Los Angeles’ Origami Ghosts’ new folky jangle-pop album A Fine Time to Talk About Nothing (out August 8) embraces the punk rock spirit with a childlike glee. Written while touring through Europe and the U.S. and living in Paris, Seattle and Austin, this is an album that embraces adventure and exploration as it delves into themes of love, death, intimacy, drugs, counterculture, and emerging technologies.
Origami Ghosts has had many iterations, but always with JP Scesniak (vocals, guitar, bass, harmonica, synth, beer can) as the primary songwriter. He’s joined on this album by Cassandra Wulff (synths, piano, flute, vocals), Ben Kendall (drums) and Jacob Leavitt (cello). The album was engineered and mixed by Sam Rosson (Death Cab for Cutie, Macklemore, Great Grandpa, Deep Sea Diver, Sydney Sprague) at the Hall of Justice Recording Studio in Seattle, the same studio where Nirvana recorded Bleach.
Today, Ghettoblaster has the pleasure of premiering the boisterous “Love Everyone,” which is a sentiment heard far too seldom these days. Fans of Camper Van Beethooven and Dead Milkmen are sure to dig this.
About the track, Scesniak says:
“I can’t remember exactly when I wrote this one, but it was during a time when there was a lot of turmoil in the world — everyday USA. It was during a time when I was frequently studying with some spiritual guides, qi masters, and yogis in Austin (2019). Love was a pretty common thread. ‘May all things be happy and free,’ is a mantra we commonly use in our yoga practice. There’s really only a few things we actually need to survive: shelter, water, food, air, and LOVE!
“It recalls for me the theory that providing positivity in the environment and words can have a significant positive effect on plant growth. It had me thinking about words we use like, ‘anyone who’s anyone…’ and I thought, ‘We’re all someone…and we’re all zany (batshit crazy)’ so what? We still need love. Just because someone seems unstable or ‘crazy,’ should we take away their need for love? That’s just going to make them worse. And when one is worse off, we’re all worse off. So, I guess it’s a song about pulling people up.
“Musically the song is inspired by folk punk music like the Dead Milkmen and the break down part at the end is very much inspired by songs like ‘Shortcut’ and ‘Joyride’ on Built to Spill’s The Normal Years.
“My favorite lyrics are probably, ‘everyone’s as anyone with cinnamon.’ The cinnamon part, because well, I love cinnamon, and wanted to give it a shout out. The line alludes to the fact that if we’re all holding (or sprinkled with) cinnamon, we’ll all smell like cinnamon. So, we’re very much the same in a lot of ways. Then later, ‘I was once upon a time going to be an economist, now I have more interest in the study of ergonomics.’ I was pretty proud to be able to weave in the economics line. It was my field of study at the University of Washington years ago. I was able to spin the yarn into ergonomics, which I discovered is the study of efficiency in working environments. So, I thought that would work: If we have more love in our working environments, we’ll be more successful. Don’t ya think?”
Kudos to Origami Ghosts for reminding us that love is the real punk rock.
Catch the band live here:
Aug. 7: Seattle @ the Sunset w/ Desert Sushi, Ashley Eriksson
Aug. 8: Portland, OR @ Shanghai w/ BLISSTER + guests
Aug. 9: Whidbey Island, WA @ Bailey’s Corner store w/ Haunting Autumn
Aug. 12: Olympia, WA @ Rhythms
Aug. 14: Red Bluff, CA @ The Downtown Alehouse
Aug. 15: Arcata, CA @ Outerspace
Aug. 16: San Francisco @ The Knockout w/ Xay Cole, Green Cat
Aug. 23: Los Angeles @ The Harmony Room w/ Fragile Gang, why try?
Photo courtesy of Brittnee Lunniss.
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