Phil Elverum

I don't think my music is that big of a deal - my entire life is parenting. The fact that I make records and go off and play shows is a small percentage of my day-to-day existence.

One thing I've heard that makes sense to me about grief is that there's this conception that it's a thing that you process, and then you're done processing it. But really it's not a thing that has an end, it's just what life is like now. You are living with this now, probably forever.

Eric's Trip is still a huge influence on me. The style of those recordings and the rawness of them is very inspiring. And the density of the distorted parts, amazing.

Comedy is deep and wild and I am excited about the mysteries within.

My first band was called Nubert Circus, a very embarrassing, dumb name. It means nothing. We were kind of grunge. I would say we were more funny punk, a lot of songs about food and stuff like that.

I don't really see myself in a lineage which is fine with me. Sometimes I do try to explicitly copy an exact song, an arrangement, a sound - and I fail. And so you can't even tell I was trying to do that thing. It makes sense in my own head but I'm incapable of copying.

There are parts on 'Wind's Poem' that are literal recordings of wind. I had this old sound effects record that I got some wind from and then I figured out that distorted cymbals sound just like wind so I used that a lot.

Grief - the actual, natural process of it - doesn't have a schedule that I can work my life around.

They're all true - the cliches like 'one day at time' and 'ups and downs.'

My grandpa is the funniest person in the world, straight up. But mostly everyone in my family groans when he is 'on.' I am his biggest fan.

Even when I was calling myself the Microphones I only really ever played new songs... because I feel, like, a pretty strong connection to the song when I'm performing it.

I grew up without religion, but my parents have always been somewhat mystical about nature: The mountain is looking at us, stuff like that.