Interview: Radiator King dances to the edge of the world

Lines have been drawn in the sand. The socio-political upheaval has reached a fevered pitch, and sides are being chosen. The most recent tragedy surrounding immigration, where families were ripped apart at the border, tears soaking the earth’s parched surface, has struck a harrowing marker in American history. With deceitful prose painting an altogether hateful and untruthful portrait of another culture, tensions and anger and anguish have never been so heightened, spilling over into every facet of life in America. Unexpectedly, blues-rocker Radiator King (real name Adam Silvestri), born in Boston and now residing in Brooklyn, captures time-spun humanity with an unreleased, unnamed new song, which was inspired by a trip out to Ellis Island. “I’ve lived in New York for awhile now, and I never once went to Ellis Island,” he tells B-Sides & Badlands, “and I really love history. I took the ferry out there one day, and I didn’t really choose to necessarily write about immigrants. I just wanted to go there, because when you go into certain places, there’s an aura there, an energy.

The song, anchoring a new batch of tunes, sees Silvestri walking a mile in another man’s tattered and torn shoes. “I just went there with a notebook and walked around and sort of wrote a bunch of stuff. I turned that into a song, and when I look back on it, it’s really a song that sort of narrates an immigrant and his experiences and how hard that must have been, and still is, for people that know no one in the country and come here,” he describes of the song. Ellis Island is both grand and sorrowful, possessing the spirits of millions of immigrants who came to this country from 1892 until 1954. It served as a prominent inspection station on the east coast and not only embodies this country’s very backbone but the present and what the future could be.

Elsewhere, in what is assumed to be a new record, the follow-up to 2017’s barnstorming A Hollow Triumph After All, the singer-songwriter tires his knuckles with songs inspired by Søren Kierkegaard’s 1843 philosophical work called Fear & Trembling, life’s generally cyclical tick and personal relationships. “I think that, on a personal level, new things are beginning in my life, and things that have passed have just ended. I’m digesting that, and I think, like any songwriter, you start to write about those experiences as you’re digesting them,” he says.

Despite the headlines splashed with tortured children in cages and Trump’s garbled charge for a wall, Silvestri had very little reservation in writing such a profound and timely song. In fact, it was bred out of his duty as a songwriter. “I don’t let anything like that affect my writing. I don’t let what’s going on deter me from writing or not writing a song. If I think that it should be written, I write it. That’s a songwriter’s job,” he speaks, sharply and eloquently. That bluntness has been evidenced in much of his work, confirmed in such piercing compositions as “The Guns You Pawned,” “ChristmasEve,” “Murray’s Hurried Blues” and “Too Mean to Die” and further cemented in his present state. “If they feel something and it seems important and worth writing, then, you should do that. You shouldn’t be scared of how it might be interpreted or taken by other people.”

Silverestri’s spirit is completely bewitching and magnetic, refreshing attributes in 2018, when so many are fearful for saying the wrong things and standing for what they believe in. “For that song, in particular, I think that the current situation with immigrants makes the song relevant. When you’re a songwriter, you look for things in life, whether it be on a personal level, historically or politically. Things happen in cycles in the world. You look for the timeless aspects of things. There are some old blues songs that when you hear them, they are still very relevant today,” he explains.

“The chorus of the song says, ‘There’s no such thing as home in this world.” I’ve never been an immigrant. I don’t know what that situation is like, but I was inspired to write that line by being there. If I was really to dissect that, I could see how that line applies to my own life, as well. You know, being on the road and not really feeling like there’s a home back back here for me, whether it’s with a girl or with a family. You start to see these connections to things that you’ve written that are not just so specific to what you thought they were. The landscape of immigration in this country, that’s something that’s heavy and happening right now, but that didn’t play into my role or why I would not write that type of song.”

Below, Silvestri reflects upon A Hollow Triumph After All and discusses sleeping on dirty floors, cycles of his life and pairing tribal beats with discerning stories.

How would you reflect on your last studio album, 2017’s A Hollow Triumph After All, now, especially as you’ve been performing it out so much?

It’s funny you should ask that. I’ve been actually thinking about this a lot lately, because I’ve been in the studio. We just finished up recording new music, and it’s probably the first time that I’ve really been able to step outside of the experience we went through with that album reflect upon it ⎯⎯ in what worked, what didn’t work, what I sought to do, what I had accomplished. I’ve been able to sort of look at it from a distance. I’d say that one of the things that was unique about that album for me was that it was kind of the first time I had tried to do it. I was really inspired by stuff that was sort of outside my typical listening pool. One thing I became really attracted to during the making of that album was the New Orleans funeral procession. It’s a celebration, but yet there’s something somber about it. I felt like a lot of those songs I was writing had that ideology behind it, where something was neither happy nor sad. It was something that hit you very hard and strong, and that comes in many different ways.

That was the feeling I was after with the majority of these songs. So, it was the first time for me that I sort of really embraced a different sound. I grew up on punk-rock and hardcore music and also classic rock and all of this sort of American music ⎯⎯ but never that type of American music where it starts to bleed into jazz and genres like that. I’m just not really my wheelhouse. That was the first time I had really incorporated that into an album, and I’m very proud of that. I didn’t do that this time around. I’m very proud that I was able to do that, and it grew my skills. You find musicians that can understand what you’re doing, and you choose them wisely. Being here in New York City, you’re able to do that.

As far as playing the songs live, after I make an album, I don’t really listen to it. I think a lot of artists are that way. You spend so much time in the mixing stage and the writing stage and recording stage. I’m listening to these songs, and you just sort of step away and you move on to the next thing. I’ve been on tour for a long time, basically the past year and a half playing these songs. So, they’ve evolved into different things. They sound different now. I’m at the stage right now mixing these new songs, and so I want to refer to the last album just to see what the strong points maybe were missing in the mixing, just as far as tonality goes. So, I referred back to the last album, and it was nice to just drive in the van the other day and just listen to those songs and be far enough removed that I can just appreciate it but also reflect on the fact of how different songs evolve. I think you use them for your own purposes and your own needs at the time, whether it’s a song that you wrote or songs someone else has written. So, it was really cool to just sit there and think about how we have adapted the songs since then. It was a natural thing. It wasn’t like we said, “Hey, let’s play it this way and with this tempo.” It wasn’t like that. It was just how we perceive the songs now.

What would you say were the weaknesses of that album, and how did you fine tune those aspects for the new music?

How Radiator King sort of operates is that there’s a pool of musicians that I draw from; their friends of mine and people that I have played with all throughout my years of playing music from when I was a young kid. So, the line is always changing depending on the songs that are being recorded and who’s available, who’s not available, who’s on tour, who’s not on tour and who’s down and ready to go. I have to work with different people, and so, there becomes a huge burden on my lap when it comes to the recording and figuring out who conductor is in all of this. There’ll be a producer involved and an engineer, and they help you with this. But at some point, you need to take the bull by the horns and figure out what you want. After all, it’s your music and that’s the song you wrote. What you want it to sound like, you’re the master of that in the end. You’re always in a state of uncovering what it is you’re trying to do and how to get there. That’s how you become a veteran musician. With that process, there were variables involved that I hadn’t recognized yet. In the mixing stage, in particular, I didn’t know enough about what you can do in mixing. I didn’t know enough about the recording process itself.

Those are tools within themselves, mixing and recording, where you can even further drive home the ideas and the sound that you’re trying to do. Utilizing the studio in that way is definitely a weakness that I’ve gotten better at, but it’s specifically with decision-making. With anyone that is a writer or anyone that’s going into studio, the worst thing that you can possibly have is self-doubt. Once self-doubt is involved, it’s very hard to make decisions. When you’re recording, the best thing that you can possibly do is make decisions, commit to them and move on. Anyone who records music and does it successfully where they can look back at something that stands the test of time, it’s people who can make decisions, live by it and move on. With the process of that album, I would say at the very end there in mixing, there were almost too many options. We were losing sight of what we had been trying to make, which is something that was very instinctual and organic. Once you start second guessing your decision, that’s the opposite of instinctual.

This time around we went to 24-track tape. We kept it very simple. We basically recorded how the song sounded. We knew in the recording process what we wanted to do, and we made it sound like that going onto the tape. So, there was really not much to do. We kept it very short. And that was that.

In a recent premiere that you did with PopMatters, in talking about the “So Long (Charlie)” music video, you spoke about how life always comes in cycles. What would you say have been the cycles of your life so far?

I’d say in a general sense and a global sense that things begin and things end. It happens on a small scale and a big scale. There’s both a sadness and happiness that goes along with these parts and different cycles. You meet a girl. Yu spend a lot of time together and really enjoying each other’s company. These are very happy moments. Usually, there’s a cycle that maybe it will end, and then, it’s the ending of something, and it’s time for you to go your separate ways. Then, there’s a mourning time, and you do the process again. People’s lives are like this, too. They come into your life. You have a relationship with someone, and then, maybe you don’t see them again for five years or maybe that person passes away. So, there’s all these cycles. I think that when I started to look at my own life, I started to understand that there are cycles and not to resist them.

I think people start to run into problems when they can see a cycle and the ending of something, but they can’t deal with it because it’s too painful, and they resist it. Or if they see a new beginning happening, sometimes maybe it’s going to make their life more turbulent, and so, they shy away from that new beginning because they don’t want to face it. I think once you start to do that in life, when you start to resist the natural cycle of things, you start to have a lot of problems. You start to see that the universe is not working in your favor, but when you can be at peace with those cycles and embrace them, you can have the bravery to understand when something is ending and have hope in the beginning of something in the future, whatever it may be. That’s kind of what I was alluding to. I’ve noticed with my life, I have to have faith in the universe and that these cycles will continue in. New relationships will come, and some things will die and new things will begin.

Radiator King started back in 2011. What has been your evolution since then?

Oh man. It’s been quite a journey. I’ll tell you that. This stuff is at the foundation of Radiator King, and I would say that even exists prior to 2011 when I played in other bands is that motivation to get up there. It’s you trying to do what those musicians did for you when you were a kid growing up. You saw them up there, and maybe they said something or played a song and it stayed with you for that whole week at school, and you were kept on thinking about it. That never leaves you. That’s the foundation of everything that I do when I go on tour. As far as it evolving, well, sometimes, I play alone, and sometimes, I play with a band. When you play alone, it’s a much different experience. It has its pros and cons, but you’re up there by yourself.

You have to have a lot of confidence and be able to look out at those people and speak to them in a way that you’re not scared. You’re not scared of what they think. You’re not second guessing yourself or your music. You’re at a place where you can stay up there confident that you deserve to be showing your music to these new people and in a city that you’ve never been. That’s hard to genuinely feel that way. I don’t think I’m quite there. I can tell you that today, as opposed to back in 2011, I’m much more secure in who I am. I’m a musician. I’m here to play music for you, and maybe you’ll find some worth in it. If people don’t like it, that’s OK. There’s other things that they can do, but I’m not going to be scared about it. I’m not going to let it affect me as a performer.

You were tweeting quite recently from the beach, and you were reflecting upon how touring life brings about a lot of sleeping on the floor and not showering. What have been some of your most trying times out on the road?

I think for any musician, a large part of your career can be struggle. You do it in, and you have to put up with these conditions that are not easy. I always think back to what someone had told me a long time ago when I was really stressed out and was going through some bad times. They said to me, “You know, if it was easy, everyone would do this.” I never forgot about that. That was an “aha” moment for me. The solo tour stuff can be awfully difficult. Whereas when you’re with band, you might have a couple bad shows where not a lot of people come, and you can hang with your friends, and you don’t feel alone. But there’s times when I just go out by myself, like I’m completely alone. I can remember I did a tour once where I did three weeks with the band down east coast, and then they flew back home. I continued around the rest of the country by myself in a van, and I was sleeping in the back of the van, too. There was a mattress back there and a bunk I had built in. That’s a long time to spend by yourself. I would meet people, but once you get outside the east coast, I know so few people who I consider to be close. So, you become a stranger. You start to piggyback some of these shows where not a lot of people are there, and you’re far away from home. I usually go to a walmart parking lot when I’m sleeping in the van, because they allow you to sleep there overnight. Sometimes, you can get in your own head and start to overthink things. You ask yourself, “What am I doing? Am I really getting further? Is this really something I can continue to do the rest of my life?”

You start to doubt what it is that you’re doing, and you forget about the good times. If you piggyback enough of those together, it can get pretty dark. But as far as sleeping on floors and stuff, we don’t get hotels and stuff when I go out with the band. So, I mean, we’ll stay in some pretty dirty places. But it’s something we kind of laugh about. It’s not something that’s so horrific. I’m a pretty neat person when I’m home, but I can tolerate some pretty poor conditions on the road. [laughs] I’ve come to the conclusion that you’re doing it for a reason. People are really great to you when you go to these different places. So, every once in awhile, you get strangers to do these sorts of nice things, and it’s just so meaningful and helpful. The times when it’s tough, when you’re sleeping on floors, and you smell like, crap because you haven’t showered, you just have to be able to know it’s not for nothing. It’s part of the journey, and you have to embrace it and enjoy it to some extent.

Do you often write about some of your encounters on the road?

I do it a lot, and it may not be so specific in my songs, though. It’s more like glimpses of things and maybe references to certain situations and ideas. I think if it’s not so literal about an event or something from the road, it’s definitely inspiration from the road. You know, you go to West Virginia or Detroit, all these different cities and different places in the country. You go to San Diego, San Francisco, Washington, and all these people live in different ways and you get to meet them. You get a little glimpse into their lives. Maybe you sleep at their house and you meet their dogs and their friends. And ou get inspired by the way different people live, and you start to realize that there’s a lot of damn good people living in this country. It’s uplifting. I think a lot of the people I meet and a lot of the situations I see make their way into my music one way or another.

In terms of this new music that you’re working on, are you drawing from any specific influences?

You’re always exploring new sounds. I was really interested in tribal drumming. I usually start out, and I write the songs and make the demos. I’ll play all the instruments, and then, I’ll bring them to a band or the band that I’ll be recording with. They adapt what I’ve written into real drum parts and bass parts that can be used, and we experiment with that. But I think for a good amount of these songs, I wrote the beats first. I have a couple of hand drums and floor toms, and I’ve been really drawn to these tribal beats. Tinariwen is a great example of a band that has these tribal beats going on. I’m always drawn to them. There’s something so rhythmically interesting about that. So, I did a lot of writing on the drums first and then kind of layering my ideas on top of that. I’m always trying to like change up your process a little bit. One thing I did with these songs, I would go to the library a lot and just stay there for a couple of hours and just write. Writing and not having a guitar in my hands is something I usually don’t do. But there are a couple of songs on this one that I did do that with. I just went to the library and read a couple of books, and then, just kinda wrote for hours straight. I started to pull apart different lyrics and poems I’d written into and put them to the music I’d done.

How do you marry beats with lyrics?

That requires great sensitivity. [laughs] It’s very hard. That’s the mysticism of songwriting. Even if you have a beautiful melody or a guitar part and whatnot, what is this? What am I supposed to say about this song? What does it require? What is the story being told? Who are the characters? Is this about me? What’s so beautiful about this in the real world? You start to ask yourself these questions, and I think this is where it requires patience and persistence. You can’t just think that if it doesn’t come to you in the first few hours, that’s it. It’s not going to happen, and you start to stress out about it. You realize that you’re onto it. You’re figuring out if you’re on the path. You’re a detective on drums. Any sort of a clue that you can take, you cherish. That’s a golden clue. Maybe I wrote one of these beats or a guitar part. Then, I’m just kind of singing gibberish along with it, and all of a sudden I say a phrase. You start to wonder what that means.You have to pay attention to these things. You have to pay attention and be very sensitive to everything that’s going on in the song and not overthink it. Let your own mind decide where it should go, and don’t try not to get in the way too much. That’s the hardest part is to not get in the way of letting your mind write the song. Sometimes, it might take a year for that song to be written. Other times, it might take 10 minutes.

Follow Radiator King on his socials: Twitter | Facebook | Instagram | Website