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An Interview With
Brett Smith
Of

Last Sigh:  To begin with, could you tell us something about yourself? Where are you from? Have you traveled a lot? What were your main preoccupations as a child and teenager? Do you come from a religious family, and if so, what denomination, and could you tell us something about how this influenced you early on, and now? When did you first become involved in music? Have you received any formal training? Have you pursued an education, and if so, in what area of study?

Caul:  I'm 32 years old, a pretty normal guy, pretty boring. I'm originally from St. Charles, Missouri and I now live in Kansas City, Missouri. I haven't traveled a great deal, certainly not enough. I've never been outside the US. As a child and teenager, I was mostly concerned with monsters, science fiction, fantasy and music. Starting in my mid-teens, I was into drugs. I started playing drums in the 6th grade and was really into that, I wanted to be the next Neal Peart.
          At the end of my teens, I started getting into making my own music on a 4-track tape deck. Chris Snipes and myself started doing stuff together, smoking a lot of dope and making crazy music. I don't come from a religious family. I was never even baptized. My brother and sister both were and went to a Methodist church until their early teens but I never went. So, outside of watching "Davey and Goliath," religion didn't really figure into my life. I ended up being an atheist for a long time.
          I think I really started messing around with music when my brother got a guitar. I remember trying to play when I was young. I really liked KISS and wanted to be a rock star. I ended up taking guitar when I was in the 8th grade, it alternated with gym class, so I had it every other day. I picked up some stuff, learned how to read music a little bit (which I've since forgotten). I've never developed into much of a guitar player. I went to college for about 2 years and took whatever I wanted. I ended up going to a tech school specializing in multi-track recording. I'm going to return to college in January to study Theology.

Caul:  I read a great deal, off and on. Depending on what I'm reading, it does have an influence on what I'm doing musically, mostly in the area of song titles or atmospheres. Sometimes what I'm reading gives me a particular feeling and I'll try to impart that to a piece I'm working on. I like all kinds of books, not any particular genre. I'm reading a book about Hildigard of Bingen right now. Recently I read a great book by Thomas Ligotti, a horror writer. I belong to the History Book Club. If something seems interesting to me, I'll pick it up.

Last Sigh:  You used to play in a band called Pedsking with Chris Snipes (Ignis Fatuus). Could you tell us something about the music you created together, and why this collaboration ended?

Caul:  Basically, we made a whole lot of weird music. It's odd to listen to it now, to think I even took part in it. I don't mean that in a bad way, it's just that it was so long ago. I notice some elements in what I do now, though. We did some songs, noise pieces. Whatever our stoned brains could come up with! I still like listening to it and I don't think any less of it because we were doped up most of the time, it was great fun. I think I would have been a lot worse off during that time of my life if I hadn't had that kind of outlet. Pedsking ended because we both ended up living too far apart to collaborate.

Last Sigh:  You recorded three tapes between 1993 and 1994. Were these ever released to the public? Could you tell us how they compare to your later CD releases?

Caul:  All 3 were released to the public, I sold them mail order. A few mail order places ordered copies to sell in their catalogs. After a certain point, I got tired of running them off and doing the packaging. They're similar to what Crucible sounds like, Crucible is sort of a culmination of what I did on the 3 cassettes.

Last Sigh:  At the time when you chose the name Caul, did this word have any particular relevance to you? Were you born with a caul?

Caul:  Caul really didn't have any meaning. I was getting ready to release the first cassette and was casting about for a name. I pulled "caul" out of a book. I liked the sound of it and the fact that it was something real that maybe not many people knew about any longer. I wasn't born with a caul to my knowledge. I'm not sure, but I don't think it's very common.

Last Sigh:  Your first CD was released by Malignant in 1996. How did this come about? And, why did you choose Malignant specifically?

Caul:  Crucible was originally going to be released by Tone Casualties and that fell through. Jason Mantis at Malignant was involved in a compilation that was going to be released on Tone Casualties. When the deal with Tone Casualties fell through, Phil Easter, who had brought me to Tone Casualties (he ran the label at the time) suggested I talk to Jason about releasing it and he was up for it.

Last Sigh:  The title of this CD is Crucible. Aside from the biblical reference, does this title carry a more personal meaning as well?

Caul:  At the time I did the CD, it did in a jokey kind of manner. I had gotten some advance money from Tone Casualties to start on the project and had purchased a new piece of equipment, a sampler, to make the CD with. I really didn't have much of an idea of how to use it, though Phil was great and gave me some crash courses in it. Tone Casualties really wanted to move on things and so I didn't really have a great deal of time to figure out how to make a record with this sampler, so in that sense, it was a crucible. I was really pressed for time.

Last Sigh:  The titles of the tracks on Crucible are more ambiguous than on your later CDs, but they seem to all revolve around three things -- spirituality, nature and movement (or the idea of traveling)? Is this a correct observation? And, if so, how did/do these three things fit together in your life and impression of the world?

Caul:  Actually, the titles were just pulled out of the dictionary. I had a list of words I liked and I organized them into an order I thought felt right and then put the songs into an order that felt right, so the songs ended with the titles by default. This is the way a lot of my stuff is done, by working with elements until it seems like it comes together. This isn't to say I think what I do is meaningless, it's just that it's guided by an outside force. I don't have an agenda to promote or any kind of axe to grind.

Last Sigh:  In an interview at the time of the release of Crucible you mentioned that you are a very non-visual person, yet the imagery that you created for your own releases as well as Ignis Fatuus' CD, is extremely compelling and evocative of the music on these respective CDs. Would you still say that you are a non-visual individual?

Caul:  Yeah, pretty much. The few things I do visually are usually sweated over. Sometimes I luck out and things move along pretty quickly. Chris' CD was like that, we cranked most of it out in an afternoon. He had some stuff he wanted to use and some ideas about it and we threw it together. I went back later and did the grunt work, making sure it fit the specifications, etc. I respond to visuals a great deal, I'm just not very good at communicating with them.

Last Sigh:  Later the same year you released another CD, this one on the German label Katyn. The title The Sound Of Faith and the music seems even more spiritually influenced than Crucible. Could you tell us something about the difference in approach in composing these two CDs?

Caul:  The Sound of Faith was based on my growing experiences with my faith, so it was more definite in what I was trying to communicate. Crucible was a reflection of the birth of the situation that I found myself in, of becoming a Christian.

Last Sigh:  The booklet to Sound Of Faith contains the following quote "Blessed are the ears that catch the pulses of the divine and give no heed to the whisperings of the world." Where does this quote come from? And, how does it relate to the music of Caul?

Caul:  It's a slight reworking of a phrase from "The Imitation of Christ" by Thomas a' Kempis, one of the first books of Christian Mysticism I read. It basically means to turn your back on the the material world and try to feel God's presence instead.

Last Sigh:  The titles of the tracks on this album are also more specific and "visual" in a number of instances ("A Golden Bell And A Pomegranate", "The Redeemer Of Blood" and "The Seven Abominations Of The Heart" in particular). Did you have a stronger focus for what you wanted to express with this work? Or, to what do you ascribe this development?

Caul:  I did have a much stronger focus, mostly because my faith had started to grow and I wanted to express all the things I was experiencing. I think that's why it has the most variety of the 3 CD's, I wanted it to reflect all the aspects of my burgeoning faith, of what I was going through.

Last Sigh:  The CD also contains one of the most achingly beautiful pieces of your body of work -- "The Type And Shadow Of Our Bodies" -- and once again it carries a very visual title. Could you tell us something about this piece? And, what the title means to you?

Caul:  Originally the track started out with more of a "jazz" feel! It had standup bass some other things. It didn't work though and I ended up reworking it into the present version. The title came from a TV show -- I was watching some weird fundamentalist Christian show show very early on a Sunday morning and a guy was talking about the Ark of the Covenant. I was getting ready for work and was still sleepy, so I wasn't following along very well, but there was something he was talking about being "the type and shadow of our bodies." I have absolutely no idea what he was talking about and I still don't. The phrase really hit me and I scribbled it down before I rushed off to work. Maybe somebody can fill me in someday!

Last Sigh:  Your third and most recent CD Reliquary came out late in 1997 on the Italian label Eibon Records. The sound of this CD appears a lot richer and more dynamic than that of the first two; it is also musically more varied. To what do you accredit these developments?

Caul:  When it comes down to it, I was just directed to make it that way, that's just the way it turned out. Personally, I did want it to have a more musical atmosphere to it so as to reflect what I was interested in at the time. I also wanted to move on in a sense, I had done the more abstract stuff and I wanted to try to create similar environments with more traditional instrumentation. When it comes down to it, I was just directed to make it that way.

Last Sigh:  While all your work has been spiritually/religiously influenced, Reliquary is the first (of your CDs) to directly refer to Christ and the Judeo-Christian tradition. How has your spiritual outlook developed between the first two CDs and Reliquary?

Caul:  It's gotten much stronger and is more of an influence in my life. I wish my life totally revolved around it and was the complete basis for my life. Unfortunately, I've spent most of my life being a non-believer, and I'm kind of stubborn, so the change is coming slow in too many respects.

Last Sigh:  The title Reliquary refers to a container of some sort meant to store religious icons. To what extent do you feel that the music of Caul is a vessel to express religious belief?

Caul:  The music I do as Caul is a vessel to communicate my experience with God. It's not a vehicle to overtly promote Christianity, though if some people come to Christianity because of Caul, that would be great. It's a musical expression of what I experience, having a relationship with God. That's all it is as well, there are no other reasons to do it.

Last Sigh:  In the aforementioned interview with Jason Mantis, you mentioned that you "received" your music from "someplace else"; a place that at the time you were only just beginning to explore, and not able to define. Would you be better able to describe this "someplace else" today?

Caul:  Not really, I get my ideas from God. I can't really know the mind of God, why I'm supposed to be doing this music. I just do it. I know if what I'm doing is the way I'm supposed to be doing it or not, I'm guided towards the right way. I get as close as I can get with the skills I have.

Last Sigh:  A fourth Caul CD Vardøger is scheduled to be released by Malignant (the label that released the first CD) very soon. Why did you choose to take the intermediary two releases to other labels?

Caul:  It just worked out that way. Jason suggested I send some stuff to Martyn Bauer, he was starting up a label. He liked my work and wanted to release something by me. Mauro at Eibon contacted me to express his enthusiasm for my music and he offered, since he had a label, to release something of mine. After I do Vardøger, I'm going to do another one for Eibon.

Last Sigh:  Can you give us some indication of what to expect from this upcoming release?

Caul:  More of the same, really. This one revolves generally around the idea of sin and chasing after what you think is real, or what you think you really need, not realizing it may just be a phantom. I've done some musical pieces for it, but I think it's going to have some more abstract things on it, more than Reliquary does.

Last Sigh:  Your homepage also mentions the upcoming release of a limited CD containing early material. Do you know yet what material this CD will feature (your early tapes?), and what label it will be released on?

Caul:  It will basically be a compilation of music from the first and third tapes. The second one was more drone kind of stuff, and I don't like it as much. It's going to be out on Beautiful Records, a Canadian label. I don't know when it will ever see the light of day. Krista and Shaun are very busy and they like to be able to enjoy the work they do on their label, so they work on it when they have the time. So it could be a year from now, easily.

Last Sigh:  In addition to Caul, you are also involved in other musical projects. What are the statuses of these projects at the present?

Caul:  Well, Trust Obey has been in limbo for a while. Tertium Non Data, which is a series of improvisations John Bergin and I did together is going to be out on Crowd Control, probably next year. The Suicide Pact, a collaboration between John, myself, Chris Snipes and Jarboe is also going to be out on Crowd Control. That's about it for now.

Last Sigh:  What future plans do you have for Caul? Do you have any plans of touring?

Caul:  I don't necessarily have any specific future plans for Caul. I'll just keep making the music and hopefully someone will want to keep putting it out. It would be great to be able to make a living off of Caul but I'm pretty realistic about knowing that there's no way it would ever happen. It's not really the point anyway but it would be nice. I've been asked to do some shows but I haven't done any. It's something that would require the right personnel and amount of time to put it together, which I'm not going to have once I start school. I think it would be great at some point, but I'm not really figuring it in to what I do.