by Patrick Pilch (@pratprilch)
Spring Silver’s sophomore effort is nothing short of superb. I Could Get Used to This finds genre-hopping wunderkind K Nkaza at the center of a wildly collaborative, ambitiously cohesive, and incredibly vivid batch of new songs. Each track is focused and fine-tuned with enough depth to keep even the most active listeners engaged upon each spin. A perfectionist at heart, Nkaza’s already impressive compositions are dialed in with thoughtfulness and utmost sonic precision. The talent and effort is palpable across their latest record, as Spring Silver’s novel approach to synthesizing style and genre only breaks further ground in the world of bedroom producers operating far beyond their supposed physical boundaries.
It’s only a matter of time before bands begin to copy Spring Silver. On their latest record, Nkaza combines their interest in electronic music, nu-metal, indie rock and more while tapping into an era of music ripe for revisitation. I Could Get Used to This sounds like nothing you’ll hear this year, as Spring Silver continues to push their sound through distinct stylistic choices and lean, undeniable songwriting. Post-Trash was lucky enough to chat with Nkaza about community collaboration, emotions in songwriting, the year 2008 and more.
PT: You have released music as Captain Galactic and you were also in Aerial View, correct?
K Nkanza: I moved from South Dakota to Maryland when I was 14. Captain Galactic was a South Dakota thing. Aerial View started as an electronic project in Silver Spring, Maryland. It slowly morphed into a rock band which ended my sophomore year of college. From there I started the Spring Silver project.
PT: Were there any specific goals you wanted to accomplish with Spring Silver?
KN: For me, Spring Silver is me really getting to go for it on a solo project. I had always been avoidant of that because I liked the aesthetic of a rock band as a traditional thing. Then I was like, “There are so many people doing this as a solo thing.” So I try to explore that. I play most of the parts and I write all of them, more or less. I don’t always play the drums but my friends might play drums and add their own thing. But it’s me trying to control all the aspects as much as I can.
PT: One of my favorite parts of Spring Silver is the poetic, abstracted imagery, especially in the new songs. What does your writing process look like?
KN: I think there’s a lot of revision. Oftentimes I’m trying to come up with a metaphor for how I feel. Then I will take that to an extreme extent with detail and narrative. It depends on the thing. Sometimes it’s true stories of what has happened in my life and other times it’s very much not. It’s based off feeling and whatever imagery I pull out of it.
PT: Do your emotions have an influence on your melodies and riffs? Can you talk about that?
KN: I'm always trying to make something that sounds well produced and efficiently communicated, even if the musical phrase might be long. I just want to make sure it translates to the listener as cleanly as possible, even though that’s a subjective thing. For writing, it depends on what instrument I’m using. I mostly play guitar when I’m writing stuff. When I was making electronic music there would be a songwriting process through the digital audio workspace. It’s just kind of wherever it takes me. It’s however I’m feeling and wherever the guitar takes me. The enjoyment I get from playing guitar and being able to express how I feel through that is really nice. I don’t think the music and lyrics come together immediately. I’ll write lyrics–I guess they’re poems–independent of the song. Then I’ll mix and match from there. I’ll come up with something I emotionally resonate with on the guitar and then I’ll look at lyrics that fit the mood. That’s more or less how they’re coming together.
PT: On “My Feeling On the Matter,” you sing, “anger keeps me lucid.” How do you channel anger into your music? Is anger a driving emotion in your songwriting process?
KN: I think there’s all sorts of emotions that are drivers for the music I make. I think anger is one of them, but I think joy, sadness and confusion are things I definitely feel a need to express through my music. Oftentimes I’ll play guitar if I’m bored or for a practical sense, like if I’m having too much screen time. I’ll just have a compulsion to pick up the guitar to do something that’s not looking at a computer screen. Music is a big part of my life so it’s coming from a lot of different places, a lot of things will make me want to write a song. Anger could come through the music, but it could also come through the lyrics and me just trying to address how I feel, taking apart the reasoning behind it. That’s why I appreciate songs that aren’t vague. I feel like a lot of my lyrics are abstracted but they feel like they’re channeled in a certain way at something. They have enough detail that they’re expressing a specific thing as opposed to something that might feel angry, but you're not really willing to explore why. Maybe I’m putting myself on a pedestal too much. I feel like there are a lot of things to feel angry about and frustrated about. Political and personal things. I think music is a great conduit for that. Obviously the things going on with the pandemic and seeing how that has affected my family and seeing my family separate and fall apart a little bit because of it. Seeing that and seeing that with friendships and asking yourself “What are the different factors that made this happen?” and “Where do we go moving forward?” Those things have influenced the music that I’m making.
PT: Yea, these are abstracted songs but I feel there’s things to hold onto. I love the imagery in “Fetch.” I like the connection between the fetch of the ocean, the dog and the person being pulled by the rope, skimming across the ocean. It’s super vivid. Can you talk about the half-delayed vocals and the recording process in the beginning of the track?
KN: There’s a lot of overdubbing, especially with the group chanting. I would record myself chanting and I would record myself over and over to get that group vocal effect. I used that to a different effect on the album a lot. I spent a lot of time processing the vocals on the verses, especially the autotune section. I was trying to make sure it sounded perfect, basically. I wanted to see where I wanted to have these group vocals that were vocoded in addition to vocals that were autotuned. I was trying to find something that was very singular despite the fact that it was coming from a lot of processes. It took a long time but I’m happy with how it turned out.
PT: It sounds amazing. I find the addition of group vocals and chants make the record more immersive. It gives the record context and character and feels like you’re entering a space. How did you seek to integrate that into your music and what was the intended effect?
KN: For Spring Silver, it’s important for me to make it feel like it’s a full band - the idea that there are people coming together to create this energy in a space. I mean, it’s an illusion. Oftentimes it’ll be just me and someone in Boston or whatever. I feel through production and performance that’s something I’m trying to cultivate. When I was really little, I would listen a lot to the albums Good News for People Who Love Bad News and We Were Dead Before the Ship Sank by Modest Mouse. For better or for worse, Isaac Brock is doing a lot of ad-libs, which is kind of funny for rock music. There would be a lot of stuff in the back where you don’t even know what he’s saying. You’ll hear it a little on the 90s albums, but it’s especially present on those albums. I thought it was this interesting and raw and surreal thing where it adds a certain element to the music. It fills it up a bit, maybe too much at times. But it’s something that grabs you immediately. That’s the example I’m thinking of off the top of my head. That sort of detail is important.
PT: How do the collaborations happen? Do you have an idea for someone or do people approach you? A mix of things?
KN: Oftentimes I’ll have ideas for backup vocals. I’ll be like, “I want this person to sing it,” in order to flesh it out a little more so it’s not just me. I’ll send them lyrics and me singing the temporary track.
PT: Were there any specific collaborative moments that felt particularly good during the recording of I Could Get Used to This?
KN: My friend Daniel Sohn did string arrangements on three of the tracks. I might send him something I came up with and he’d be like “Can I go off the map instead of doing this?” And I was like “for sure.” I had heard what he had done on my friend Max Gowan’s album Last Companion. There’s a song called “Tracing” where he has this crazy orchestral arrangement. I listened to that and I was like “I would like him to be involved on my album.” He did some amazing stuff on the instrumental track “Light Tread” and two of the other tracks. It was really neat stuff. It all fits together. On “Light Tread,” I was doing the synths, beats and guitar. Daniel had the string arrangement. My friend Harlow Diggs came up with these chip-tune lines and it all came together really nicely. I’m very happy and grateful.
PT: Can you talk about the arrangements between Daniel Sohn and JB Fullbright on “Saymour’s Stop”? How much input did you have as far as these parts were written?
KN: I decided to have them both on that track. Some of it’s JB and some of it’s Daniel and the people he worked with. A quartet. I more or less wrote the cello parts on “Saymour’s Stop.” I would send midi tracks or wav of a fake cello in FL Studio. From there. The cello part is the same melody as the vocal line. JB recorded it with one of their friends and sent it back.
PT: I really admire your collaborative and communal approach to music. Can you talk about your experiences in the DMV DIY? Were there any rewarding moments?
KN: It’s always been fun to put on shows. In South Dakota there wasn’t much of a scene, maybe in Sioux Falls. But it was cool to be able to organize shows where people would come. It was sort of a party thing, but you felt kind of like a pro. You’d be like, “Oh, I’m going to a gig” and you’re in high school. Sometimes you’d end up someplace in Virginia playing with some grindcore bands. That might be fun but sometimes the genres don’t fit together. But that was the fun thing, there would be a crazy amount of bands on one bill all playing different stuff. It was kind of funny and a lot of the people who were there back in high school are still doing it and are still in the scene. It’s neat to have that as an experience with all of this. I’ve always been obsessed with music but to have that communal dimension is a neat thing.
PT: Where do Spring Silver songs start?
KN: I spend a lot of time coming up with riffs and coming up with songs. I’ll write lyrics or poems that I think could be lyrics. From there it’s me deciding what sort of riffs or lyrics I like and combining them. Cultivating a song from there. It’s coming from multiple places. I’m very detail oriented and there’s lots of editing going on throughout the time I’m working. You never know when the big edit might come. I’ll work on a song for a long time then I’ll get rid of a bridge and do something else. The songs evolve a lot, for the most part.
PT: There’s a couple of tracks on I Could Get Used to This that stray from the traditional “Spring Silver sound” like those songs “My Feelings on the Matter” and “Saymour’s Stop.” Can you talk about those?
KN: I enjoy a lot of different genres and aesthetics and I wanted to incorporate various styles into what I was doing to see where that would take me. Oftentimes when I try a shift in style, since it’s still me doing it, it’ll still end up sounding kind of different from when I originally started it, which is kind of neat. With “My Feelings on the Matter,” that was me drawing back to when I would produce electronic music as a teenager. I was trying to wholeheartedly make a song like that. I’m always listening to a large amount of music and a lot of different styles of music. I feel like if the song is something I’m willing to pursue, I’ll go for it. That was something I felt was really important and that I more or less could work it within the aesthetic and make that happen. It was also important to not restrict myself.
PT: Your music hits on this emotional level that is super intense and I have these emotional ties to the way things sound. This feels self-centered and I mean this in the nicest way possible, but your music reminds me of a certain period of my life, like 2008. Was there anyone’s music you were thinking of in particular or was this based on your past experiences making electronic music as a teenager?
KN: Ed Banger Records stuff. Justice and Sebastian. As a teenager, I was listening to that stuff a lot. I was drawing from a lot of the music from around that time. Daft Punk. I was really into The Kooks and Arctic Monkeys. That was their primetime, in 2008. I just really like the production sound. I feel I get a lot of comparisons to the mid-90s and mid-2000s and that music is the stuff I grew up listening to. I wanted to create that production sound because I’m very fond of it.
PT: It really strikes a chord. You’re a visual artist as well - what have you been working on?
KN: I’ve been painting a lot. Acrylic. I’ll post some on Instagram at some point.
PT: Oh right, did you do the single art to “Set Up A Camera”?
KN: Yes. I also did the pen and sharpie artwork for Dark Matters, the Maneka album. I would very much like to continue. If people are looking for album covers, I will do those.
PT: You’ve changed the album art to The Natural World a couple times. Can you talk about your decision behind this? And is The Natural World your Life of Pablo?
KN: I always think about that, I’m like, “Oh god it’s like Life of Pablo but no one cares!”
PT: I care! I’ve been paying attention!
KN: [laughs] You care. Pat cares.
PT: There’s been maybe two or three reworks?
KN: There’s been three. I like them all but I like the last one the most because I feel it expresses a lot more of the aesthetic I was going for, which is kind of all over the place. My main thing with album covers is I’m looking to make something really eye grabbing and really colorful, which is funny because the new album cover is subdued tones. The Natural World wasn’t an album that was exploding in popularity so if I changed anything most people would be like “that’s it, that’s the cover.” If I was on a Kanye level of fame, I’d maybe have to wait for a deluxe edition to do that. It was the beginning of the pandemic when I made the second one, so I didn’t have much else to do. This album cover I probably wouldn’t change. If there was some sort of deluxe edition, I’d have trouble thinking of a better album cover for I Could Get Used to This. I like the final edition of The Natural World. If vinyl allows it maybe I’ll do it with various versions of the cover.