Marian Call: Part 1 – The Interview

If you’re not aware of who Marian Call is, she’s a wonderfully talented singer/songwriter residing in Juneau, Alaska.  Her songs are about making a home in Alaska, Science Fiction and living life as a geek and last year she launched a Kickstarter campaign in an attempt to tour Europe, within 3 hours the target of $11,111 was met and by the end of the campaign a total of $63,301 was raised and Marian toured Europe, produced a Live in Europe album and recently released this epic video shot on location at the Space Expo in Noordwijk, Netherlands.

A year later and Call is on her way back to Europe with shows in the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, Austria and England. You can check out Call’s full tour schedule here so make sure you don’t miss a show near you.

Not only that, Call just recently announced a new album is on its way and you can pre-order it here.

Elizabeth Ann chats with Marian Call at SDCC 2013

Back at SDCC this year, Elizabeth Ann caught up with Call to chat about the success of the Kickstarter, geek culture and much more, check it out below.

NL: More and more geek music is coming out to the masses, why do you think that is?

MC: It’s probably a reflection of geek culture in general, I don’t think that it’s growing like crazy- as to the love that people have for these things is more widespread than we thought. I think that a lot of us didn’t know how fun it was until now to get together with other people who like this stuff and to find more of this stuff. It’s so easy on the internet to go “I like this thing, let me get everything associated with it”, “I like Marian Call so let me try all these other bands” like Molly Lewis and The Doubleclicks. It’s easier now to connect the dots, that means it’s easier for more of these little operations to happen which is really great.

NL: Speaking of the internet, with it being so easy to get (music), download it and not necessarily pay for it how does it make you feel to know that your fans not only pay for it but also donate to your Kickstarters, support you on these tours and even offer you places to stay?

MC: They are amazing, my whole everything only works because of them, and their generosity is…I think it’s partially (because) it only works because I rely on them and I know I rely on them (laughs), I’ve written a lot of thank you notes and not as many as I need to. I very much rely on the kindness of strangers and because of that I try to work my ass off, I try to give as much as I am able to give, I play as many concerts as I can play, I play in tiny towns, big towns, I play in weird places, I play in people’s houses.

I try and give as much of myself as I can and I think there’s an exchange, when I participate in something I care about by funding it, like when I fund a Kickstarter I feel really excited and I love it but it’s hard when you’re the one doing the Kickstarter and you’re all ‘I hope they like it’ and they fund it.

NL: And they funded it pretty quickly.

MC: They funded it very quickly, way more than I thought. Several people had this problem where you do really well and then have way more stuff to make; than I had time to make.

NL: What inspired the use of the typewriter as a musical instrument?

MC: I had a specific song that I really wanted a typewriter in because it was about being nerdy and old fashioned and to me that just felt right and I learned to type on a typewriter in the library when I was in elementary school. I would spend my recesses in the library helping the librarian instead of (being) outside with the other kids and I wanted that specific sound in that specific song, so I recorded it in the studio and then kinda forgot about it until I started playing live shows and people we’re like ‘where’s the typewriter?’ whenever I did that song and I was like why would I play a typewriter at my show but that was exactly the reason to play a typewriter at my show because who has a typewriter in their show? and now my typewriters are my best friends.

NL: We’ve both contributed to the All The Nomz cookbook, tell us about the recipe your chose and why you chose it.

MC: So I chose several soups probably because how I’m always talking on Twitter about how I make soup and everyone’s always ‘I want your soup!’ so I decided to share some soup recipes or more of a general soup making principles.

So my recipes were for very hardy soup that can be vegetarian or dairy free or than can y’know, there’s a lot of variations on how to make it but there’s some general principles on how to make it really flavourful, creamy and fully of healthy stuff too.

NL: Which is important when you’re doing a cookbook, as the reader of it you can just go…

MC: Yeah just go here’s what’s in my kitchen, that’s how I grew up, my Mom was always one of those cooks who would just go ‘okay, what’s in the kitchen and what can I do with this’ and that’s more of my style. If I generally know how to make a thick soup out of a bowl of butter I’ll feel like I have something, it doesn’t matter what’s in my kitchen, I’ll just put this stuff in it.

NL: In my travels with my brother we’re seen plenty of moose crossing signs but never any moose so I firmly believe they are imaginary like unicorns ‘cos I’ve never seen one. So I have a friend from Alaska so she said, ask her for her strangest moose story or strangest moose experience.

MC: Actually a moose almost jumped onto my car from above. There was a spot on the highway where there was a ledge about 10 or 12 feet above and a moose leapt down into the road and almost jumped onto the top of my Suzuki Sidekick to the point where I was looking up going it’s jumping on my car right now and I’m going 40mph and it just barely missed me and kind of slipped on the ice and just kept on crossing the street, it didn’t even seem to notice me but I thought I was going to have a moose in my car for a minute and the car would have been flat and I don’t know what I would have done.

The weirdest moose experience period was when a moose slipped and fell on an ice falls, way, way, way up a cliff about 30 or 40 feet and it slipped on some ice and fell upside down onto the highway and (fell) right in front of a state trooper and some acquaintances of mine stole a moose crossing sign and went to that corner and put it upside down and drew little motion lines to show a moose falling but it didn’t last very long.

NL: Anything you want to plug?

MC: I have a new live album out and I’ll be releasing a whole bunch of music that I’ll be announcing shortly. The best places to find out about that is to follow me on Twitter or on Facebook and on my email list, which may sound lame but I’m going to be releasing a tone of music via the email list and also posting pictures of the Postcard Tour I’m currently undertaking. I’m having strangers write post cards to each other.

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I hope you enjoyed this interview with Marian Call, coming up in part 2 I’ll give you guys a recap and lots of pictures from Call’s shows at CERN, Manchester and Birmingham.

Tags: All The Nomz, AllThenomz, CERN, Conventions, FanGirl Squee, Friends, Geekery, Interviews, Lee, Marian Call, Music, Musicians, Nerdtastic Ramblings, SDCC