Greg Dulli talks solo album ‘Random Desire’ and its influences in BV interview

So this is your first true solo record, did you have a sound in your mind or was it just more like you were the only person available at the time, and it just ended up this way?

I think I knew, I was working on some songs, I'm always working on songs. But once I realized that a bunch of the fellows in my group were going to be busy for a year or more, I just started to think I should do something, I should do my own thing. Then I had a couple songs that I liked already, and then I just built around those. Then probably late last January, early February, that's when I got a hot hand and probably most of the record was written and/or finished in between February and July of last year. I think there was one latecomer, one song was really late, because I had a record and one of the songs wasn't working, so I took it out and wrote a song specifically for that slot, and then it was finished.

Did you have at that point an idea in your mind, like what you wanted it to sound like, as opposed to a Twilight Singers' record or an Afghan Whigs' record?

Well, the thing that I always had about those records was by and large, in both the Whigs and the Twilight Singers, while I was the songwriter, I was probably the least talented player in the groups. So I had ringers around me always, and in this particular case, I was like, "Dude, you've got to be the ringer this time." Unless it's just out of your league, and then you can call someone. There's someone joining me on every single song, but by and large I am doing the lion's share of the playing. That became the sound, I didn't have to have the best drummer, I didn't have to have the best bass player, I was serving the song as the writer. It was really cool. Once I let go of that and let it just be that, it was that became the sound, I was the sound.

What was the most difficult area of performing and recording process for you doing everything, or most everything?

No difficulty. I don't really, my way of life is not difficult. Other people have difficult lives and vocations, mine is, "Wow, do I need a bridge? Should I put hi-hat on this?" Those are my decisions, so there was just nothing really putting me out. I felt like this record really wanted to happen, so it kept helping me make it happen.

Your tour starts in about a month, who is in your band for this?

It's myself, Jon Skibic is playing guitar, he is a Twilight Singers and Afghan Whigs' alumni. Rick Nelson, same thing. And then a young man by the name of Trey Bourgeois, he is the drummer. He was the Whigs' lighting guy for the last few tours, and Keeler took him out as the Raconteurs drum tech on the last Raconteurs tour. I had seen Trey play at soundchecks and made note of that, and he is the drummer. Joseph Arthur, who is supporting all the shows, he's going to jump up and play probably about half the show with us. He's the swing man, he'll play when Rick's playing strings, Joe will play bass, and when we need a piano player that's not Rick or myself, it will be Joe. He's got some things to do. But by and large, mostly it will be a four-piece band.

Is Joseph bringing his paint kit on tour?

I encouraged him to do it, so I love watching him sing and paint, it's fantastic. I have several of Joe's paintings, so I'm a huge fan of him as just a human being, let alone an artist.

Before we get into your list, I also wanted to mention a couple other influences that I hear. When Andy Gill died you tweeted about how Gang of Four's third album, Songs of the Free, was a big influence on you. A lot of people just point to Entertainment! these days, what was it about Songs of the Free that grabbed you?

I got turned on to that record by some girls I went to college with, and they not only loved a man in a uniform, they loved the song, "I Love a Man in a Uniform." That was the song that got me into that record, and I subsequently, my roommates had Entertainment!, and I got caught up on Gang of Four. But Songs of the Free was my gateway drug into the Gang of Four universe. I had never heard someone play guitar like that guy, let alone write the type of songs that they were writing. Super unique group, nobody like them. Songs of the Free was my way in.

I think for a lot of people, especially in the mid '80s, it was, because that song was unavoidable at alternative discos or whatever.

The girls, they love to see you shoot.

A band that came to mind  for me when I was listening to Random Desire  -- do you remember that Manchester band Doves?

I love Doves, and I love ... I don't know if you heard, Jimi Goodwin made a solo record a couple years ago. Those songs, there's a song about whiskey just called "Oh! Whiskey." It's so beautiful, and there's a live version where he does it with his band, and I'm watching this, I'm like, "How is this song not a smash?" But I never really understood why Doves weren't huge. I really love Doves.

So let's go through the list you sent me, and the first one you had was trumpeter Donald Byrd. Was there any particular record that was your gateway or big influence?

There's this song called "Cristo Redentor," which is on A New Perspective from 1963, he recut it on that funk album in the '70s, Thank You ... For Funking Up My Life. But that song in particular was on a playlist that I had when I was driving out, when I would drive the two-and-a-half hours to Joshua Tree every so often to work on the record, back and forth. "Lansana's Priestess" was another song that I loved off that. I love Donald Byrd, and he taught at Howard University, and his proteges were a group called The Blackbyrds who had a bunch of hits themselves. They were his students.