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Going the Distance
Twenty years into her career, pop singer-songwriter Aimee Mann is still fighting the good fight.

By Drew Pearce

During the 14 years between Aimee Mann’s first hit, 1985’s “Voices Carry” with her former band ’Til Tuesday, and her Grammy and Oscar nominations for the Magnolia soundtrack, music fans lived through the grunge years, the ska and swing revivals, and not one, but two generations of teen pop. As those trends came and went, Mann continued to refine her edgy, intelligent songcraft, earning critical acclaim and a devoted following. Along the way, however, her battles with record labels garnered almost as much press as her music, and it seemed she might be destined to be remembered more for the fighting than her writing.

Then in 1999, director Paul Thomas Anderson’s film Magnolia put Mann back in the spotlight. Her songs, including her second breakthrough single, “Save Me,” provided not only the backbone of the soundtrack, but the inspiration for the screenplay as well. In 2000, Mann capitalized on Magnolia’s success by buying back the masters for Bachelor No. 2 and putting it out on her own SuperEgo label. It was a perfectly timed roll of the dice, and the gamble paid off. Fueled by the radio-ready single “Red Vines,” Bachelor No. 2 sold more than 200,000 copies, and in the process Mann became a hero to like-minded indie musicians.

Over the past five years, the 44-year-old singer-songwriter has made the most of her new-found freedom, stepping up the pace of her releases. In 2002, she delivered her fourth solo album, Lost in Space. It contained some of Mann’s sweetest melodies to date, but the lyrics were bleak enough to make you wonder how many songs could be squeezed from the rinds of failed relationships. Last fall, a new, more vibrant sound emerged. Fronting a new band that could not only reproduce her layered arrangements but also rough them up around the edges, Mann released the CD/DVD Live at St. Ann’s Warehouse. Old favorites like “Long Shot” sounded revitalized by the exuberance of the band in the concert setting. Within months, Mann issued The Forgotten Arm, recorded live in the studio with Joe Henry producing.

The Forgotten Arm is a concept album that chronicles the relationship of a man and woman who meet at a state fair in the 1970s in Mann’s home state of Vir-ginia. Though the characters struggle with the familiar demons of addiction and defeatism, they don’t seem to have reached their dead end yet. On this record, instead of getting the rearview-mirror perspective, we get to ride along in the backseat as the story unfolds. I talked to Mann by phone from her LA studio where she was preparing for the tour in support of the new album.

What inspired you to write a concept album? Did you have a story line in mind when you started?

MANN The idea of writing from song to song about the same people sounded appealing. The beauty of a concept is you don’t have to come up with a hard-and-fast plot. You can just picture these people in certain places and certain circumstances. Part of this also just comes from writing. You find yourself writing something and then you try to figure out what it’s about: “Who are these people and what are they doing?” I had written a song called “Goodbye Caroline,” and I was like, “What’s going on here? I wonder if this is the scenario—maybe these two people are out on the road and he’s sort of losing it, and he says, ‘Look, I’ve got to go get some help because I’m having a big freak out.’” So, in my own mind, I have this idea of what might be going on.

So the songs came first and the story emerged from them?

MANN Yeah. It’s a little of this and a little of that. But some of it’s just a way to incorporate my own interests. I had started boxing, so I found myself thinking in terms of boxing metaphors.

Why did you take up boxing?

MANN I met somebody who used to be a boxer. He gave me a boxing lesson. So I started taking lessons for real. Also, he was a recovering crack addict. So I used bits and pieces of things from his life. In fact, there’s a song taken directly from a conversation I was having with him when he had a relapse; it was a really bad situation.

Which song was that?

MANN “Clean up for Christmas.” He actually said that to me. He said, “Look, I think I’m going to try to clean up for Christmas and then that’s it, because I can’t figure out how to live sober and I can’t live loaded.”

Where does the title The Forgotten Arm come from?

MANN Well . . . [Laughs.] I was going in to spar, and my friend was showing me some moves, kind of like—not dirty tricks, but tricks. So he showed me this trick called “the forgotten arm,” which is when you get them against the ropes and you press your right arm against their waist and hit them with your left so they forget about the right. Then you come up with an upper cut when they’re busy defending against the left. Anytime he shows me a trick he makes up some name for it.

Why did you decide to record live this time?

MANN That’s part of the concept, too. I have a lot of vivid memories about the Virginia State Fair, which is why I wanted to set it there. There’s a bit of a redneck edge—not really trailer-park—but a car-ny redneck edge. Music was always present. Certain rides have music blaring. So I wanted the music to sound like period music.

Something the characters might have heard on the radio back then?

MANN Exactly. Something they might hear over the loudspeaker, or maybe a band that was playing in the fairgrounds.

One notable thing about your records is how layered the arrangements are, but there seem to be fewer countermelodies on The Forgotten Arm.

MANN I like layers, too. But for inspiration, I went back to certain records I’d listened to when I was growing up, like Elton John’s Tumbleweed Connection and Rod Stewart’s Every Picture Tells a Story. What I like about them is there’s virtually nothing going on. When you really strip it down, each part becomes more exciting. That does sacrifice the bits that come in and out, but it makes up for it in each sound having more of an impact—and in the joy of great players playing together.

Does the Southern rock sound of this record come from the players you chose, or was it intentional?

MANN It was intentional. My instructions to the band were “Mott the Hoople with a touch of alt-country,” which sums up the music you’d hear in Virginia. There was a bit of the hayseed. You know, bands like Lynyrd Skynyrd. But there’s a bit of the glammy stuff, too.

Without as much ornamentation in the arrangements, the lyrics and vocals stand out more. The way you’re singing seems different, too, a little lighter.

MANN I don’t know exactly why. I have had people comment that they think my singing is significantly better, not to toot my own horn, because I can’t really see that it’s different. I think it’s a function of the songwriting. When you’re writing about characters, everything doesn’t have to be so perfect or precious or personal. You can be empathetic to the characters without getting all involved yourself or feeling like you have to put in things from your own experience.

The lyrics seem less analytical this time.

MANN That’s probably it. It’s more that I’m telling a story or illustrating certain themes, and not really worried about analyzing what’s going on and why, which is something I used to be more interested in. You can see these people together—this is what they’re doing and this is what they say, and hopefully what they feel is self-evident.

Why did you choose Joe Henry as producer?

MANN Joe’s awesome. He lives here [in Los Angeles] and I’d run into him a few times. He produced a record for John Doe that he had me sing background vocals on. I just thought it would be the perfect thing. He makes records really fast and makes them pretty much with a live band. And that’s the kind of thing I wanted to do. But I also wanted somebody to take on the responsibility of choosing the players and putting it together. I have a live band that I really like, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s the perfect thing for the studio or for these songs. So I thought, well, I’ll just tell him what my concept is and see what he puts together. And it happened really fast. We spent very little time recording. We got Jeff Trott to play most of the guitar because I’d enjoyed his playing in Sheryl Crow’s band, and I was after kind of a straight-ahead ’70s rock sound, so I thought he would be appropriate.

How do you keep things fresh? How do you keep from repeating the same chord progressions and melodic ideas?

MANN I think I probably do [repeat progressions]. I really should keep track in some way, but the only way I do is that I’ll play something for my manager and say, “Does this sound familiar?” And occasionally somebody will say, “That sounds an awful lot like that song,” but by then I’m already attached to it, so I’m like, “Whatever. I don’t care.” But I probably do have similar cadences, not from song to song, but ones that will pop up here and there.

I have to be careful not to use the II major [chord] too much. That’s a big favorite of mine. I never like using the V. But I’m consciously trying to stick the V in there instead of the II major every now and then. I’ve got a lot of minor V on this record. One to minor V.

On songs like “Save Me,” you seem to save the clever couplets for opening lines and verses (“You look like a perfect fit / For a girl in need of a tourniquet”) and the more emotional lines for the chorus (“But can you save me / From the ranks of the freaks / Who suspect they could never love anyone”). Is that a conscious decision so the clever lines won’t seem overdone because you don’t hear them repeated in the chorus?

MANN The chorus, I think, always has the feel of an emotional release, so yeah, sometimes I think that if I’ve got a couple of clever lines in the verse, I can get away with having a simpler, more heartfelt chorus. It’s a fine line to walk. You do have to balance it out, because it can just get cheesy and Hallmarky.

What was the co-writing process with Elvis Costello on “The Other End of the Telescope”?

MANN It was written by mail. I had a melody that I liked and couldn’t really come up with anything for it. Elvis and I had talked about writing a song together, so I sent him a cassette of what I had. It was like those ads [laughs] that you used to see in the back of magazines: “Send us your music and we’ll write lyrics to it.” So it came back and it
had lyrics and a bridge and it was just great.

How do you keep things fresh? How do you keep from repeating the same chord progressions and melodic ideas?

MANN I think I probably do [repeat progressions]. I really should keep track in some way, but the only way I do is that I’ll play something for my manager and say, “Does this sound familiar?” And occasionally somebody will say, “That sounds an awful lot like that song,” but by then I’m already attached to it, so I’m like, “Whatever. I don’t care.” But I probably do have similar cadences, not from song to song, but ones that will pop up here and there.

I have to be careful not to use the II major [chord] too much. That’s a big favorite of mine. I never like using the V. But I’m consciously trying to stick the V in there instead of the II major every now and then. I’ve got a lot of minor V on this record. One to minor V.

On songs like “Save Me,” you seem to save the clever couplets for opening lines and verses (“You look like a perfect fit / For a girl in need of a tourniquet”) and the more emotional lines for the chorus (“But can you save me / From the ranks of the freaks / Who suspect they could never love anyone”). Is that a conscious decision so the clever lines won’t seem overdone because you don’t hear them repeated in the chorus?

MANN The chorus, I think, always has the feel of an emotional release, so yeah, sometimes I think that if I’ve got a couple of clever lines in the verse, I can get away with having a simpler, more heartfelt chorus. It’s a fine line to walk. You do have to balance it out, because it can just get cheesy and Hallmarky.

What was the co-writing process with Elvis Costello on “The Other End of the Telescope”?

MANN It was written by mail. I had a melody that I liked and couldn’t really come up with anything for it. Elvis and I had talked about writing a song together, so I sent him a cassette of what I had. It was like those ads [laughs] that you used to see in the back of magazines: “Send us your music and we’ll write lyrics to it.” So it came back and it had lyrics and a bridge and it was just great.

What songwriting techniques have you picked up from collaborating?

MANN You pick up a little here and there from everybody you encounter. I wrote with Jon Brion a lot for the first and second record. I learned a lot because he would come up with interesting chord progressions or chords I would never use, and I would incorporate that sound into my vocabulary. But my big learning curve comes from continuing to write myself.

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Aimee Mann's Equipment Picks
This article also appears in Acoustic Guitar, Issue #150

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