In 1999, Olivia Tremor Control’s record label filed for bankruptcy, leaving the Athens, Georgia-based musical ensemble to ponder its future. Bill Doss split to form The Sunshine Fix, while Will Cullen Hart was joined by much of his former band for new project, Circulatory System. Circulatory System's self-titled debut was released on their own label, Cloud Recordings, in August of 2001 to almost universal acclaim.

Less than two years later, Circulatory System has begun work on their sophomore release. I caught up with them before their recent show at Southpaw in Brooklyn to talk about their label, their creative process and their new record. John Fernandes brought me downstairs into the dressing room, where Pete Erchick and Will Cullen were working out a song. Pete was singing and playing guitar, accompanied by Will on bass. John tried to bum a smoke, but struck out -- I told him that I don’t smoke.

John Fernandes: That’s good. I'm trying to quit. This whole New York thing (as of March, smoking is prohibited in the city's bars, clubs and restaurants) is really helping me out. I don't mind smoking outside -- I like being out in the open air. The other thing that's great is that you always know where to go to bum a smoke.

Will and Pete put their guitars down and we settle into the interview.

Splendid: What made you start your own record label (Cloud Recordings)?

John Fernandes: It was kind of a practical decision in that we hadn't had the best experience. The Olivia Tremor Control records have been out of print since 1999. Flydaddy (their record label) filed for bankruptcy without having paid us for a lot of records, and then they wanted us to pay them money for the rights for them. We wanted not to get into that situation again, because if you pay for the recording of everything, no one can tell you that they own you. And there was the factor of maybe being able to do whatever we want -- kind of in the spirit of the artist run labels like Saturn, Sun-Ra's label.

Splendid: To have total ownership of everything.

John Fernandes: Yeah. Nothing against Flydaddy -- it's just business.

Splendid: So you guys own all the music now?

Will Hart: Well, Olivia Tremor Control does. Not us, as Cloud Recordings. It's Olivia Tremor Control.

John Fernandes: We're gonna put them out, just to make sure that they're out there. We're gonna try to put out extra tracks that were left off Black Foliage because of time constraints.

Splendid: How is the tour going? You've got, like, nine or ten shows with the Sea and Cake?

John Fernandes: Yeah, nine shows, and then some of our own.

Splendid: How did you get hooked up with them?

John Fernandes: John McEntire came to see us in Chicago last November and then was scanning around on the internet, and just ordered the CD on the internet and really liked it. His girlfriend really liked it. She said they listen to it all the time. They needed someone to do some of the East Coast shows, because Califone had supported them on the West Coast and then were gonna go off and do their own shows.

Splendid: It's kind of a contrast in styles; Circulatory System does more of an original show every night.

John Fernandes: We try to do a show that's maybe not the exact same versions of songs from the album. Sometimes it's just different arrangements.

Will Hart: Or more with the tempo.

John Fernandes: We'll change things around -- on record we'll do things one way, and then live we have the two drummers, strings, bass, organ and guitar.

Splendid: And you don't have the luxury of 50 tracks.

Will Hart: Exactly.

John Fernandes: We switch instruments a lot -- like, I'll switch between violin, clarinet, bass clarinet and bass. And Heather (McIntosh) plays cello and bass and Pete (Erchick) plays organ and bass, so we can keep the arrangements interesting even if it's not exactly the same sound every time.

Splendid: Do you work from the same set list every night?

Will Hart: Yeah, we have a few that we can kind of come in and out of.

John Fernandes: We'll probably play a little longer tonight because we've got the whole night.

Will Hart: Each time we go, we kind of decide what we're going to do for about two weeks, or whatever. There's a core.

John Fernandes: We try to stick with close to the same set list, too, because Philip Brown is just joining us for this tour. On the first East Coast tour we had Jeff (Mangum) playing drums, and for the West Coast tour we just did in November, Derek from Of Montreal was playing drums, but now he had to tour with a different band, so now we've got Philip... It's good to have Hannah Jones, who also plays drums; she can kind of tell him how things are situated, kind of keep him up to date. We only had a certain amount of time right before we left to show him. Philip is great about picking it up really fast -- he listened to the record a few times, and he knew it all before we even got together. The new ones he picked up fast.

Will Hart: It was easy to make the transition. We were all like, "oh, yeah, we can do this."

Splendid: How does a Circulatory System song come together? There's so much going on in the songs all the time...

John Fernandes: A lot of times he'll (Will) bring the song in with the chords and lyrics, or sometimes even a started version that he recorded at home, and then we'll start layering around that. Or we'll just start a song at a studio and do the basic tracks -- the drums, the bass, organ and whatnot -- and then he (Will) takes that mix to his house where he has the digital 16-track and just starts sculpting on it, layering piles of stuff, you know, just spending nights, just getting it perfectly right. Then we take what he does on the digital 16-track back over to the studio, synch it up to the track, the drums, and start adding horns and backing vocals and whatnot.

Pete Erchick: Everyone kind of hears it and plays off of that.

John Fernandes: Yeah, everyone has tapes of the basic tracks, so they use them to work on their arrangements, getting it tighter, and then we'll work some of it out on the road. We're playing a ton of new songs that we're gonna record when we get back home. The set's kind of evolving every night.

Will Hart: (Nodding in agreement) It's really cool. It's just happening differently from that (Circulatory System) to this. Before it was like bringing it and letting everybody sculpt it as we go. We've had fun doing that.

Splendid: So the next album has not been recorded yet?

John Fernandes: We've started on a few tracks,

Will Hart: Parts.

John Fernandes: So we still have a lot of the way to go.

Splendid: What was the last song in your set last night?

John Fernandes: "Come Away"?

Will Hart: "Come Away".

John Fernandes: That's what we're calling it for now, but it will probably have a different title.

Splendid: You really seemed to have that together.

Will Hart: Thanks.

John Fernandes: That's cool.

Will Hart: We've already recorded about three different versions of that -- we've played it in practice and added stuff over it. We're kinda seeing what exactly we want to do with that one.

Splendid: So, will there be an Inside Views-type album (the band's rearrangement of several songs from Circulatory System) after the new one, too?

Will Hart: We were just talking about that. Probably. Yeah, we've been talking about that.

John Fernandes: It's always fun to hear how things were put together and hear alternate versions.

Will Hart: Yeah, some of them are so different that I think...yeah.

John Fernandes: Will does what he considers a demo in his bedroom, but before he'll even give it to us...he's not content to just give it to us with just the guitar and vocal or whatever; he'll be like, "Aww, I just want to make it interesting for you" and pile all this stuff on there and we'll be like, "But this is great, too." We'll probably re-record it, but then there's this great home version of it that definitely should be used for something -- it's something that people should hear.

Splendid: Do most of the songs come from you, Will? Do you take them out and introduce them to the band, or does some of each song come out of jamming?

John Fernandes: Some of the arrangements come together, but he always brings songs in for Circulatory. With Olivia, he wrote some songs, Bill wrote songs,

Pete Erchick: I wrote one.

John Fernandes: Eric, the drummer, had some instrumental arrangements and I did some instrumental bits. But with Circulatory...tonight we're also gonna be playing Pipes You See, Pipes You Don't -- that's Pete's songs.

Pete Erchick: And The Instruments have an album out now that we're gonna play a few from. What's happening now is that I'm playing in probably six different bands, and I'm enjoying it quite a bit. They're never all going at once. It's kind of a beautiful thing because we're in a band where a whole bunch of people are all songwriters or they create things in different names. It's just nice when someone can be the orchestrater, in a way, and other people can help out, but he's responsible.

Splendid: That must help with ego clashes a little bit.

Pete Erchick: We'll have a situation where I'll want to do some of your stuff if you help me out with some of my stuff in a different context.

John Fernandes: Will plays drums in Pipes You See Pipes You Don't.

Pete Erchick: It keeps the band more solid, too.

John Fernandes: We'll play a show where we'll do The Instruments, Pipes You See Pipes You Don't and the Circulatory. It's all the same people and we can kind of joke with the crowd, like, "Hey, recognize us?" But then we'll just rotate around. Heather will play the acoustic guitar and cello while we back her up, and then Pete will play his songs.

Splendid: You talk about playing as other bands and playing everyone's music. What about Olivia Tremor Control? Would you ever play any of that, or is that something that's in the past, or on the side?

Pete Erchick: We were having fun the other night and we had no encores (planned) so we busted out "Opera House".

John Fernandes: Someone requested it and we all just looked at each other and said "fuck it".

Will Hart: It was just a goof, but it was fun.

Pete Erchick: I'm not saying we'll never play Olivia, but right now the main focus is on this (Circulatory System).

John Fernandes: The Olivia tour is probably not gonna be happening too soon.

Splendid: Is everything amicable with Olivia?

Will Hart: Yeah.

John Fernandes: Definitely. Bill (Doss of Sunshine Fix) lives right around the corner.

Will Hart: I've known Bill since late high school. He's a little older, but you know... Everything's cool.

Splendid: You guys have been compared to all of the seminal '60s bands -- The Beach Boys, the Beatles and the Byrds, and so forth.

Pete Erchick: Does Circulatory System get compared that way? I know Olivia was, but I feel with Circulatory System, even though it's obviously (Will's) songs and he was half of Olivia, it hasn't really done a movement. I guess I don't recognize the influences as being so obvious anymore. Maybe it's just that I'm so involved in the music.

John Fernandes: A few of the songs, when he played them for me, had this kind of Old World feeling, like "let's get into some weird Renaissance" -- like in "Now" or something like that.

Splendid: I heard someone at the show last night say there was almost an Irish feel?

John Fernandes: Maybe because of the violin.

John, Pete and Will stammer over each other trying to define their sound.

John Fernandes: With violin and cello, yeah, we do try and bring back arrangements and sounds that might be more like something...Old Worldy.

Will Hart: I know what you mean. We play on a drone, guys play off a drone. Which is an Eastern thing. Like Ravi Shankar, and all that. Specifically, because he's talking about the drone, the drone element in a couple of songs -- "Come Away," and the other one.

Splendid: Several of you play many instruments. Did you grow up with it? Were there influences in your house, from your family, growing up?

Will Hart: Not all of us play many instruments. If you play any stringed instrument you can play them all.

John Fernandes: My dad always used to play traditional Indian music during the day, but then at night he'd bust out really bad '80s music. He had this electro-pop that was so wrong. It had this sitar that was just all wrong, but it was really funny because during the day he'd be all "You must understand the beauty of this traditional music," and then at night he'd be all (John doing his best beatbox imitation).

Splendid: So will the beatbox be on the new album?

Will Hart: (Laughing) We're always in search of a new direction.

Splendid: We spoke about record labels back at the beginning, and obviously you aren't going down the major label path. I'd assume that at some point during your career you had that opportunity. Is that something that you ever had to think about? Is it something that you're thinking about late at night, wondering "what if"?

John Fernandes: (In the past) we've been offered contracts in which the labels had stipulations that they weren't going to bend on, such as greatest hits compilations where after you put a couple of records out, they wanted to be able to have the rights to just pluck any songs they want and put them together. Then they'd have the right to remix, where they'd choose a producer and recording engineer that they want you to work with. Or if you handed them a record that they don't like, they could get anyone to remix it. Those were things that we just couldn't bend on.

Pete Erchick: It's that, and in the process with Olivia there were times when a label or two were interested. They send you a contact that they hope that you'll just sign off the bat, with the terms they want. The process -- you read it and have your lawyer read it and talk about your ideas and you send them back a revised copy. Then they revise it, and it gets revised again, and in the process our revisions were never added. Maybe it was they thought that we were too timid or they didn't agree with what we wanted to put in. We don't know. Either way we sent a counter proposal and never really heard back. Maybe they just didn't care so much.

Splendid: So it wasn't really a decision, then?

Will Hart: Kinda.

Pete Erchick: In the end maybe they just didn't care so much any more. They're not so hip.

Splendid: And now you've got things like American Idol, where you've got these teenagers who are just ready to sign.

John Fernandes: Music has changed so much in the last few years anyway...

Will Hart: It's undergone a revision. Whatever it was, they had some weird shit going on.

John and Pete exit to take care of an issue with the opening band.

Splendid: Lyrically, your songs, though they get deeper into inner philosophy and circular logic, are mostly pretty light, airy and fun. In the times that we're living in now, is it hard to keep that feeling in your music?

Will Hart: I've gone through a lot of that. It's weird, I think; sometimes it's, like an artist or whatever you want to call me, different people doing stuff, whatever you want to call them. I think my role is to try to lend the happiness and not be involved. I'm not a politician, but I'm definitely affected by it. I'm not one who can block it out and pretend we're, like, having a blast. It took me a while to get over that. It's heavy but everything is gonna be all right. I feel that. In my heart and soul.

Splendid: It's also great to have music like Circulatory System that you can use to take your mind away from it for a while, be in a different sphere for an hour or so and then come back and read the headlines, or worry about that another time.

Will Hart: I'm not trying to make a comment on it. I'm trying to think of how to say it without sounding phony, but...I want people to realize there's a different dimension to our lives that we can reach and have. Do you know what I mean? And in that way, I don't know exactly how it relates. You know, you relate to the news, but you're not getting the full story. I'm not an investigator. That's what I've decided. It's not my role to politically investigate these things in all this. If someone else is doing that, great, and I'll learn it from them. I'll try to get some ideas from there. When we get together we're still happy and (quoting "Joy") we can still believe in joy. You know? I mean, we're gonna get fucking past this. It's gonna be fine. That's what we all feel when we get together and play. We try to bring that. It's the only thing you can do. I think that is our role.

Will Hart: (to John as he returns) He was just saying how he enjoys the aspect that (the music) is happy, sort of.

Splendid: There are darker parts as well.

Will Hart: I would consider them introspective, but they are dark, I guess.

Splendid: But we can still believe in joy.

Will Hart: Hopefully it's that simple. I can be that simple. For us, it's a simple message. That sounds silly. Sitting here looking at each other, I think you get that. Does that sound too silly? You know what I'm saying. If it sounds that way, edit it. In a good way.

Splendid: When can we expect the new album?

John Fernandes: Hopefully late fall. We're just trying to figure out now how to get more distribution arrangements worked out, trying to make it even more solidly distributed than the first one, trying to get someone to even help us maybe with manufacturing. Because we have these Olivia records now, and this Circulatory record, and we're trying to license a record from this German band, Workshop. So we have all these things that we want to put out, if we could just get someone to help us, like press them and distribute them.

Splendid: To me it seemed like the Circulatory record just appeared. It was like there was no build-up or push when it came out.

Will Hart: We just floated it out there.

Splendid: One day my friend came back from the record store with three CDs and one of them happened to be Circulatory System.

John Fernandes: And you're, like, "Where did it come from?"

Splendid: Exactly.

Will Hart: We were, you know, like a cloud.

John Fernandes: We did all these different things to try and get publicity. Now we've learned that most people just want you to hire that publicist. Like, we got these suitcases where (Will) painted the outside so it looked like windows where you could see into the suitcase and see these clouds inside. So we had these painted blue suitcases sent to all the magazines, with the CDs. When you opened up the suitcase there'd be cotton balls for clouds inside and all these neat little toys to play with, along with the record.

Will Hart: Magnifying glasses.

John Fernandes: A shrunk-down lyric book that you had to read with a magnifying glass.

Splendid: Kind of like what's in the actual CD jacket.

John Fernandes: Yeah, maybe we'll have to include a magnifying glass with the real CD. They were way too small. So when the suitcase came, all we had were CDRs because we wanted to get them out early, before the finished ones came back from the plant. We made individual cases for each one. But I think most people were like "What the fuck is this? Who is this band?"

Splendid: The reviews I've read were uniformly good. Would you agree?

John Fernandes: Yeah, we've just had a hard time cracking the more mainstream press. With Olivia, everything just kind of fell on our laps, because there was this buzz with Neutral Milk just getting discovered, and Olivia and Apples all kind of getting discovered at the same time. There was this whole "why is this happening?" And it was easy to get a lot of press. Now we're dealing with a backlash.

Splendid: It almost seems as if there's a stigma with the whole Elephant 6 thing...

John Fernandes: Yeah, it really is. But once you're inside a label you find out all these things that work in the industry that you just wish you didn't know. Like we got a really bad Magnet review and it turns out that the guy that wrote the review works for this Digital Club Network where they wanted to webcast the Circulatory System show and I couldn't get everyone's signature before we played so we ended up not being able to do it. He gets mad about it and requests the record from Magnet and writes a bad review. I was reading it and I'm like "Hey man, I recognize that name, that's the guy that wanted us to do a webcast and we weren't able to do it." I called him and we talked things out and he assured me that it, that the bad review, had nothing to do with us not doing the show. But you never know.