This is the third time I’ve talked to and watched PAPA perform in less than year. Darren Weiss is wearing a striped turban and Danny Presant is limping slightly from a pulled ligament in his foot. A college student named Jake has replaced Darren’s older brother on guitar. This isn’t the same PAPA I saw open for Rogue Wave last July, and we both know it.
The band’s debut LP Tender Madness (2013) has weathered the tour circuit, and is now headed back out into the summer festival season. While some of the songs are nearly three years years old, both Darren and Danny agree they still have plenty to share from the record.
“As we tour the songs survive little mutations through our interactions with an audience. There are different kinds of life breathed into each set,” says Darren. “Or maybe they liked Tender Madness and were over it, so now we’re about to fuck their shit up all over again.”
PAPA is deep into writing their second album, set to release later this year. During their Sasquatch Sunday night performance on the Yeti stage, the band gave us a taste of some of their new material. It isn’t the PAPA you’d expect, but it’s still the PAPA you adore.
“We’re exploring actually less sounds and more songs,” says Danny. “The sound is more people in a room throwing shit off each other rather than finding sounds that we think are cool.”
On stage, Darren sings, adlibs and shouts so attuned to the music that predicting the next moment is impossible. The chants of “PAPA” mid-set proved that it’s not just me who’s caught on. There’s a reason they call their fans #papaarmy. PAPA pays homage to those kindred spirits and encourages them to proceed with abandon.
It’s an interesting time in music right now. PAPA doesn’t quite fit – nor do they want to. They are somewhere in the middle: not quite indie darlings, not quite mainstream. PAPA is like the bridge between the two trying to wake everyone the hell up.
“As we grow in popularity, I think we continue to be able to put ourselves in a position of not giving a fuck about what people think about us,” says Darren. “We’re focused on being the most interesting, toughest, sexiest versions of ourselves and allow that to speak on our behalf.”
As fairly young artists in the music industry, PAPA has seen (and consciously avoided) the fame game played out by musicians in Kia commercials and in the hands of A&R execs. PAPA is more concerned about evolution – of themselves as artists and of others.
Their most recently released track “I’m Not Sorry” echoes these sentiments. “One of the most important lines to me in that song comes in the bridge, ‘go ahead / call me crazy all you’d like / until you realize / it doesn’t matter if you’re right.’ If insanity is what’s true then that’s so much healthier and better than trying to fit into some bullshit societal position.”
While discussing the current state of music in this country, Darren brings up the song “Rock N Roll Nigger” by Patti Smith. He pauses for a moment, knowing he must be careful with his words.
“The chorus of that song is: ‘outside of society / they’re waitin’ for me / outside of society / that’s where I want to be.’ That’s where I think PAPA exists culturally and that’s where our identity as a band is,” says Darren.
“And even if that makes us less popular but more meaningful to the people who understand what we’re trying to do, that’s infinitely more important to us.”
Danny straightens up on the couch and agrees, “We’re going rogue in 2014.”
