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Interview With Ed Droste of Grizzly Bear

Ed Droste, the out front-man of Grizzly Bear, is a man on the move. Almost as tall as a grizzly bear -- but as approachable as a teddy bear -- Droste has been touring almost non-stop since last August with his band, and there doesn't appear to be an end in sight.

Currently performing in support of their critically acclaimed sophomore effort Yellow House (Warp), Grizzly Bear is winding up their tour with Canadian singer Feist, where they occupy the coveted opening slot. And then it's back on the road for the Pitchfork Music Festival and a variety of other dates. Droste sat down with AfterElton.com at The Vic in Chicago to talk about Grizzly Bear.

AE: Grizzly Bear is on tour with Feist until the end of June 2007. How has that been?

ED : It's been so much fun. She and her band are all amazingly nice, great vibes. They have a totally different audience than we do, so it's great to play for new people. She's just exploded — she's huge now. It's really cool.

AE: Has Grizzly Bear been playing any new material while on tour, and if so, how has it been going over with the audience?

ED : We play two songs from the first album and maybe four from the new one and a cover. We have some new material, but it's a little louder and it doesn't work for this tour. We're trying to do the mellow set for Feist.

AE: Along with Grizzly Bear, artists such as Chris Garneau, Joel Gibb of The Hidden Cameras and Antony of Antony and the Johnsons are breaking the gay male musician mold.

ED : I'm surprised you didn't mention Final Fantasy or Patrick Wolf, and the lead singer from Deerhunter, Bradford Cox.

AE: Those are other good examples. But you're all essentially breaking the mold, or reinventing it, if you will.

ED : What is the mold? Are you going to use Rufus [Wainwright] as an example? [laughs]

AE: I was going to say Bob Mould, but the difference is that you and Rufus and some of the others have all been out right from the start.

ED : I think it's funny that a lot of our straight fans don't realize that I'm gay, because they don't read the gay publications. And the straight publications don't feel the need to write about it, which is nice. I don't care if they do, but it's not really defining of the music.

AE: But do you see yourself fitting into the realm of queer musicians?

ED : I think anyone can fit in. I don't think it's an exclusive scene. There are tons of different types of gay musicians that are doing music. Dear Hunter is a total shoe-gazer/My Bloody Valentine type of thing. Patrick Wolf is very theatrical. And we're just sort of folky. So, sure — why not? I fit in. I'm not stressed about it. [laughs]

AE: Has Grizzly Bear ever been invited to or would you ever play a GLBT music festival such as Idapalooza [in TN] or Alt Q [in Chicago]?

ED : Yeah, I'm sure if it was incorporated into our tour schedule. It's not like we identify as a gay band. I'm the only gay member. I think there was something in Seattle that we were invited to do, but we just didn't have time or it didn't work out.

AE: Would you say that you get an undue amount of attention from the Bear community due to the name of the band?

ED : Yeah. There's this site called Bears Gone Wild that did a little Q&A with us. But I don't think that I've noticed that our shows have a huge bear population. Maybe I'm just not aware of it. Maybe they are coming. I have no idea. I think there are definitely some bear fans, and I've discussed it with a few bears.

AE: You've described Horn of Plenty as being a more “gay-centric” album, while the song “Plans” on Yellow House is the only one of a queer nature on the disc. Will the next Grizzly Bear album strike more of a balance between gay and non-gay centered material?

ED : I don't know. There's really no way to say. I kind of like vague lyrics. Sometimes they are gay, but they're not overt. A lot of the lyrics on Yellow House Dan [Rossen] wrote and “My Love's Another Kind” could be interpreted that way, and I think he's very open to that interpretation, too, even though he was thinking of it as something else. That's why I relate to it when I sing those lyrics, because I'll sing those parts with him on the song. I think we all are into the vague nature of it.

AE: I'm glad that you mentioned Yellow House , because the album was extremely well received. Were you prepared for that?

ED : Uh, no! [laughs] It was very exciting. I was very pleased. I didn't think people were going to get it. I don't think it's necessarily an immediate pop album. I think it demands multiple listens and actual attention given to it, as opposed to background music. It could just sort of wash by, if you weren't paying attention, and I really couldn't fault someone for listening to it that way. I have plenty of CDs that I enjoy as background music.

What I've discovered from talking to people who really love the album is that they'll be like, “I didn't really get it at first, and then I came back to it a month or two later and it really grew on me and I discovered all these things about it that I like.” Which I prefer to someone loving it immediately and getting sick of it.

AE: Grizzly Bear recently played festivals such as Coachella and Sasquatch, and will be coming to Chicago to perform at the upcoming Pitchfork Festival. What does it mean, as a relatively new band, to be in such musical company?

ED : It's exciting! I find that it's hard for me to go and see music because I'm on the road so much. So festivals are a really great place for me to see bands that I've always wanted to see.

AE: That makes sense.

ED : And to meet people. Depending on the size of the band, they are in varying ranges of accessible to chat with. [laughs] Some people might just roll in in a limo, jump out, play a show, and run away.

AE: You've actually seen that?

ED : Yeah, I saw PJ Harvey do that. And a lot of the big bands, they get all these other people to do the sound check for them. Then they just arrive, they play and they run away. But then other smaller bands hang around. But it's so fun. It's great to be playing amongst that.

But festivals are weird and I never judge a band from a festival performance because it's outdoors and people are talking and everyone's hot. It's not the best place to appreciate something with nuance unless it's a dance band — then it's great. But for some of the softer stuff, like us … sometimes I wonder whether it's really beneficial. We do it because it's a lot of fun, but whether we're really winning fans without mellow stuff …

AE: How do you think you are going over in that type of venue?

ED : It's not the best for us. An outdoor festival is not the best. We try to amp up the songs a little bit for that kind of setting. Generally speaking, we're best viewed in a club or a theater.

AE: Since late August of 2006, Grizzly Bear has been touring on a consistent basis. Do you feel as if you have been set adrift or do you enjoy the sensation of being on the road?

ED: I definitely like being home a lot and I think I'm ready for a big break. But at the same time, sometimes I get restless at home, so it's really nice to travel. And I like performing a lot. It's really fun. I mean, I don't like driving and there are a lot of elements of touring that I don't like. But it all pays off because the performance part of it is really fun.

AE: Are there cities where Grizzly Bear plays that you feel they get the band more than other places or is there a universal openness to the band's hard to categorize style?

ED : Chicago has been a good city for us. Generally speaking, the major metropolitan areas are most receptive. New York and L.A. and Seattle and San Francisco and Chicago and Boston. The South is a little slower to pick up on us, but Atlanta has been good, and Austin. We played a show in Baton Rouge for a couple hundred people and they were a great, fun, kind of rowdy crowd.

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