I notice that on The Raven you‘re doing a lot of things with your voice, really pushing it in ways I’ve never heard before. Is that something you‘ve been working on?
For a long time. Ever since I sang with Jimmy Scott. Jimmy taught me a whole bunch of things. I’ve been putting them into effect.
As sound itself is such a big part of The Raven‘s impact, your choice of Willem Dafoe as a narrator in parts was particularly inspired.
His voice is so beautiful to listen to. Forget about the words that he’s saying, just listen to that voice: It‘s like a great chocolate bar.
His tone is very persuasive. On headphones it goes right down your spine.
See, that’s what I thought. God, listen to Willem, Jesus. Then pay attention to what he‘s saying. ”I who write shall have long since gone my way into the region of shadows . . .“
Elizabeth Ashley does some readings on The Raven, and she’s wicked, too. I didn‘t know she could do things like that.
She’s amazing. By the end of Fall of the House of Usher, God, that‘s brilliant. Wow. And it moves forward. You gotta hear it on big speakers, check that out. You can hear it on headphones, too, but it’s all in your head and not your solar plexus.
What is it in Poe‘s work that you identify with?
It’s what the world identifies with. It‘s compulsive, obsessive, anxious -- paranoia. This essay he wrote, ”The Imp of the Perverse“ -- now I took that title and wrote a little play called ”Imp of the Perverse“ in the album. I was just writing in the style of Poe, ’cause Bob Wilson had said to me, ”Can you write a little Freudian take on Poe?“ And that‘s what it was. For better or for worse. Anyway, what was the question?
What pulls you toward Poe’s work?
The theme: Why am I so attracted to that which I know is bad for me?
Yeah, perverseness. Like in ”The Black Cat,“ deliberately hurting the one you love most.
Here‘s a guy who’s done some bad thing, whatever he did. He‘s running down the street, he feels the urge bubbling up on him to kill someone. I mean, he couldn’t get away with it; he‘s home free, but . . .
When I did the Halloween show a couple years back at a church in New York, I did ”The Tell-Tale Heart,“ and it’s when I did it out loud that I finally understood the story; I had really missed the whole point. In ”The Tell-Tale Heart,“ at the end, he hears this pounding heart -- well, it‘s probably his own. And the cop is sitting there and the guy whose heart is pounding says, ”Fucking liar, what do you mean you don’t hear anything? Don‘t you hear that? Do you think I’m stupid? Do you think I‘m fucking stupid? You’re mocking me? You‘re mocking me? I know you fucking hear that, you cunt-sucking son of a bitch, you think I’m stupid, you could just lie to me?“
And that‘s why: ”You’re mocking me.“ I said, Oh, there you go.
Everybody feels that rage. It‘s not just confessing a crime. Most people are upset if they’re in a rage, or they do something during that rage. The guilt from that rage everybody knows from inside. Everybody‘s gotten angry out of their minds. I’d like to see the person who stands up and says, ”I haven‘t.“
That’s what this is about. Dealing with that: What is that impulse? We‘re animals. And everybody deals with it the best they can.
