Q&A With Small Black’s Josh Kolenik

New York synth-lovers Small Black caught the indie world’s attention in 2010 with the self-titled debut EP and first full-length album “New Chain,” an effort that earned a spot on WEEKEND’s 20 Best Albums of 2010 list.

Wednesday, the band will bring its dreamy, electro-pop game to The Bishop’s stage. Lead singer and keyboardist Josh Kolenik recently talked to WEEKEND about the importance of cover art, being on a Bloomington-based label and breaking into pools.

WEEKEND How and when did you guys sign to Jagjaguwar?
JOSH KOLENIK We signed last January, I think, and they just approached us in the fall after we self-released the original EP. Then we just kinda worked it out to do a re-release of it in the spring and followed up with “New Chain” in the fall.

WEEKEND What do you remember most about Bloomington?
KOLENIK We actually played at The Bishop over the summer with Beach Fossils. So that was our first time there and we got the Jagjaguwar-Secretly Canadian tour of the land. (laughs) It was fun. I think we broke into a pool in the middle of the night. It was chaotic.

WEEKEND Would you say that your hushed style of music translates especially well in a smaller setting?  Or do you also get good crowd responses in larger or outdoor venues as well?
KOLENIK Yeah, you know, it’s a learning process and we’re in the first year of taking this stuff on the road and how you approach different venues. You know we really like the tight, small space like The Bishop because it kinda promotes a party atmosphere and it’s more about the vibe in the room than having perfect sound or that sort of performance. Whereas when you’re playing a big, open space or a bigger club, you’re trying to connect with the people in the back of the room as well as in the front so it really relies more I think on a better sound quality and a sort of performance that’s a bigger, higher-fidelity sound and just bigger and wider in scope. So we try to approach those shows differently as far as where our levels are at and our general energy level and mindset. But as far as a preference between the two, I don’t think we have one yet. Just whatever’s appropriate for the evening or for the town or for the space, you know?

WEEKEND Where are you right now, and what are you doing to prepare for the tour?
KOLENIK I’m just in Brooklyn right now and I’m going to get a coffee. You know, we just finished up rehearsal yesterday. Just arranged a couple other things from “New Chain” that we hadn’t had time to get together for the last tour. We’re just headed down to South by Southwest and gonna deal with that madness and have fun there. Hopefully we have a couple new songs arranged for this tour that we’ll be treating people to who have come out and seen us
previously.

WEEKEND What are the songs?
KOLENIK We hadn’t been playing the song “Panthers,” and we’ve been doing a cover of a song by Best Coast called “Sun Was High.” We aren’t really playing any new material — yet.

WEEKEND One surface observation of Small Black would be that you guys don’t really use guitars or have a guitar player. Can you tell me a little bit about your songwriting process and how that’s different with no guitar? Do you ever write songs on guitar?
KOLENIK Yeah, it’s funny, I was thinking about this today. We kinda all were guitar players in this band. We just got bored with it and decided that we were more interested in working with the computer and sampling and keyboards and the freedom of songwriting on Pro Tools. I think a lot of those first skeletons of Small Black songs for the EP were guitar stuff that eventually just all got eradicated. Like the song “Kings of Animals,” that was a bonus track. That was the first song we had done and that was a guitar song. It was more that we got interested in just putting that kind of dingy drumbeat behind it and that’s why that song stuck around. I don’t know, we banned it from “New Chain” — we just said no guitars, period. We didn’t even bring one to the writing and recording sessions, so all the songs are written off loops and keyboard lines and different samples and things that we found.  But I think for the next record, guitar is off the “banned list.” We might ban just chords, no guitar chords allowed. (laughs) It’s fun to make rules, you know? For anyone that’s sat in front of a computer trying to make music, it’s just like infinite space in front of your ears and your eyes.
Because otherwise, it would make me a little crazy. But yeah, I don’t know, I started picking up the guitar again.  I think maybe I’m interested in that songwriting that way. You know, I didn’t like it for a while because with a guitar, your hands just kinda do things because it’s easy.  You go to certain chords because, I don’t know, it’s just comfortable. I know my hand likes to go from E-minor to A-minor so I just do that, whereas I think with a keyboard, it’s just so differently laid out. And I feel like a lot of times you write from bass parts first so I don’t know, it just forces you into a different decision. I’m maybe interested in being limited by the guitar again though.

WEEKEND All your cover art shares a vibrant, almost kaleidoscopic quality that seems to fit your style of music perfectly. What kind of oversight does the band have in composing pieces of cover art?
KOLENIK We’re very anal about it and we don’t just ask somebody for an idea and then do it. The cover that we’d done with our friend Morgan Blair was amazing and we like to work on everything with her. She’s just so enthusiastic and a talented person. We saw her art at a gallery and just contacted her immediately because we thought it was a perfect fit for the band, and she’s become a great friend. So we’ve kinda worked hand-in-hand with her and come up with designs. She brings us stuff, and then we go back and forth. She understands the color palette and the general geometrics we’re looking for.

WEEKEND What are your future recording plans as of right now?
KOLENIK The second we got home from tour, we were dying to start working on new stuff, so we’ve got a ton of new songs in development, but you know, they take a lot of time. Once we’re done with this tour, we’re gonna go back down to Delaware for a little bit and just focus and try to get some more of the ideas into perfect, finished-song status. We’ll probably spend most of the rest of the year just working on these songs and hopefully have the next record out in some sort of timely fashion, but we’re trying to take as much time as we need and not rush it in
any way.