I'm not sure if Timothy Renner is better known for his music or his artwork. You've seen his pen & ink drawings adorning the covers of Camera Obscura releases, and other record covers, as well as illustrating various magazines and books, all spun out in his antiquated line work, with the feel of old steel engravings. All imbued with a mystical intensity and a distinctively cryptic sense of mystery. While his various musical projects, such as; Mourning Cloak, Stone Breath, The Spectral Light & Moonshine Firefly Snakeoil Jamboree, his role in organizing and playing as part of the The Poor Minstrels of Song and the Temple of the Moon tour, and his Terrastock performances have helped to carve out a simultaneously new and age-old chapter in folk music, while provided an ongoing exploration of what psychedelia can be.
G.P.: What do you think about the intelligence and capacity for feeling of animals?
T.R.: One of the most arrogant and cruel things I've ever heard was a well-known radio talk show host tell a child that his dead dog would not go to heaven. If this is the case, then I don't want to go to heaven. I'd like to go to wherever the dead animals go. Life is give and take and all plants and animals live by the death of others. I understand this cycle... but it is a cycle and to think ourselves better than or removed from the animals is wrong. We're only a part of it. Even in our funerary practices we've tried to remove ourselves from the cycle: we no longer return to the earth, but liquefy in concrete vaults. So, yes, animals have intelligence and feeling and spirit. It's just different from ours.
G.P.: Can you describe the individual identities of your various musical projects?
T.R.: Mourning Cloak was the first, and that was about exploring inner and outer space. It was more electric and more obviously 'experimental' (i.e. less song oriented). Mourning Cloak is in a chrysalis stage. Beyond, an old album that was never released will come out this month. "Farewell Eternal Blooms" will follow, and that will be the last for awhile (besides a CDR of remixes). I have set very specific terms which must be met for Mourning Cloak to fly again. If this happens, there will be more Mourning Cloak music. If not, "Farewell Eternal Blooms" will be the farewell. StoneBreath was initially a solo effort, but then I met Prydwyn. When we make music together, we don't need to speak. Everything is said there. Where M-Cloak was of the aether, StoneBreath is earth music. The Spectral Light & Moonshine Firefly Snakeoil Jamboree was going to just be the new StoneBreath album, but our label didn't like the idea of an album of mostly traditional songs... and it DOES have a different sound than SB. This is more of a collaboration with Sarada, Prydwyn, and RA Campbell... all great friends of mine... and TSL&MFSJ now is a separate entity, with a life of its own. People ask me; "Why so many band names?" because, to me, they are different. I am doing this for the love of creating, not in an effort to 'make it big.' I honestly don't think my songs will appeal to mass quantities of people. I put out music for the few people who like to listen to it. If I ever had a 'hit', that would be great, but I certainly don't expect one. If I change the band name every record, the right people will still find it.
G.P.: Magic?
T.R.: There's far more magic in a song that's survived several hundred years than in a book from the new age section of Borders.
G.P.: What inspired you to want to make music?
T.R.: Pearls Before Swine. It was their first two wonderful albums which made me want to pick up a guitar and write my own songs. Years later, to actually meet Tom Rapp (PBS mainman and songwriter) and accompany him on stage at various times has been a great dream come true. Tom and his wife, Lynn, are two of the kindest and most 'real' people I've ever met.
G.P.: Do you ever have visions, or "see" images of another time or place?
T.R.: I believe I've seen ghosts and will-o-wisps.
G.P.: What is a will-o'-the-wisp
T.R.: I still see them sometimes, happily. I thought it was a very common thing to see until very recently. In the most basic sense they are glowing globes of light which hover about through graveyards and woods. In the old days they called them corpse candles because they were so often seen in cemeteries. They were thought to be the souls of the dead. Sometimes it was considered foolish to follow them because they might lead you to your demise or deep into the forest then disappear to leave you lost. I will always follow them when I see them. We used to call them "will-o-wisps" so, as a child, I thought they had something to do with willow trees. (maybe, in some vague way they do, willows being a tree so often carved on tombstones)... Anyway, of late I've takes great interest in the photographic phenomenon of glowing globes or bars of light (thought to be the globes in motion) which seem to appear more and more when people take pictures in supposedly haunted places at dusk or nighttime. Surely I can't be the only one to make the connection between the will-o-wisp and the glowing globe phenomenon?
G.P.: How did you become involved with The Ptolemaic Terrascope?
T.R.: A friend lent me an issue and that was about all it took. The magazine is done so well- it looks so great, and the writing is top notch- Phil really has created something unparalleled... and there is a familial feeling about it, between the zine and the labels that have become associated with it, and the Terrastock festivals, it has really just taken on a life of its own. The first Mourning Cloak 7" was out for months before I sent it to PT. I was afraid that they would hate it! However, it turned out that the PT family quickly became great supporters of my music and art, which is flattering to say the least. If it weren't for Phil and PT, I wouldn't have met Tom Rapp. I wouldn't have met Tony from Camera Obscura (the record label which released the first StoneBreath CD). The entire Terrascopic family have helped me beyond anyone else I think, and I'll never be able to fully repay them I'm sure.
Dark Holler/Timothy Renner
http://www.somedarkholler.com/
Interviews
