Seth Kauffman - Floating Action Interview
Seth Kauffman creates Floating Action albums; writes, produces, engineers, plays all the instruments. Purposefully dodgesworldly success in pursuit of musical purity- has released 8 albums since 2005. Currently works in the studio and tours with 'dudes who get it' like Jim James, & Dan Auerbach. Has played on albums by Lana Del Rey, Jim James, Ray Lamontagne and Angel Olsen. In this interview we explore Kauffman’s youth growing up in North Carolina on classical music, listening to the likes of Sam Cooke and Robert Johnson, participating in groups in college, forming Floating Action and his most recent project, Dream Sitch, with Michael Nay of Cotton Jones.
Tell me about growing up in Black Mountain, NC. What was your childhood like? When did you first begin to fall in love with music? Was music something that was relevant around your household growing up? Do you have any siblings?
I actually grew up 2.5 hours east of Black Mtn, in Greensboro, NC. I was the youngest of three, with two older sisters. My mom forced us all to take lessons (Suzuki method), me on violin, and my sisters on cello, and viola. So we grew up playing recitals etc, then by high school we all played in the Greensboro Youth Symphony. Classical music was all we were allowed to hear growing up. This was that era in the 80's when the church viewed all 'secular' music as Satanic. (Remember that Christian documentary called Hells Bells? About how all rock music was Satanic. We all laughed at that back then, and knew it was bogus. But I often think back on that now, how all those accused bands are clearly not Satanic and like, shouldn't the people who made that movie, issue an apology? 'Hey sorry we accused you of something you're not, and were actively trying to ruin your career haha funny stuff indeed!). Age 16 was roughly when my mom finally let me quit violin lessons and the Youth Symphony. Age 15 was when I first picked up a crappy old acoustic guitar, and started trying to play stuff by The Drifters, Sam Cooke, and early Rolling Stones. So that eureka moment was definitely around that time, when you realize you can play whatever, on a guitar, or any instrument for that matter.
What would you and your friends do for fun growing up? Who were some of your earliest influences in your more formative years? When and where did you see your very first concert and when did you realize you wanted to spend your life pursuing music?
I lived out on the country growing up, but in a neighborhood. That was just out in the country. So no stores, or anything to walk, or bike to. For fun, we did your standard stuff, big wheels, rode bikes around in circles for hours, played in creeks, in the woods. More in the middle school era, my next door neighbor Derek and I used a camcorder, and made all these ridiculously silly videos starring this ond Bert puppet (like Bert & Ernie from Sesame Street). We would also snowboard on this steep grass dam hill nearby, and video ourselves eating serious shit. We even made fake ski slope signs for the different grass 'slopes', called things like 'Satan's Intake Manifold', and 'Ovaltine'. My earliest influences, this was back in the era where you would cassette tape a song you liked off live radio. I had a tape like that with The Drifters 'Under The Boardwalk', Sam Cooke 'Chain Gang', and The Rolling Stones 'The Last Time' (how's that for specifics?;). That was, and still is, my SHIT! I think also by the time I was in high school, my parents (and the world in general) had eased up on the 'satanic panic' phenomenon, and being the youngest of three, my parents slacked up a little, and oldies became acceptable. My dad had Greatest Hits of Bob Dylan and Beatles Sgt. Pepper vinyl semi-hidden. I remember pulling them out in high school (at that time, vinyl was super uncool) and being blown away by those records. I remember hearing Kenny Buttrey's brush drums on 'Just Like A Woman', and being like 'oh ok, so this is how it is...' It was also an interesting era, because there was no internet. So if music wasn't being played on the local classic rock station, you just were not aware of it!
I remember going to high school and talking to your friends like 'have you guys heard of this Beatles album called Sgt. Peppers?', and nobody had, because it wasn't Van Halen.., There'd be like one other person who was like 'yeah, i found it on my dad's vinyl'. Or also, there's always that one cool guy in a higher grade, who knows all the good shit. In my case, there was a dude named Jamie Shaver, you'd be like 'do you know that song 'Honky Tonk Women' by The Rolling Stones?' And he'd be like 'yeah, but have you heard of CCR?! and Led Zeppelin?!' But yeah, I think me playing along with all that Sam Cooke and Robert Johnson, etc. in high school (and nobody else I knew liked that stuff, so it felt like my own personal world) was probably the moment when I knew pursuing music was what I had to do. Once you kind of hit that thing, that they hit, even if it's just you alone in your bedroom playing along with it, it's all over. Also another huge huge random moment was, summer after graduating high school, at a lake house with some dudes, and one guy brought a cd of Rolling Stones 'Let it Bleed', which I'd never heard of at that point. I remember running back into the house to grab a towel, or whatever, and it caught my eye. Nobody else around, I hit play, and it floored me, especially 'country honk', then 'love in vain'... Then the song 'let it bleed' comes after that... Oh man, that was IT! My first concert… I could be wrong about this, but - it was either Bob Dylan co-bill with Paul Simon (right before Time Out of Mind?), or Buddy Guy (maybe Santana was on that bill to?) at Carowinds amusement park.
Did you participate in any groups prior to Floating Action?
Oh yeah, tons of hilarious, (but awesome) groups back in the day, haha. In college, at the beginning of the Dave Matthews craze, a guy was starting a band like that, and heard I played violin. So actually this guy (Chris Sorenson) is kind of responsible for getting me into the music career world. His band was called Brown Root Seed Co., Classic mid 90's Asheville, NC vibes. He, and I would also do this weekly background music gig at a bar in Asheville, where I would just wing it playing slide acoustic guitar, mandolin, dulcimer, violin, harmonica, whatever. Also around this time, I was recording and playing tons of music, with my bestie Bryan Cates. His dad was the pastor of a small church in Greensboro, NC, that had this old, unused original wing of the building, that was basically a dungeon, and Bryan had unlimited access to it. So we had a 4-track cassette recorder set up, and he is so incredibly prolific a songwriter, we would just spend hours and hours, all night, making stuff up and recording it. I also played drums (2001-2003ish) for The Blue Rags frontman Abe Reid (look him up!). Talk about the school of hard knocks for gigging... I'd make $20 per night, only playing a few nights a week. I was so broke, but knew to focus on really playing music, I couldn't be sidetracked by a 9-5 job. That was the era where every month to pay rent, you have to supplement by selling a crucial piece of music gear, that you know you should never ever part with, but have to. After Abe Reid, I had a band with my lifetime best friend Bryan Cates, called The Choosy Beggars. It was like Motown, Soul, Americana-ish, but we were like 6 years ahead of our time, nobody was doing that then, especially in the southeast United States, so we never really had a chance.
Can you tell me about this project and how the group came about? How did you initially meet your bandmates and what led to the decision to first form this group, mainly as a solo proj.? When and where did you play your very first gig as FA and what was that experience like for you?
Floating Action came about after Choosy Beggars fizzled out, around 2004, I messed around with making my own stuff up, and playing all the instruments. Not knowing what I was doing AT ALL, (still don't) but therein lies the fun and discovery. I made an album called 'Ting', just for fun, was too embarrassed to ever try to make it be a real band, or anything. But I played it for a few friends, and they freaked out. Then I sent it to this guy Bruce Bromberg at Hightone Records, and he loved it, and signed me to that label. So I was kind of forced to form a band and start playing out. I think the first ever Floating Action gig (at that time I just called it Seth Kauffman) was a house party in West Asheville, put together by another Asheville band called Menage, and the band was myself, Tyler Ramsey, and Evan Martin. I met Tyler through a mutual friend Thad Cockrell, who recommended we should play music together. Then Evan was a friend of Menage, and they recommended he'd be a good person to play drums. I don't remember much about that gig as far as what the experience meant, but more just, 'oh wow, we actually pulled off playing these songs I made up, and never thought anyone would hear, and people didn't throw anything at us!'
You released your first album back in ‘09. Can you tell me about writing and recording that record? How did the deal with Park The Van Records come about? When and where did recording begin and what was the overall vision for this record? What did you guys ultimately want to explore and express with this material with it being your debut?
I had made a record called 'Research' before that self titled, and Park The Vans loved it and released it digitally. So the self titled one I made next, at home, at that time my wife, and I lived in this cool 1927 house with tall ceilings. I was solely playing music then, and no kids, a lot of debt, so I had all the time in the world to just make stuff up and try stuff. I recorded it into the 1/8" sound card input of my dying desktop computer (actually the last track 'one more time' on Research, you can hear me smashing the computer monitor against the wall in real time, that was the trick to getting the monitor to come back on). Then Evan, and Michael Libramento, and I (that I would say is the original core FA lineup) drove to Philly to Dr. Dog's then studio, to have Bill Moriarty mix it. I started recording that album in 2007-8, with no overall vision, just trying to capture some exotic grooves, and just exploring and trying things that most studio experiences at that time would shoot down.
You released your Park The Van follow up “Desert Etiquette” in 2011. How did you want to approach this record that differs from the previous work?
Still no real plan, but I think PTV had crumbled, so I just made Desert Etiquette as if it were never going to be released or heard. Actually when I started out to record it, I was like 'maybe I should try recording in this super expensive nice studio in Asheville, kick it up a notch.' So night one, the vintage console I wanted to use, kind of the main reason for recording there, the studio was like 'oh it actually doesn't work right now.' Then I recorded 'The Balance' there through some other expensive vintage gear, and compared it to the version I'd recorded on my busted crappy gear at home. I was sweating bullets, because I couldn't tell a difference, yet was about to pay $1,000 (that I didn't have) per day. I called my trusted engineer friend Brian Landrum in the midnight hour, to come over, and take a listen, to see if he thought it was worth it. It was a heavy moment; us both standing there listening, then he shook his head, and was like, 'It doesn't sound any better here.' Big life lessons! Brian lent me a Royer ribbon mic, and I went back home and wrote, and recorded Desert Etiquette very quickly, under two weeks. Then my old pal Bill Reynolds, and I mixed it very quickly on an old 16 channel Trident console. Had it mastered, then quasi-self released it, then PTV came back to life for a minute, and wanted to release it digitally, and on cd. So there was never any real 'label plan', to tour, or plan of any sort.
How did you eventually meet Mike Dixon over at PIAPTK/Soild Gold? What were some of your most fondest memories of those early FA days and do you have a record(s) that speaks to you the most?
I met Mike through my friend Dimitri Manos (Golden Boots, Dr. Dog). Mike made a lathe cut single of me covering a Blake Mills song, before Blake was huge, the idea was that Blake would cover a FA song for the other side, but he was like 'nah'. Then Mike gradually started figuring out how to outsource and release small pressings of FA full albums, to where you could actually break even, even make $100, what a concept! All the fond FA memories involve laughing at Neil Hamburger crank calls while on long drives in the van. Then we later discovered Longmont Potion Castle, and that carried us a good 20,000 miles. The great memories are usually laughing about how broke we were, driving thousands of miles to play some shitty bar, where you got a free pizza (this is a true story) when you play there. We were so so so broke, and had been talking up this free pizza for days. We get there, and are like 'yes, could we get our band pizza now please?' And the bartender was like, 'well do you have a poster up on our bulletin board?' Our label was supposed to send posters out, so we all slowly walk ten feet over to that bulletin board, scanning, no poster. We're like 'no, there's no poster.' The bartender says 'oooh, sorry, our policy is, if you don't send a poster, you don't get the pizza.' Heartbreaking! We went next door to a Jimmy John's, the iceberg lettuce still had actual chunks of ice in it, spent our last few dollars on a sub. All my credit cards were maxed out, I had enough gas money to get us home (St. Louis to NC), and that was it. There was no choice, but to bail on the rest of that tour! We had already spent a week losing money at SXSW, and still had like two more weeks of touring after that, to all tiny bar shows that paid no money.
Outside of FA you’ve worked with some killer artists such as Ray Lamontagne, Jim James, Angel Olsen, Lana Del Rey as well Cotton Jones. What have been some of your experiences with collaborating with these folks? What have you been up to more recently? Is there anything else you would like to further share with the readers?
Hmmm... I'm not sure. It's definitely not about self. And more about knowing fully well that I have no idea what I'm doing, and don't take myself seriously. I just love getting deep into that feeling that they're feeling in their songs, when you can do that, it feels like you're unlocking some new galaxy. I just played on a Dylan LeBlanc record in Muscle Shoals, that was super fun. It was Dylan, his dad on guitar, me on bass, killer drummer Fred Eltringham, and this guy Moose on keys. We'd go next door, and eat bland salads at Sweet Peppers deli, it was so cool to experience that and see Dylan, and his dad work together. I also just made a new Dream Sitch album, that's myself, and Michael Nau.
