Joewi Verhoeven goes reel to reel with producer Steve Barker

In our greatest instances of loneliness and isolation, the music our generation craves most is the indie wails of bands like Pavement, Silver Jews and Sonic Youth. We encounter a kindred spirit over the fuzz, the reverb and the sense that all it takes is a heartbreak and a nicotine-weary voice to create a seminal album of post-pop gems. Twenty year-old Joewi Verhoeven, the creative mastermind behind Arrows Made of Desire, has already gained a reputation as a man whose voice and guitar can carry us through the noisy drone of our low times, when we need to hear the present-day answer to the blues. Currently recording the follow-up to his landmark debut, Songs That Sell Fish, at the only analog studio in Beijing, Verhoeven’s recording process marks a moment in the maturation of one of the city’s most important young artists.

Born to a Dutch father and Chinese mother in the Netherlands and citing musical influences that range from ‘60s-style American blues to ‘90s post punk, Verhoeven began honing his talents on piano, guitar, bass and drums in order to compose his signature brand of genre-bending, DIY indie rock at the age of fifteen. After relocating to Beijing upon graduating high school, Verhoeven quickly attracted the attention of Matt Kagler, head of Tag Team Records.

“A couple of years ago Joewi, who was 18 or 19 years old at the time, handed me a demo entitled Songs That Sell Fish after a White2J show at What Bar. Several days later, I got around to giving the disc a spin, and before I got through the fourth song, I was on the phone with him offering a record deal,” Kagler fondly recalls.

Produced on an eight-track and engineered by Verhoeven with the help of Lonely China Day’s Deng Pei, Songs That Sell Fish featured Verhoeven on vocals, guitars, bass and percussion. On acoustic ballads such as “Misanthropy,” the young Verhoeven mused on solitude over surreal jazz guitar structures.

“I was very blues orientated,” Verhoeven admits, “but I felt that the dark undercurrent present in a lot of alternative rock music was missing in conventional blues.” The result of this search for higher meaning between two genres is an album that moves between the worlds of punk, jazz, blues and folk, strung together only by a sole guitar and Verhoeven’s infectious vocals.

On the highly anticipated sequel album, however, we can detect a marked shift of approach, not least in part because Verhoeven has matured both as an artist and as a man, discovering new influences to his style during the process.

“I discovered (Mississipi blues legend) Skip James after recording Songs That Sell Fish. He put folk and blues in a different light for me. His style of minimalistic, dark, atonal, acoustic guitar playing in combination with lyrics that are pro-violence and misogynistic inject his music with a certain intensity that still gives me the goose bumps every time I listen to it. Especially in my acoustic guitar playing, I borrowed a lot from his style and other bluesmen like Mississippi John Hurt & Lonnie Johnson.”

An attraction to the sonic engineering of the past also drew Verhoeven to the rich tone that only analog tape can bring to a record. With the help of Kagler, he found Beijing’s only analog studio, which is run by composer-producer Chen Yuli. Verhoeven soon found himself entering Chen’s studio with veteran dub producer-journalist Steve Barker.

“Barker is like my music dad. He has me listen to records to get ideas for the recordings, and I trust and respect his opinions on music ... I feel that Barker and I are on the same level when it comes to the vision that we have for the album,” Verhoeven enthuses. “And he has seen Mississippi John Hurt playing live for Christ’s sake!”

With the rise of his star in the Beijing indie rock scene, Verhoeven was also able to develop relationships with many of the city’s fellow musicians, which gave him the opportunity to explore a more collective approach to the new album, provisionally titled Songs That Sell Out.

“Playing with more musicians results in more energetic and colorful sounds and provides suggestions concerning the compositions,” Verhoeven explains. “For example, having Red Hand’s jazz drummer Xiao Dou on board influenced the way some songs sound. I could say goodbye to the electric drums I had been messing around with on the previous album. Playing and preparing most of the songs with a band results in having compositions that you could never get by doing everything by yourself. That’s the band feel that I hope to capture with this record.”

Though the newfound synergy between some of Beijing’s top names in music has made Songs That Sell Out one of next year’s most anticipated albums in Beijing, it is the words, voice and emotion of Verhoeven’s music that has created the band’s following.

Tag Team Records’ Matt Kagler is the first to sing his praises, gushing, “Joewi is so talented that I keep a mop and bucket around when we hang out just in case he explodes! By now, he and I have become pretty good friends, and I value that just as much as I do the business end of our relationship.” It’s that very intimacy to which the listener can also be privy during those dark and soulful moments when it could just be us, our headphones and a dose of Arrows Made of Desire.

by Rachel Simhon

Analog Alchemist: Producer Steve Barker

In addition to his present production duties, Steve Barker is host and co-creator of “On the Wire,” the longest running alternative music radio show in the UK. He is also a contributor to The Wire magazine (www.thewire.co.uk), where he writes about everything from dub to Beijing’s underground music scene.

CW: What are the key decisions that shape an album’s production when you go into the studio with any artist?
SB: It’s usually more questions than decisions. Though amongst the key considerations that may shape how the recording is approached is to say, “This is not Pet Sounds or Dark Side of the Moon. The main instrument of the singer is the voice, so let’s concentrate on the voice quality.”

CW: Which artists and producers have influenced you?
SB: The sound of 50’s rockabilly and Sam Phillips’ productions from Sun Studios in Memphis, Brazil’s great bossa nova and samba artists in the 70’s, pre-war country blues and gospel, King Tubby and Lee Perry.

CW: What do you enjoy most about being in the studio?
SB: Watching how the process of recording can change people’s ideas about themselves, about sound and what they are capable of.

CW: What do you see as the key differences between the production of your own music and that of another artist?
SB: Well as a non-musician my own ‘music’ is at present purely virtual, however conceptually I am working on developing some pieces based on multiple layers of bass drones. I will produce this with my son Max who is currently on maximum funk alert (www.myspace.com/onebigmobbeats).

CW: What excites you about the analog format?
SB: Most of the stuff I choose to listen to is old music. All the great artists of the 20th Century recorded in analog studios. They must have been doing something right.

CW: At what moment do you know that work is complete?
SB: When the money runs out! Seriously, over-production is one of the ills of the music business. Because the technology is there, mixing and post-production can go on forever.

CW: As a radio DJ, music writer and associate at On U Sound records, what do you contribute to another artist’s material?
SB: My approach is to look at the particular tunes I think have quality and can be developed with the signature of the artist intact. Joewi is a talented young guy. He has a fresh approach and is wide open to new ideas. At the same time, he loves old giants of country blues like Bling Willie McTell and Mississippi John Hurt, so despite the differences in our ages, we at least have that in common.