Bachelorette

Scott Wasserman

S: So, Bachelorette, where did that name come from?
B: I just liked the way it looked written down. I saw it written down somewhere, and… yeah, I really liked the way the word looked.

S: When did you get your musical start? Playing instruments, singing, etc.
B: Just growing up, yeah. I guess I came from a musical household. We had a piano, and on trips my mom used to play guitar to us. She played Autoharp, and played piano. We listened to a lot of music as well. As I got older, I wanted to start playing music, so I started learning the piano, guitar, and the drums.

S: And when did the electronic influences come in?
B: I’m not sure exactly, probably not until I was a little bit older. I bought my first synthesizer when I was about 17, and started playing in a band. It just kind of kicked off; I started playing organs and keyboards and stuff. I played in a band called Hawaii 5-0 for quite a few years, and I would play synthesizer, and organs, and guitar. As I went along, I sort-of got into recording. I had a 4-track recorder. It just kind-of got to the point where I had these ideas, but I really needed multi-tracks to record them[.] It wasn’t something I could do with the band. I had stuff I wanted to do, but I really needed to do it on computers. I went to university so that I could start recording on computers ‘cause that was only way I could think of to have access to good recording equipment and computers and stuff. Yeah, I kind of went off the path a little bit. I played psychedelic pop music in the band Hawaii 5-0, and then I went to university because I wanted to use computers. I started making sort-of academic music, electro-acoustic music. Sort-of... noise.

S: Who were your musical influences at that point? Who did you listen to a lot?
B: Um, I don’t have any classical people, just Pop, like the Beatles. Whenever people ask me about my influences I always think of the Beatles ‘cause they’d probably be my biggest influence. But over the years, I got into things like Aphex Twin. I was actually quite into Aphex Twin when I was at university, and I was really into The Orb in high school. They’re sort-of one of the pioneers of Electronic music in the 90’s, and I remember when their song “Little Fluffy Clouds” came out and sort-of blew me away. Probably that was my first introduction to really enjoying Electronic music.

S: So things sort-of took off from there. After your first EP did you get signed to a record label?
B: Yeah, I was on a label in New Zealand called Arch Hill, they released my first EP as Bachelorette, and about a year later I recorded the album called Isolation Loops. I self-released that one in New Zealand because New Zealand’s a small country, and it kind-of seems pointless to have a label where they take 50% of what you earn. It’s easy to get the word around about music. Do you wanna know stuff about Isolation Loops? That was my first full-length album. In a sense “EP” was like a mini-album, 7 tracks, half an hour long. Isolation Loops has 11 tracks, and I recorded that on my own at an old, I don’t know what you call them here; in New Zealand we call them “baches,” B-A-C-H. [Baches are] like a little sort of holiday hut. Not like a flash holiday home or anything. [Mine was] in like a fishing village, and it was owned by my family. My greatgrandfather built it in the 1920s. I went and stayed out there for a couple months, so I wouldn’t have to pay rent.

S: And now this newest [album], My Electric Family…
B: Is out on Drag City because they came to my Chicago show. I have a manager who lives in Portland who’s been really helpful just trying to get Bachelorette out in America, and she invited the Drag City people along to the show I did in Chicago. She just kept in contact with them when I was recording this album, and then they said they wanted to release it when I finished it here.

S: What would you classify your genre as?
B: Sometimes I call it Computer Folk, and sometimes I call it, well, there’s a touch of Psychedelic in it, so sometimes I call it Psychedelic Folk Pop. Some people call it Psy-Folk. Isolation Loops had a bit of a space theme, so kind-of Cosmic Folk or something. It changes though. I was hoping to get more “Poppy”, and a couple of the songs are a bit more “Poppy.”

S: What do you see yourself doing in the future? B: I don’t know! It just depends on what I feel like doing, I don’t really have a clear idea of what direction I want to go in or anything like that. I just want to make music that I’m happy with, and what I’m into can change slightly along the way. Generally, if I finish one album and mix one, I feel like approaching it a bit differently because I like to find a new way of doing things; finding a new way of making music that I’m happy with.

S: Are you looking to make yourself more well-known in the States, or is your heart in New Zealand?
B: I’ve been thinking of maybe coming over here for a while, like for a year or something. I just like it over here anyway, and New Zealand is really far away. As a musician it’s not the best place to live if you want to have your music heard by people. And you know, when you put a lot of time into recording music and writing it and everything, you want the people who would enjoy to be able to hear it, and I see this tour as an opportunity for that – revealing the music to more people and getting it out there.