God’s Country

Product Information

Raygun Busch: Honestly, if I had been left to my own devices at the beginning, it would have been way sillier, more gorey, way more stupid. I was encouraged to keep everything a bit grounded, because it would seem more disturbing, and dammit, the boys were right. I sincerely hope we are not viewed as edgelords, but I do consume a lot of media with pervasive dark themes because that’s what I like. LM: I’m glad! I’m glad that people all over the world like our stuff, but I do feel like our music is so weirdly, uniquely American that it’s funny people in the UK are digging it, because it feels very Oklahoma to me. Now, moving forward, are there any literary or cinematic influences you pulled from in particular for God’s Country? Are there any real-life stories you pulled from? The music is serious - what we’re doing is serious. So you’ve gotta have a little fun somewhere else, you know what I mean?

NR: That’s the one. ‘No Love Deep Web’ came to me as a comparison for ‘God’s Country’. The albums are both so unrelenting and don’t sugarcoat the way they present things. They’re really forceful. But also, it seems like your music is more observational than theirs - both with the lyrics and also the way it’s all brought together. NR: Yeah, as someone for whom those bands were doing things before I was born, I can relate to how the similarities between them and you are changed by the era we’re living through. Like, Crass probably wouldn’t have written a song called ‘grimace_smoking_weed.jpeg’, but that’s what happens when you get internet-brained.

Recommendations

In light of this award, we sat down with the band over video call to shoot the shit about the reaction to ‘God’s Country’, Chat Pile’s journey up until this point, and what the future has in store for the group. NR: Given that you chose to frame the record by calling it ‘God’s Country’, what do you think it does to the psyche of people or a community to be invoking God on their existence like that? NR: It’s a really impressive LP. You’ve made something really unusual, and the staying power of it is borne out by the fact that it’s now showing up in our end-of-year list and those of many other publications. Raygun Busch: It was borne from necessity but it’s really the only way to do things, right? We’ve each been recording our own music since at least our teen years. There’s really no reason for anyone to ever pay someone to do shit that a computer has made pig simple for the masses. The internet and computer programs have completely equalized the medium–You can make a record or a movie or whatever you want (easy as writing that book always has been lol) if you really want to. Tangerine was shot on iPhones and Tangerine is one of the best movies of the century so far. Deathconsciousness by Have a Nice Life was recorded using Garageband for chrissakes!

Stin: Yeah, Ray took the words right out of my mouth with the whole “manifest destiny” thing. It’s obviously a very American thing, but it’s hyperly an Oklahoma thing as well. I feel like we’re the last domino of that type of mindset, and attributing that kind of entitlement to God plays a big part in how bad things are. LM: We will grind a song down a ton, so there’s a lot of repetition and stuff. It’s the only way I really know how to write music - I’m not good at writing a full song and presenting it. I don’t really want to write like that anyways, I like to do it with people. My ideas are not always right, so I like to have people with good ideas to input as well. NR: It’s interesting that you mention ‘God’s Country’ taking a while to record and release, because it does feel like an album that’s been incubated. That’s a strength for me - it’s like the structure of the writing, and the interplay between the vocals and the instruments, wasn’t just thrown together. It feels well thought out.

On The Go

RB: We’re all here [Oklahoma] because this was the last place in the country to settle. We had forced every indigenous person here and Montana, and then we were like, “actually, we want this No Man’s Land that we’ve put you into.” And that’s where we live. We’re a long time away from that, so it’s not like knowing whose land you're on is at the forefront of everyone’s minds. You remember that mini-movement that happened a few years ago, there was an app and all that shit? That stuff is really important to know, but a lot of people maybe don’t think about it.