Introduce yourself...

This is Jake from The Wind-Ups. We’re based out of a college town in Northern California called Chico. I play guitar and front live, but played/recorded everything on the record itself.

Do you prefer the recording process or performing live?

I’ll always live to perform, but since the start of Covid I’ve become far more endeared to recording than ever before. I spent so much time with my TASCAM 388 that I ultimately fell in love with the entire process. I talk about that machine like it’s a person, but hey, it’s my friend. To be honest, recording had always been something of an anxious-but-necessary chore, if that makes any sense. Now

I actively look forward to it at all times. Granted I’m doing this out of my house on my own time, but that’s part of the beauty.

What would be a dream collaboration?

Wow. Let’s go with a person currently living on this planet. And having thought about it for a moment here, I think I’d choose a duet of any kind with Shannon Shaw. Something mid-tempo and dreamy perhaps. Or maybe something that sounds like “Diana” by Paul Anka, hahaha. I’ve held Shannon in high regard for a long time now.

Describe a favourite album.

Lately I’ve been especially into early electronic soundscape and compositional stuff, from the ‘50s and ‘60s. I recently got a nice repress of the Forbidden Planet soundtrack by Louis and Bebe Barron, and it’s fantastic. I also just got another four-LP set of Daphne Oram’s collected works. That’s an avenue of listening I got more and more into during early Covid, especially when I was able to start experimenting with my own tape delay and theremin.

What’s a favourite book or film?

I’m a big nonfiction reader. Not sure I have a single favorite, but I finished a good one a couple months ago called The Riddle of the Labyrinth, which is the story of the decipherment of Linear B. I’m currently picking away at like four others...definitely a picker. As for film, man there’s too many to choose from. But piggybacking on the book thing, I recently took a detour and read Solaris by Stanislaw Lem, which is the book the seminal Russian sci-fi film is based off. I’d been a huge fan of the film for years, and the book is equally amazing. I’d love to spend more time watching old Russian and Eastern Bloc films. The allegory is always top notch.

What's your favourite local haunt?

Well I’ve worked as a promoter at a rock ‘n’ roll dive bar called Duffy’s for a decade. And that includes being six years sober now, which says something about how I feel for the place. But since I don’t drink, I actually haunt coffeeshops in my free time. If you give me a couch and free refills, there’s a good chance I may never leave.

What's your strangest experience while performing live?

I’ll go with the time Terry Malts played to nobody at a nice club in Omaha. We’d come to realize the day of the show that there was no event page, no flyer and no social media of any kind, despite the fact that it was a legit venue and we had a guarantee. When we got there, we also found out

there weren’t any other bands and the promoter was M.IA. So basically the booking had simply been abandoned, aside from the staff having it on their calendar (they were very friendly). The live room was actually walled off from the bar itself, so when “showtime” came, we went in there, played our full set to literally nobody, got paid, and went along our merry way. We even got meal buyouts. Lol.

If you weren’t playing music in Chico, where would you be ?

That’s something I think about every single day, though I don’t seriously consider moving anymore. There’s a give and a take to living anywhere; whole different sets of pros and cons. I’ve never been able to figure out exactly where I would “move” to, although I grew up in the Bay Area, and it still feels kinda like home in its own way. For the most part I’m content to travel, tour, and fantasize about living

in the places I visit. Like Japan. Man, living in Japan would be special.

Any sage advice for young musicians?

Yeah, don’t get wasted all the time. It seems cool when you’re caught up in it, but it’s actually the exact opposite. It’s so much cooler to live life as your best self.

Pleased To Meet Me: Jake Sprecher of The Wind Ups (Beehive/ Terry Malts/ Smokescreens)