Turbo RAT for the louder, aggressive parts. It was a balance between those. Honestly, the sauce was the AC30 itself, clean, and just driving it in combination with the Turbo RAT. I would also mess around with the Electro-Harmonix POG a little bit, and a chromatic delay. I can’t give you all the secrets [but] I have a lot of pedals.
On the whole, The Ends is a more aggressive album than your earlier self-titled album. Even with “To Death” being melodic with some melancholy to it, it’s still an adrenalized, speaker-blowing sound. Going into the recording, did you realize it was going to be this amped up?
D: My thing is that I always want to do at least one song that shows you that I can write a ballad. I love slower songs; I love the pace of it. I had that song in my pocket. We were going to do it with acoustics, but [producer Dave] Schiffman was like, ‘Fuck no! Go get your electric guitar. Lose the acoustics.’ We jammed it with electrics, and what a decision that was—a way better decision.
Something I’ve noticed about the construction of various OBGMs riffs is that you have a penchant for a doomy resolve. Whether it’s the verse in “Triggered,” the chorus in “Not Again,” or the busy ending of “Karen Os,” you close out those riffs with left-field, gloomy chord phrasings. What draws you to that sound?
D: I love pop music. I love the way it sounds, and I love that it makes me move, but there’s something about it that is very predictable. If you’re going to hum along with a pop song you’d never heard, you would likely be able to predict the next chord...and the chord after that. I always try to find ways where you would not expect us to go. That’s literally what that’s about. Honestly, those chords really stand out.
There aren’t many leads or solos on The Ends, compared to your self-titled album. Was there intent to go more direct and for the throat?
D:, I’ll be real, I’m not a good guitar player. I learned how to play guitar four months before we made Interchorus [the OBGMs debut EP]. I’d learned enough to write a song. I didn’t learn it to play leads, jacking off to show you how good I am. Leads are only great if they’re placed in a certain way. I don’t want them to dominate; I want them to be an accoutrement—a sprinkle on top. When we’re playing live, I barely have my guitar in my hand. I’m throwing it down and jumping on people. I’m not going to make an album where I’m forced to hold the guitar. That’s why you don’t hear a lot of leads.
Bonus Gear Talk: Walter Martin
Photo by Melissa Martin
I’d spoken with Walter Martin earlier this year about putting together his excellent The World at Night for ION Magazine. The piece went up through the site last week, and you can check it out here. Like most stories, there was plenty in our conversation that didn’t make it into the profile.
Before Walt went solo, and before his amazing run with the Walkmen, he was the organist in Jonathan Fire*Eater. He explained to me that the execs at DreamWorks Records, whom released the band’s sultry 1997 swansong, Wolf Songs for Lambs, had thought they had another Smash Mouth on their hands, since both bands had a retro, ‘60s organ sound in the mix. I love the alternate timeline where Jonathan Fire*Eater’s “These Little Monkeys” streams through Shrek instead of “All-Star”, but the band never caught on in the mainstream.
Last winter I’d seen Walt post a photo of his beat up and duct-taped Vox Continental organ— a key ingredient to Jonathan Fire*Eater’s woozy rave-ups— so I asked him how it’s been holding up after all these years. Let’s pick up from there!
Walter Martin: I’ve used that for 20 years. It’s right here—I‘m looking at it. I got it in Atlanta, Georgia, during the Jonathan Fire*Eater days. I probably bought it in 96/97. So, yeah, I’ve used it on everything since then. It’s really good!
There are actually a few different kinds of Continentals. This one is an English one, which has wooden keys. Not that the wooden keys make it sound better, but the English ones really do have this magical sound that the Italian ones—which were made a little bit later— don’t quite have. I’m very, very attached to this one.
Has it gone through any significant repairs?
W: It has, but it hasn’t been in the shop in a while. I know how to fix it myself. Whenever I play it, I have to take the top off and push certain spots, and jam things in certain spots, to make it go. I can’t really play it live, because the keys usually stop working. As far as using it for recordings, I can make it work long enough to play through a song.