We’ve been devoted fans of Portland’s Tender Age since the moment we heard their first 7 inch release, Anything/Mirrors, in 2014. Everything the group has put out since then has continually impressed us, offering up a uniquely lush bedroom pop sound that we can’t get enough of. Last week we were thrilled to premiere the band’s most recent single, “Lowers”, taken from their newly released EP, Disappear Here, which we couldn’t recommend more highly. We are likewise pleased to present you with our two-part interview with the band, stemming from a recent phone conversation we had with the group that was truly a delight. What follows is part one - look for part two in the coming days. Enjoy!
***
WTSH: Can you guys each
introduce yourselves and tell me what your contributions are to the band, both
live and in the studio? And then can you let me know who isn’t present for this
call, so all the band members get mentioned?
Elaina: Sure! So, I’m Elaina
Tardif. I play guitar and sing. Sometimes I play bass when we’re recording.
Tauna: I’m Tauna Leonardo. I
play guitar and do the lead vocal – well actually Elaina and I both kind of
share that duty right now.
Bryan:
Hey, I’m Bryan Robertson – I play bass live and in the studio. And a sampler
occasionally.
WTSH: Okay cool. Can you
tell me a bit about the members who aren’t present for the interview?
Tauna: There
is Christopher Klarer, who also plays guitar. And then our drummer is Nick
Ferrucci.
WTSH: Who comes up with
the material for your songs? Who does what as far as song-writing duties?
Tauna: Well, Elaina and I
both usually write the skeleton of a song and bring that to practice. Then we
develop it together as a band. The process is largely a group effort for the
most part.
WTSH: Do you and Elaina
work together to write these skeletons of songs, or are you writing
individually?
Tauna: Well, this is
bedroom pop haha, sad bed pop, so we mostly write the songs in our bedrooms.
Elaina: Haha, yes. Usually
we write separately, although we’ve written together before. But the usual
process is that the songs come from one person, usually either Tauna or myself.
And actually we are working on a song right now that Bryan wrote, so yeah, it
does vary.
WTSH: How did the project start
and how did you guys come together?
Elaina: It was all Tauna.
Tauna: Haha, yeah, this is
one of my first bands, and I started it about three years ago. It was a lot
different then – it was a three piece, with different people. We had stand up
drums, and just guitar and bass. And then over time, because it was my first
project, I kind of developed the sound and got that how I wanted it to be. Then
I found the right people to do it, who are the current members of the band. The
five of us have been together for a little over a year. Bryan is the oldest
band member, aside from myself – he’s been in Tender Age for about two years.
WTSH: So how did you find
your band members? Did you just kind of go out looking for them, after deciding
how you wanted the project to sound? Did you have a particular vision in mind?
Tauna: I just went out and
started meeting people in Portland who played music, and who had similar tastes
like my own. It was kinda tough for a bit, took me quite a while to find everyone.
I suppose my only vision at the time was to do something that worshipped reverb
and noise. Something different than what I was feeling and experiencing at the
shows I was seeing at the time and the music that was coming out then,
especially in Portland. Portland had a pretty intense indie rock and dirty
garage rock presence that I didn’t identify with. A kind of early 2000s indie
rock sound or like Burger Records was really dominating the scene. I felt
lost in that world and was tired of it. I just wanted to feel something – and I
didn’t at shows, ever. I wanted to find people that were going through what I
was going through too.
I
always think of this moment in 2006 when I saw that Sofia Coppola movie Marie
Antoinette in theaters. It was a big turning point for me and what I started to
find in music. It had this amazing soundtrack. There’s this big landscape scene
when “Pulling Our Weight” by The Radio Dept. comes on and it just hits you in
this particular way I’ll never forget…or like when “Just Like Honey” comes on
at the end of Lost in Translation. It’s just like all I ever wanted to feel
ever again and I was hooked into something deep. Forever chasing this feeling
and sound, trying to find it in everything I could, finding my own place in it
too.
Where
was all that in the live music I was seeing at the time? It was totally absent
and unreliable so I stopped going to shows and started a band. I was eagerly
trying to decipher Robin Guthrie’s brain. Rich layers and harmonies. The Reid
brothers [of The Jesus and Mary Chain] too and The Byrds, can’t forget about
them. I am a devout Byrds fan. Those harmonies! Pop music in general though is
like a drug.
It
took some time to find the right people to see all this through with for sure,
lots of trial and error. More and more though I was figuring it out, our sound
developed, I stuck with it through a lot and now I truly do see that
vision fully realized in this current lineup. Which is such a wonderful
feeling. I can’t believe how far we’ve come. I wasn’t sure I’d ever get to
this place and I’m so proud of the new EP.
WTSH: For the past few years
now, a lot of the new bands that I’ve really liked and gotten into have come
from Portland. Appendixes, Soft Kill, WL, Soft Shadows, Haste, Cat Hoch, Force Publique…It seems like a lot of
the projects know each other or are related. So it seems like now Portland has
a good scene going, which you guys are a part of, with a shoegazey, dreamy
sound. Would you agree that there’s something synergistic happening?
Elaina: I would definitely
agree with that. A lot of the people in the bands you just mentioned are some
of our best friends. They are like family to us, or at least that’s how I feel
about it. My boyfriend is in Appendixes. One of my best friends is in WL. Our friend
Conrad, who is also on our label with Warm Hands, plays in Soft Kill.
It’s pretty close knit and sometimes bands will even share members. It’s a
tight little community.
WTSH: Would you say this
scene has sprung up in just the past couple of years?
Elaina: I
would say yes, at least in my experience. A lot of these bands are only a
couple of years old, like us, so I would say this little community started two,
three years ago. Appendixes have been around the longest, I think, maybe three
or four years. They were a band about a year before Tender Age came together.
Elaina: It’s a very small
label run by Mehran Azma, who is basically the best guy ever. He’s a very
supportive person. Warm Hands is one of the other bands on the label. Toxic Slime and Adhere to Form, a side
project of Vice Device, are going to
be released on the label too. We’re very close with the Toxic Slime gang. But
anyway, Mehran is just the best. Really intentional with what he does and just
so incredibly supportive. He really keeps us going.
WTSH: Do you know how long
the label has been around?
Elaina: I think the Warm
Hands thing came out about a year and a half ago, and that was the label’s
first release. So yeah, it’s very small and brand new. But it’s really grown in
that time. Mehran is a total powerhouse.
Tauna: Yeah, there aren’t a
lot of Portland bands that are on label, especially one like this, because Mehran kind
of does it all – he puts on shows, books them and promotes them and everything.
He also works at a record shop in town called Beacon Sound. He has a show on our
local radio station, XRAY.fm, called “Past
Haunts” as well. The station itself is also a pretty new thing that has come
along in the last year or so and shaped the local music presence. We haven’t
had anything like that really, where you’re constantly connected to what’s
happening if you just turn on the radio. It’s also just a well-curated radio
station. So that’s cool.
WTSH: I’ve been hearing
that Portland has had a huge influx of people moving there recently, causing
rent and the cost of living to go up dramatically. Is that your experience?
Elaina: Definitely. I know people
who are getting evicted. Their rent is like doubling, it's crazy. There are new
buildings popping up everywhere like mushrooms. It's all under the pretense of urban
renewal but it doesn't feel…like it’s really helping the community. We were
just talking about this on the way here actually.
Tauna: I feel like we talk about
this every day lately.
Elaina: Yeah, it’s really
intense. I feel like when I moved to Portland in 2009 this conversation wasn’t
even happening then. It was easy for me to move here with little to no money
and find an entry level service job and pay my rent. It wasn't easy but it was
easier than I imagine it to be now. If I was that eighteen year old kid again
moving to Portland now I would really be struggling.
A
lot of people live with roommates here and I think that’s how we all get by. We
all have a lot of roommates. There’s a cool community of people and friend
circles that came from living together.
WTSH: What is the industry
that's employing all these new people that are moving in?
Elaina: Mostly the tech industry
from what I understand. I know that's a vague term but...
Tauna: Like Nike, Intel. I think
I read recently that Google is moving here now.
Elaina: Yeah, Nike isn't a tech
company but they employ a lot of techs. One of the biggest employers
here.
WTSH: I used to live in San
Francisco and it sounds parallel to what’s happened in SF. Facebook and Twitter
are right in the city and Google is south of SF and there have been years and
years of evictions and rent and mortgages going way up, and it’s felt like it’s
just been taken over by – not urban renewal but by another population that has
more money and the people that lived there are being squeezed out. So it’s not
actually a kind of development or renewal that’s helping the people that live
there.
Elaina: I'm from the Bay Area and
I kind of saw that happening and that’s why I moved here, to get away from it.
And I feel like…
WTSH: Oh, you're from San
Francisco?
Elaina: Well, I'm from Santa
Rosa. I always thought I would live in SF but when it came time for me to do
that I couldn't and found my way up here and it’s happening here. Like the
place I work for is going to be torn down to make room for condos.
WTSH: Yeah, it’s the same
pattern, it’s the tech boom and this kind of thing always seems to follow in
cities that are relatively creative, that have young people and art. Other
demographics are attracted to that and move in and ruin it.
Elaina: Right now we're sitting
in the office where Bryan works and he and a friend have this little start up
company that’s an example, it’s a design company. There are little pockets
where the creative community can kinda take advantage of this but it’s very
thin. It’s hard. It’s hard to get a foothold. It seems like the industry is
employing people that don't necessarily live here yet. It’s a change in the
culture. For better or worse.
WTSH: Yeah, there's this
pattern. A few years back a lot of the music that I was listening to was coming
out of Brooklyn, and Brooklyn had a scene that attracted people, and has since
become way too expensive for many of those musicians.
Do
you want to talk about your influences? Tauna, you mentioned Cocteau Twins
earlier.
Tauna: Yeah sure. Cocteau Twins
was something I was heavily influenced by when I started Tender Age, I don't
think it’s as present anymore with my songwriting, but I worship them, so it
probably is. Maybe it is more so with my other band with Chris
[Christopher Klarer, Tender Age guitarist] called Satsuma. Any post-punk, darkwave
type of thing isn't as present in Tender Age anymore.
The
big influences I think to mention that especially brought Elaina into this band
were Sonic Youth and the Breeders. I don't think I’ve ever really shared that
with someone I was writing songs with before. I worship Kim and Kelley Deal and
Josephine Wiggs. So being able to explore that territory was a big part of
where we were drawing from, what seemed possible to do, what we could try and
where we were going. We’re all a bunch of weirdo freaks that like weird notes
and abrasive sounds. I recently heard Kristin Hersh talk about that too and
felt even more of a kinship toward her.
Elaina: Yeah, Sonic Youth and the
Breeders. Kim Deal and Kim Gordon…What else?
Bryan: I don't know, we kinda go
in waves. Galaxie 500 has been pretty heavy lately.
Tauna: It has been a Galaxie 500/Luna
year for sure. I saw Dean Wareham recently and Luna and cried more than I ever
have at a show, like a baby. That music is so heavy and emotional to me. Bryan
says it feels like home.
Elaina: Galaxie 500. I've been
listening to Body/Head, Kim Gordon's newer project. That’s really good. They
have a Nina Simone cover so I started listening to Nina Simone again. What else
do we like? I like Patti Smith.
Tauna: Throwing Muses is my big
thing right now.
Bryan: My long time favorites
have always been Swirlies. They
are a little underrated. There’s like a fun element to them, they don't take
themselves so seriously. And then pre-1994 Stereolab is my desert island
discography. Can’t get enough of that sound.
Elaina: Yeah, totally! I
don't know if this comes through in our music but I got obsessed with Delia Derbyshire. Do
you know who she is? She's like this early proto synth BBC sound effects lady.
She does the Doctor Who sound effects but she wrote her own music too. I found
her, then followed the train of thought from her into early Pink Floyd, into
older stuff, then Stereolab. I listen to hip hop too, we have really wide
tastes, Kendrick Lamar…Tauna, do you have more?
Tauna: Yeah, I've just been
thinking a lot about Felt, been listening to a lot of Felt lately, and Mazzy
Star. I found all these CDs. Somebody got rid of their entire CD collection, I
don't know why, probably like 300 CDs, and left them on my street corner. I
think this person used to be a radio DJ in the late 80s/early 90s, ‘cause it’s
like everything you could possibly want almost, all stamped promo copies and
singles of college rock and underground.
WTSH: Wow, that’s pretty cool!
Tauna: Yeah, I think I was
pretty much into everything already, so it was like a gold mine to have them. But
it forced me to really go album by album of some bands where I wasn’t as
familiar with their entire catalog, like Low. The coolest find in that box were
all the infamous deleted Smiths singles. I thought that was just something they
said in High Fidelity, but it’s true! They've been sitting in my car and so
I've been devouring them.
To be continued…
We’ve been devoted fans of Portland’s Tender Age since the moment we heard their first 7 inch release, Anything/Mirrors, in 2014. Everything the group has put out since then has continually impressed us, offering up a uniquely lush bedroom pop sound that we can’t get enough of. Last week we were thrilled to premiere the band’s most recent single, “Lowers”, taken from their newly released EP, Disappear Here, which we couldn’t recommend more highly. We are likewise pleased to present you with our two-part interview with the band, stemming from a recent phone conversation we had with the group that was truly a delight. What follows is part one - look for part two in the coming days. Enjoy!