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COVER STORY: Interview with Fountains of Wayne 
Interview with Adam Schlesinger of Fountains of Wayne By Josh Goldfein
september 2003
new york
Fountains of Wayne hope to cross over with their third record, Welcome Interstate Managers (S-Curve/Virgin), but maybe they don't get why we adore them. As the poet laureates of the "bridge and tunnel" crowd (who else you got? The Sopranos? Junot Diaz?), songwriters Adam Schlesinger and Chris Collingwood, who met at Williams College in the 1980s, speak for the loser in all of us: too close to the inside to be an outsider, but not cool enough to be hip. Their just-retro power pop, which recalls the golden age of MTV, is also a taste that is probably sweeter to those who still treasure it than to kids who will first discover the band at school this fall.
Schelsinger, who grew up in suburban Montclair, New Jersey, is currently in heavy multitasking mode: in addition to promoting the new album, he's also a partner with Smashed Pumpkin James Iha in Stratosphere Sound, a New York City recording studio, where he's worked with artists from They Might Be Giants to Robert Plant; a member of the wist-rock band Ivy; and the father of a four-month old daughter. He's also worked on the music for That Thing You Do, Crank Yankers and Josie and the Pussycats, among others. We called him at his home in Chelsea.
Mjuice: So where were you when the lights went out?
Adam: At home. Like everyone else, at first we thought we did it. We lit some candles and made dinner. When the power wasn't back in the morning we went to my parents' in Montclair.
M: It seems like you're the only people making music about Montclair.
A: We're inspired by other people who write about the place they're from. It's like Ray Davies' London, or Randy Newman and the South. Even if you don't know that place you might want to know something about it or the people there.
M: Hip hop used to be that way.
A: Same idea.
M: Speaking of bling bling, it seems like the people on this record are moving up in the world: they fly for work; they have cell phones and computers.
A: Maybe they're just getting older. Chris and I have both worked in offices; he's done a lot of temping. He still takes programming jobs between records. You know the song "Joe Rey" on our first album? Joe's the guy who hires Chris to do programming.
M: How's your technical facility?
A: I can do e-mail. and I'm pretty good with the software for making music.
M: Do you download it?
A: At the studio we can do that pretty easily. I admit I've done it, but usually when we're working on something and I need it as a reference.
M: Any helpful composition gadgets?
A: Not in the writing, but definitely in recording; the arrangements get changed because of ProTools. I still write in the traditional way, with a guitar and piano. The biggest impact of digital music for us is losing a certain level of quality control. We can go out and play a crappy show and the next thing you know the whole world can hear it, and there's nothing you can do about it.
M: But it must be gratfiying at the same time.
A: You have to try to look at as a positive thing, that people are that interested in what we do.
M: So if you record your own stuff you must not have any problem with studio material getting out.
A: No, but when I was working with the band Phantom Planet a few years ago we borrowed a Pro Tools rig from a guy who had just recorded the last U2 album and he had the whole thing on the hard drive.
M: In the wake of the consolidation of the music industry, a lot of artists are trying different business models for putting out records.
A: Well, we have a new label but we have the same exact thing we had before, the traditional deal with a major label. We thought about other options but this band does not want to wear business hats and music hats at the same time. I personally might have been interested in that, but not the rest of the band. We thought we had a record that had a shot of at getting on the radio, and you need a major label for that. We could put out a record and sell it to our fan base and maybe sell the same number of copies, but we wanted to have a shot at making it bigger, and for that you need a major label. Our new label thinks of us as pop band, not just a fringe act.
M: Let's talk about some of the new songs. Who is Stacy's mom?
A: That's just about the point in your life when you're discovering the opposite sex. Well, for me it was the opposite sex. But it comes from when I was twelve and my best friend told me my grandmother was hot. I really didn't like that.
M: You guys walk a fine line between empathy and contempt. I'm thinking of "Red Dragon Tattoo" or , on the new record,"Hackensack."
A: Well, we don't want to make fun of people. "Red Dragon Tattoo" is just a funny story about a guy who wants to impress a girl by getting a tattoo.
M: But the guy in "Hackensack," waiting for some movie star to remember him, is pathetic.
A: I got totally busted by a reporter for the newspaper there, the Record of Hackensack. He said, "You just used the name Hackensack because it's easy to rhyme." It's so true.
M: How's your daughter?
A: She's pissed. She's in her stroller right now, throwing a tantrum.
M: Does she have a favorite toy yet?
A: Her hands. She's really into her hands. Mostly eating them.
M: How does she like your music?
A: Sometimes I play the piano with her. She likes that.
Josh Goldfein is a regular contributor to the Village Voice. His work has also appeared in LA Weekly, the Chicago Reader, openletters.net, and The New York Times Magazine.
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