Efter the Parade

The Skinny catches up with Casper Clausen as he and his Efterklang entourage are negotiating the hills of North Dakota. "All we've been doing for the past few days is constant driving," he seems to grumble. "Talking to you guys is a break from the routine."

So he doesn't mind the press haranguing then? "It's nice somehow, even vaguely amusing, but generally cool to see that people are taking an interest in what you're doing, and maybe get to explain yourself a little. It feels like a natural part of making an album; you go through a period of time where you are focussing on the music and then get to step back a little bit from that. Sometimes it's not nice looking at yourself in the mirror all the time, explaining everything you've done, but that can be interesting from a personal perspective."

The album in question is the Danish outfit's third studio LP Magic Chairs, which they are in the U.S. to promote. However, their schedule has hit a slight snag: "We were supposed to have seven band members on tour [Efterklang are comprised of a core group of four which is expanded – often considerably – when playing live], but our violin player Peter Broderick had a problem with his knee, so he had to stay at home, so we're having to make it work as a six-piece."

Fortunately, this setback doesn't appear to be fazing the remainder of the outfit, and the glass is most definitely half-full when Clausen reveals it almost as an opportunity. "A lot of the pieces have been composed with the violin, and when that element is removed, it takes a while to work out if we actually need to substitute for it or if there’s something else going on that’s nice to listen to instead. There are so many elements in our music; it's sometimes hard to tell where the core of the song is. Sometimes there's another sound coming out which you haven't noticed before."

Having been released to very favourable reviews, Magic Chairs is generally considered a more accessible, song-based album by comparison to their previous effort, the sprawling epic that was 2007’s Parades. Such was the layered complexity of the piece (a "Frankenstein's Monster" according to Clausen) that it was only technically possible to play the album live using a full orchestra, a project which Efterklang pulled off with some aplomb last summer, performing with, among others, the Danish National Chamber Orchestra (and documented on the Performing Parades LP/DVD, released last October). "Parades was a big playground where we could explore all the opportunities we could think of. If we needed a tuba player we'd grab the phone and find one; there were no limits to what we could do in the studio. That, strangely, made it a tough project as it can be difficult to know when to stop playing with the sound. It was quite a strain for us, staying in the studio for a year and a half, not playing a single concert. After that, we had to really think about which direction we were going in. It didn't feel natural for us to make it 'bigger' than Parades because that was gigantic and the practical details of organising an orchestra are insane."

For Magic Chairs, Clausen admits, there was a natural tendency to downplay their previous grandiosity. "This time around it was more about limiting ourselves a bit more, and trying to make it easier to transfer to a live setting. The songs were recorded with the four or five of us playing together at the same time, which is a little different for us."

Previous Efterklang releases appeared courtesy of the small but beautifully-formed Yorkshire-based The Leaf Label (who have released work by Caribou, Four Tet and many more notables). This time round, the comparatively big hitters (yet no less independently minded) of 4AD are overseeing the release. Clausen explains the switch: "We've grown as a band and it's now the perfect time for us to move to something bigger – a label that will still understand Efterklang and what we're doing but at the same time be able to push it to more listeners. This was perfect as we’ve been fans of 4AD for a while and when we did contact them they were very keen to release this new album. What was really important was the fact that they gave us the freedom to do whatever we were doing and that they understood that we are a band that works in different ways – on our own – and they just wanted to amplify that a little more than we've been used to. So our mutual perspectives are perfect really."

So does this mean that the darlings of the underground chamber orchestra scene are shilling for the mainstream plaudits? Clausen laughs wryly. "It might sound like that but actually the 4AD deal came about after we'd made most of the songs already. To us it's more apt to imagine it as an experiment for us. We've never made an album like this before and were curious to see what Efterklang would sound like if we made an album in a more accessible, focused or simple way. It's not really made with the purpose of reaching more listeners, but if that happens, it will be nice."