Q&A with Neon Indian

The last time 23-year-old Alan Palomo’s synthpop project Neon Indian performed in Bloomington was October 2009, the same month he released his debut album, “Psychic Chasms.” Thirty months later, Palomo is back in town with an expanded live set-up and fresh material from last fall's “Era Extraña."  WEEKEND spoke with Palomo about the new album, growing up in a family of musicians and working with the Flaming Lips and Kreayshawn last year.

Catch Neon Indian at 9 p.m. Thursday at Rhino's with openers Friends and Dreamers of the Ghetto.

WEEKEND: You’re coming off a busy week in Austin at South by Southwest.  How did it go?

ALAN PALOMO: It was good, man. It was kind of a wonderful clusterfuck, is the best way I can describe it, just because it’s such a mess. I haven’t missed a single South By since my sophomore year of high school. But it sort of strikes me that it’s starting to outgrow what the city has to offer in terms of hotel rooms and accommodations, just because it seems like everybody is kind of in a mad dash, sleeping on each others’ couches. But I think that’s kind of what’s fun about it. I definitely had a good time.

WEEKEND: You had a big year in 2011, which included releasing your new album “Era Extraña” in September. What would you say fans could expect the material from the new record to sound like live compared to the “Psychic Chasms” material?

PALOMO: I think as far as live goes, I feel like when I was writing “Era Extraña,” it was after maybe about 18 months of touring for “Psychic Chasms” and having to perform the same songs every night. I feel like after performing live for such a while, performing certain songs over and over by myself, I thought there should be more live instruments this time, like a bit of live percussion and guitar and all that.

WEEKEND: “Era Extraña” generally seems bigger, crisper and less “bedroom” than “Psychic Chasms.” Was that more or less your intention, and what other kinds of things were you shooting for with this record?

PALOMO: I didn’t want to write another lo-fi record in the traditional sense of the word, just because it didn’t feel like it would be very representative of where I’m at this point. I mean, to completely ignore that I have studio access I don’t think would have necessarily made for the most interesting thing in my head. But I still wanted to capture that sort of theme or essence or swirly quality of it, but I feel like I did it with the individual sounds. With “Psychic Chasms,” it was pretty easy to just write a song and then fuck it up later, just kind of fuck up the entire actual recording of the song and play around with those components. But for “Extraña,” I feel like I was writing sounds that were individually fucked up in their own capacity, and then trying to combine all those elements to make one solid, cohesive song. So it was definitely a different approach. But yeah, I wasn’t exactly sure what I was set out to make. For me, it was more of a personal testament to whether I’d be able to sink or swim in a studio environment.

WEEKEND: Around the time you released “Era Extraña,” you also teamed up with Bleep Labs in Austin to create your own mini-synth called the PAL198X. You even released a 1980s-style infomercial for it, and Jimmy Fallon played with it on his show. Is there any chance we’ll see it at the show?

PALOMO: I’m actually starting to sell them on the road because I have a secret plan for them that will involve the participation of everybody that bought one, but you know, I don’t necessarily use it live just because I would feel a little odd using my own synth. But it was definitely something I made with the intent that I wanted to see what the potential was as far as people taking it and incorporating it into their set-up and maybe being able to recontextualize it as a different instrument just because it has a lot of leeway to play around with it.

WEEKEND: You also surprised some of your fans last year when you went on a college tour with Kreayshawn. How did that come about, and what was that experience like?

PALOMO: Well, there was a miscommunication at the beginning as to how it came together or what the situations were, and unfortunately, it wasn’t until I was pretty wrapped up in it that I knew what this was, which was a co-headlining tour. And I mean, to be totally honest, she was super awesome and so were all her people. I guess it just made for some awkward shows though. I kind of feel like there were two very distinct waves of audiences, and it didn’t feel as unified as it could, which I think was the initial spirit of what we wanted to put together with that.

WEEKEND: Not long before “Era Extraña” came out, you recorded a collaborative EP with the Flaming Lips. Aside from the psychedelic similarities between you two, the Flaming Lips are also known as this group that’s never been afraid to indulge in left-field artistic endeavors, such as building elaborate movie sets or collaborating with Ke$ha. Did they inspire you to be less inhibited artistically?

PALOMO: Yeah, absolutely. I think the EP that I made with them was one of the first experiences where I didn’t really feel confined by the general impulses that I tend to go through with my own projects, which is like, everything always eventually finds its way into some cohesive song. With the Flaming Lips, it really was just kind of jamming, for lack of a better word. And it was incredibly liberating. I love that they walk into a situation not really preemptively trying to see what song they’re supposed to make. In a lot of ways, I feel like the songwriting is always surprising them, because they’re kind of feeding off of that energy. And seeing them in the studio is as much of a production as any of their live shows. I really feel like they definitely have a flair to what they do, and in a lot of ways, it helped me finish “Era Extraña.”

WEEKEND: Your dad was a pop singer in Mexico. What were your experiences in growing up around music and getting started with it?

PALOMO: Yeah, he recorded an album in the late ’70s and then another in the early ’80s. I didn’t actually play music until college. I mean, I owned an acoustic guitar in high school, but everybody did. It was interesting, I feel like just through osmosis, I always kind of absorbed what my brother and my dad were doing. I didn’t really know I wanted to do music. But I guess when I finally did decide to, there was a certain intuitive quality to it that just came from growing up watching my brother and my dad play their instruments.