Dave Dederer’s Birthday Interview

Dave Dederer turns 46 today (October 5). Happy Birthday Dave!

I thought about collecting some older articles to my “Dave Dederer – Birthday” blog post, but I thought an interview would be much cooler than posting some past articles?

Interview with Dave Dederer (Presidents Of The USA / PUSA)

2010-09-03 – Tractor Tavern, Seattle, WA – Photo By Niffer Calderwood

1. You have two songs on your MySpace profile “Now Elizabeth” and “I Can’t
Reach You (The Who Cover), was these recorded purely for MySpace?

The Who cover was part of a recording I did as a Christmas present for my
wife. I can’t remember which version of “Now! Elizabeth” is up there, but
it’s either part of the same Christmas gift recording or a version I did
with Duff McKagan back when we had our little band The Gentlemen. Either
way, it was recorded at Egg Studio with Conrad Uno. Just me sitting and
playing and singing with an acoustic guitar.

2. There is also an alternative version of Addicted To The Fame by SUbSET,
Is it earlier or later version of what was released on Addicted To
Fame/Jupiter 12″ vinyl?

We weren’t very good with “version control” in Subset. Even though we only
ever had the one official release (I don’t even have a copy of that 12″!),
we did a lot of different mixes of a at least 12 songs, and they’re all
floating around someplace…that might be a rough mix from earlier that I
just happened to have on my computer when I set up my MySpace page, which I
haven’t looked at in a couple of years.

3. Any hope at all, that the Subset songs could see a light of day?

I would like to put them out and it occasionally comes up, but just hasn’t
happened yet. All the tracks are good but none approach the live show,
which was truly amazing…probably even better than The Presidents by
themselves.

4. Back in early 2000 you were talking about releasing album via Orange
Recording. What happened to this release? and are you still planning on
making a solo album?

The problem with making an album is then, if you want to do it right, you
have a band and play shows and go on tour and try to make something of
it…and that’s just not what I want to do with my life. I’m not interested
in making a record or having a steady music gig just for fun. Music is more
important than that…when I’m really making music it’s pretty much a matter
of life and death…you are either going for greatness 100% or you’re
wasting your time, especially with intense rock music. If I can’t give it
100%, then I’m not doing justice to the music, and that’s not right. That’s
why I stopped touring with the Presidents.

5. If you plan to release more songs via MySpace. I’d really like to hear a
re-recorded version of Untitled (from Dukes O’Pop cassette). What is the
story behind that song? To me, it’s a very Dylanish type of song, kinda
reminds me of Buckets of Rain?

Ha! I just recorded “Buckets of Rain” for another little present for my
wife! That was my attempt to write a straight-ahead country song.

Listen Duke’s O’Pop – Untitled

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6. Presidents jumped early to the online music wagon with Freaked Out And
Small. (You could say that the title says what music selling online was way
back then) Even thought the things didn’t go too well with Musicblitz…Do
you think it was a valuable experience as online music vice?

I haven’t thought about it much, but we really were early in that space,
which is funny given that I now spend 100% of my working time on digital
music stuff, now with Hewlett Packard. I also almost signed a solo deal
with eMusic when it was first starting out…would have been one of the
first purely digital recording deals.

7. 2006 you said that “Online music is at about 0.5% of its potential”, How
do you see the percentage now?

I think it’s at about 10% of its potential. iTunes is now the biggest music
store in the world. But pretty soon you’re not going to care whether you
own the music or not and you’re going to be consuming music in all sorts of
ways you never anticipated.

8. Is it all digital format to you, or do you still buy CDs/vinyls?

I am sitting at my desk at home with five huge boxes of LPs next to me, a
rack of CDs behind me and Rhapsody on my laptop and iPhone and a radio on
the desk. So I’ve got it all. LPs still sound the best. CDs are a distant
second. I mostly listen to the radio — particularly to KING FM, which is
our local classical station. I’m on a big classical and jazz binge.
Rhapsody is great for when you branch out like I am right now…I can listen
to all of Louis Armstrong’s Hot Fives and Hot Sevens records for a few weeks
without having to go out and buy them. It’s not so much that I don’t want
to spend the money to buy them, it’s that I don’t want the damn CDs or LPs
sitting around the house. Less stuff, please.

9. Speaking of vinyls…Last PUSA vinyl was the II album. Was there ever a
plan to release later albums in vinyl format?

Not that I know of. I’m sure if you or someone else wants to pay to press a
bunch of PUSA vinyl and then try to sell it, and give us at least a little
cut, then we’d be happy to let you have at it!

10. President’s started “a new phase” earlier this year, how involved you
are with this new phase?

What’s the new phase? I don’t know what the heck’s going on. I just help
count the beans.

11. Do you still play guitbass on your freetime?

Don’t have a 3-string in the house but I do play a lot in drop-D tuning on
the six string, which is pretty much the same thing, and I will occasionally
bust out a PUSA song on request.

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