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Papa M.
 Slint.
Palace Brothers. Tortoise. These three ultra-influential US
bands have made some memorable, amazing music, and David Pajo
was right in the thick of it with all of them. He even played
bass for Royal Trux and Stereolab. These days he spends his
time playing under the guise of Papa M. The last few years have
found the absurdly influential guitarist/multi instrumentalist
starting to sing. It's something he was always too shy to do.
And why, since he posesses a voice and style that echoes Leonard
Cohen and good friends Will (Bonnie Prince Billie) Oldham and
Bill (Smog) Callahan, and his broken-down rusted lyricism (check
his 'Whatever Mortal' record from 2001). Speaking to the heroic
Pajo, I found he was one of the most humble humans I have ever
had the honour of speaking to.
Pajo, joined by sisters Paz and Ana Lenchantin, will play in Australia for the first time since 1999. His voice is cheery. He speaks fast with a lovely intonation. His long time label Drag City has just released a bunch of Pajo's mostly out-of-print singles as The Hole Of Burning Aims.
It's sad that some people will only recognise Pajo's name because he spent some time in Zwan, Billy Corgan's post-Smashing Pumpkins project - but at least he managed to take fellow Zwan-ite Paz Lenchantin with him, she of A Perfect Circle fame. "It seems like in the last five or six years I've always tried to tour with at least one woman, for a number of reasons. It definitely makes the whole experience a lot better. When it's five or six guys in a van, it starts to get a little decadent," he laughs, possibly remembering his salad days with people like Oldham. "Having a woman there tempers things a little bit."
Pajo shrugs off my call that he is an underground god. "No..." he laughs, nervously, "I think I've been lucky to play with good people. That's all I think I ever did." C'mon Dave! Listen to Slint's 'Spiderland', Tortoise's first three records, any number of Palace Brothers releases... "Yeah there probably is [an identifiable Pajo sound]. I need to start mimicking it," he says chortling, again. "I don't know what I mean by that."
While many of his fans love his work as M, M is the Thirteenth Letter, Aerial M and Papa M, even more of them rate his participation in Southern Gothic dirge punk band Slint as his most prominent and pivotal time as a musician. Mogwai's John Cummings even revealed that Slint might reform for one of the All Tomorrow's Parties festivals during an interview last year. "It got voted down for a number of reasons. One of them was that the only reason we'd be doing it would be for the money. I don't think the majority of us could justify that. If we're gonna get back together and play some shows we need a better reason than money. I'd rather get a day job and keep Slint as a precious thing," he laughs. Pajo adds that three of the four original Slint boys got together and practiced in the mid 90s, writing two really cool songs while they were at it. But whether those songs or a reunion will ever come about is totally up in the air...
Now living in New York, Pajo still has a house in Louisville, Kentucky where he records from time to time. As we speak he is working on the songs for his next full length. It seems that each Pajo fan I speak to has their own wish list for his upcoming shows. "Y'know, I'm not even sure what the set is going to be. It's kind of selfish, because I have been playing the same songs for so long I'm starting to get bored a little bit, as far as the older stuff goes. So I want to focus more on new material, the stuff I am recording for the next record. We'll see. I dunno."
Upon parting I ask Pajo what makes him truly happy. He is stumped. I help him by saying that for me, it's my friends and family and knowing my place in the world. "It's hard to answer questions like that. I guess friends and family make me unhappy. Gosh. I don't even know."
Talking to him for fifteen minutes made my day. It made my week. You'd be a fool to miss him.
Lenin Simos
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dB Magazine proudly presents Papa M at Jive on Sun 27 June. See Prize Frenzy™ for giveaways.
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