Nashville Webmaster: I see you are a grad of Oberlin. Your bands (Codeine, Come) as well as Liz Phair, Seam, and Bitch Magnet also sprung forth from there. What was it like artistically/musically during your tenure there? Did you know liz during your time at Oberlin?

Chris Brokaw: --i only knew liz very peripherally at oberlin. she was a friend of a friend. i don't really feel able to comment about what oberlin was like artistically or musically. it was a small liberal arts college 30 miles south of cleveland. i was there to study! i ended up playing a lot of music too but i don't really feel like i can comment on any prevailing artistic vibe there.

Webmaster: What were your first impressions upon meeting Liz? Was Liz initially reticent about playing music around you?

Chris Brokaw : my first impressions of liz were that she was very gracious; generous of spirit; and really smart. an exciting person to talk with. she wasn't really reticent; i walked in her bedroom and saw that she had a guitar and i played her some stuff and she played me some stuff. pretty relaxed.

You initially came out to SF to meet-up with one of Liz's roomies (Nora?). Descibe the scene there at the time (mostly arty types from oberlin living the boho life). were you familiar with her roomates at the time, future film-makers Nora MacCoby and Charles Wurmfeld?

Chris Brokaw: ---well...i went out there to pursue a little romance that didn't quite pan out at the time. actually, it was kind of a disaster, and liz sort of saved my ass by driving me around san francisco and cheering me up. the scene there was both exhilerating and awful, in a slightly hallucinatory way that seems very san francisco...it was pretty interesting. they had the biggest dog i'd ever seen in my life, as big as a horse...everyone there was really smart, and interesting to talk to, that's for sure...

Webmaster: A question from fan jeremy engle: What did you think of Liz's guitar style at the time? Her style or lack thereof now?

Chris Brokaw: ---i thought her guitar playing was amazing. she had these strange chords i'd never seen before that sounded completely natural and consonant but unlike anything i'd really seen. sophisticated and complex "without sounding that way", if you get me.

Webmaster: Give us your personal review of the Girlysound tapes.

Chris Brokaw: ---i thought they were really stunning. i couldn't believe this trove of great songs. i also loved that she was recording this at her parents' house, and the tapes sounded like she was singing quietly so that they wouldn't hear her. i thought they were really exciting, i thought she had instantly hatched as the best new songwriter in America.

Webmaster: Elaborate a little on the tape trading circles that you circulated Girlysound on. Is it true you fowarded copies of the tapes to Gerard Cosloy, Matador owner?

Chris Brokaw: ---here's the truth of the matter: i never circulated those tapes at all. i made copies for 3 friends, 2 of whom completely ignored it. (the 3rd was my sister, who made copies for a couple of friends of hers.) tae, from kicking giant, was the one who made hundreds of copies of them and sent them around. at one point i saw a review in some little fanzine and was glad for it. i didn't know about liz signing with matador until i read about it in Tower/Pulse magazine! i'm glad that maybe i encouraged liz to record her songs, but, the rest was other people's work.

Webmaster: What was your opinion of the progression of the Girlysound tapes to what would become most of Exile in Guyville?

Chris Brokaw: ---initially i wasn't really crazy about Guyville. i loved the starkness of the girlysound tapes, and thought that that was the best and strongest vehicle for those songs. i also didn;t have much taste for pop music, at the time, and so the popification of many of those songs left me cold. i also was bummed that several tunes, such as "girlsgirlsgirls", had been these long, almost dylan-esque epics on the girlysound tapes, and then cut down to more sort of bite-sized tunes on Guyville. i really did think that liz was selling herself short. i understood what she was trying to do, i just didn't necessarily agree with it. fortunately for her, everyone else did, so...

i listened to Guyville recently and really enjoyed it. it's an amazingly well-crafted album.

Webmaster: I see where Tae Won Yu received a Exile in Guyville gold record for his efforts in launching liz with the girlysound tapes. Did she hook you up with a plaque?

Chris Brokaw: ---she did not. but he deserved it a lot more than i!