A Brief History of William Tyler

William Tyler is a Nashville-based guitarist who has played with Lambchop, the Silver Jews, Bonnie 'Prince' Billy, Tim Chad and Sherry, Charlie Louvin, and his own solo project the Paper Hats. Tyler is also the founder of the Sebastian Speaks record label, which has released records such as Hilarity and Despair: American Answering Tapes Volume 1, a "compendium of discarded and disregarded answering machine tapes" as well as records by Forrest Bride and Ted Lucas. On November 23rd, William will be releasing Behold the Spirit under his own name on the Tompkins Square label.

I sent Mr. Tyler a few e-mails with questions about his experiences playing on some of the many records and songs that he has. I didn't ask him about every piece of music he leant his talents to... but for the ones I did, William was able to provide me with some great stories about how these songs and LPs came to be. This guy rocks!

Check out his stories below...

"Death of an Heir of Sorrows" by Silver Jews from Bright Flight, 2001

Back in the Spring of 2001 I got a call from David Berman asking me to play guitar on the upcoming Silver Jews record. I was 21 at the time, barely knew what I was doing with the fretboard, but I was used to being around folks that were a lot more accomplished and older than I. We tracked "Bright Flight" in a basement studio in Nashville over just a few days, all live, barely any overdubs, straight to two inch tape. I have fond memories of frequenting local burger haunts with Tim Barnes and being the designated driver most evenings for David and Marky (Nevers). I feel like this is precisely the kind of album David moved to Nashville to make: old school and no nonsense, with accompaniment that manages to embellish while still being sympathetic. In many ways, my favorite Silver Jews album, though not due to my own contributions!

Master and Everyone by Bonnie 'Prince' Billy, 2003

I am fairly certain this is the first Nashville record Will made. He had befriended Nevers through David Berman and came down from Louisville in the summer of 2002 to track this album with his brother Paul. I played on three or four songs, Tony Crow played on a couple as well, but I recall Will and Marky wanting to limit the overdubs. I think that is one of the paramount reasons this record is so powerful. It's spare without being stark.

"Being Tyler" by Lambchop from Aw Cmon, 2004

I have played with Lambchop on and off, but mainly on, for the last ten years. When I joined the band I was a wide-eyed decade younger than the next youngest member, and there were a good five years of hazing to follow. I redshirted early on as a guitar player since there were already like 1000 pickers in the ensemble, but by the time of "Aw Cmon" I was taking over a lot of lead parts. Ironically enough I had very little to do with this particular track, other than the fact that I was absent at the rehearsal where the band learned this song. In "honor" of my non-presence during the genesis of the song, Kurt named it for me.

Tanglewood Numbers by Silver Jews, 2005

This was the kind of epic album that everyone seemed to play on, like David Crosby's first album, or "Son of Schmilsson". My involvement with "Tanglewood" was limited to some overdubs on about half the tracks, a few weeks after the core band (including Malkmus, Kotzur, and Mike Fellows) had already recorded the bulk of the songs at Marky's house. That said, one of my favorite places in the universe to listen to music is coming off the console speakers in Nevers' front room, and I recall we spent two evenings (including a desolately chilly Valentine's night) overdubbing on this one.

"The Sleeping Prophet" by The Paper Hats from Deseret Canyon, 2009

"Deseret Canyon" was the first solo album I attempted, and its recording sprawled over the course of a few "favor" weekends at Mark Nevers' house. Basically whenever he had a free weekend he would let me come over and track some music, and due to my extreme jitters at finally getting to record some of my guitar compositions, I needed quite a few takes on each song. Looking back on it, I really could have used those beta blockers that concert pianists use to calm their nerves. On this song, we spent a whole day layering ambient noise tracks in addition to some fine pedal steel playing by Paul Niehaus (Lambchop, Calexico).

"Caller ID" by Tim Chad & Sherry from Baby We Can Work It Out, 2010

Tim Chad is the alter/uber ego of Silver Jews drummer Brian Kotzur, a born showman and one of the best damn percussionists I have ever had the privilege of playing with. A lot of people might feel that with this band, we all have our tongues firmly planted in cheek but I look on it as a group of Nashville musicians trying to make party music safe again for a very jaded age. We love our Barefoot Jerry records as much as our Prince records, and our road trip mixes bounce between the Dead, latter day Isley Brothers, and the Butthole Surfers.