CYNIC's PAUL MASVIDAL: 'I Don't Think I'm Capable Of Writing Really Simple, Simple Music'

Christopher Porter of Washington Post Express recently conducted an interview with guitarist/vocalist Paul Masvidal of the reunited progressive rock/metal band CYNIC. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below.

Washington Post Express: Where did your interest in chromaticism come from?

Masvidal: I don't know. I think it's just listening to different kinds of music. It's just the nature of the ears absorbing a lot of jazz, and I got into a lot of chromaticism. A lot of people don't realize that Bach, if you swing the "Inventions" and a lot of of Bach stuff, it practically becomes bebop. It's super-chromatic, too. So, there's all that going on with my formative years and studies, and it turned into this weird hybrid when I started to write songs; hearing a lot of chromatic movement and different colors and chordal combinations, and it just made its way into this thing that turned into CYNIC. It was just a natural thing as the result of playing and listening to a lot of different things.

Washington Post Express: With your interest in jazz, why doesn't CYNIC doesn't improvise more?

Masvidal: [The songs are] written through improvisations that become concrete. A lot of the ideas are fluid, and then we just compose them and say it's now a finished idea. But CYNIC always has felt more compositional to me than a totally improv band. There's moments where it feels appropriate to do that; for example, a lot of guitar solos are extensions of harmonies and not a solo-solo. It's really about keeping this continuity and really establishing a piece rather than reinventing it every time. Perhaps more in the future when we get into more headline dates on a regular basis, we'll probably be experimenting more just because we'll be so bored playing the same songs over and over.

Washington Post Express: Do you ever get jazz folks at your shows, or is it mostly metal people?

Masvidal: [When touring as an opening act] I'm usually seeing at least one [FRANK] ZAPPA or MILES DAVIS or some kind of cool T-shirt at the shows. It just seems like they're like us, [people] who are into metal but also into all kinds of other stuff and appreciate what we do. But in terms of a purely CYNIC audience, it's really eclectic; it's kind of all over the map. Because we get younger pop-emo kids and we get these more sophisticated musicians and jazz guys and that whole scene, and then there's the straight-ahead, old-school metal guys.

Washington Post Express: What's the status of the other band you and Sean do, ÆON SPOKE?

Masvidal: After this tour, we're going to go back into the studio. We have a new record written and we're just going to go experiment and see what it sounds like. We know we're taking it into a different direction; we're just not sure what that is yet. But the songs are there, so I feel fine about having a really solid foundation. ... We're excited because it's going to be a really intense four weeks of ÆON stuff.

Washington Post Express: What are the main differences for you when writing for ÆON SPOKE versus CYNIC?

Masvidal: I think it's just a different head. I don't know how to explain it. There's also some big shifts happening with ÆON with the potential of introducing a female vocal, so it may go into an even further experimental direction. Really mellower and ambient, and a different kind of sophisticated space versus anything heavy or anything rock — leaving rock almost completely. That' where our heads are at now. And I think just harmonically and melodically, there's just things that are different: CYNIC feels almost futuristic and modern; ÆON is more Earthy or organic and pure — there's almost an innocence to it. I don't know how to explain it — childlike almost.

Washington Post Express: Would you say ÆON SPOKE's music is more simple?

Masvidal: I don't think I'm capable of writing really simple, simple music. Even if it appears simple, there's some deceptive quality that I'll screw it up with. ÆON is almost deceptively complex — like, less is more. It's like seeing a beautiful design and thinking, "Wow, that is so simple and meaningless, like a Rothko painting," but not realizing the approach to get there. That's kind of the approach with ÆON: making it appear super-simple, which is really hard to do.

Read the entire interview from Washington Post Express.

HeavyMetalSource.com has uploaded quality video footage (see below) of CYNIC's May 5, 2009 concert at Toad's Place in New Haven, Connecticut.