guy picciotto talks with aaron gemmil of aaa film.

q: You were just in New York completing the Fugazi documentary with Jem Cohen. Are you happy with how it's turned out? Could you tell us anything about it?

guy: Basically for the last ten or eleven years our friend Jem Cohen has been filming the band on tour, at shows, in the studio and at practice using all kinds of different equipment: Super 8, 16mm, video, etc. People familiar with the band will probably recognize his name because he collaborated on lyrics with us on the song "Glue Man" and on the graphics for our last 3 records, but he is also a pretty well established underground filmmaker in his own right. Anyway, about two and a half years ago we decided to get serious about putting together all this footage he'd been amassing and as a result we are finally ready to put out what will be a 2 hour film. It will be released as a video available through Dischord and maybe also as an actual film blow-up if we can get the cash together to pay for the film transfer. It was a really interesting project to work on because there was a truly collaborative process between the band and Jem, trying to feel a middle road between our perception of ourselves (probably not the most objective frame of reference) and his more distanced viewpoint. It's somewhere between a straight documentary and a kind of dub/collage free for all. Anyhow, I hope people will find it interesting. There is a ton of music unique to the film that we used as soundtrack as well as a lot of live performances. There probably will be a soundtrack to accompany the release of the video as well.

q: Jem contributed lyrics to your first E.P, has done the cover art for the last your last three albums, and now the film.... How long have you known him, and how've you maintained such a close working relationship with him?

guy: Jem and Ian actually went to the same high school, so they've been friends since the late 70's, early 80's. The working relationship started very early in Fugazi's history. He'd made this film called Glue Man* ). He kind of got us involved on the soundtrack for that short film and it sparked our song of the same name which Jem contributed a lot of the lyrics for. His brother Adam also helped with photography for some of the early records, like the upside down live shot on the cover of our first 12" and the subway photo on the cover of Steady Diet. I think some of our best collaborations have been on the covers of the last 3 records- they just hold together really organically; there's a nice thread running through them.

q: You also made some short films on your own... what led you to make a film? You mentioned John Cassavettes in In on the Killtaker; is he an influence?

guy: Ever since I was really young, I've always been completely jacked up on films. I have a long list of filmmakers whose work I am really affected by. Cassavettes was certainly one of them and I wanted to pay tribute to not just his films themselves but also his manner of working, his really intense fusion of autonomy with a collaborative community instinct. As for my own movies, I've only made two Super 8 films called Silly Game and Please Cry. They were really fun to make but I'm not sure I can make any great claims for them. Both are kind of portraits of the same character: the first deals with the guy in isolation, brewing tea and shoplifting obsessively; In the second one, he makes contact with someone else at the zoo and something mysterious and ill comes down between them.

q: What's your favorite Cassavettes work?

guy: I can't really rank the Cassavettes films- each one has elements that completely blow me away even after having seen most of them a few times. Killing of a Chinese Bookie, Faces, Husbands and Minnie & Moskowitz- even having listed four I want to keep adding all the others, Opening Night etc. I think anyone interested in film or acting or scriptwriting or camera work or independent production will find a lot to learn from any and all of these films.

q: What other films and filmmakers do you admire?

guy: As far as other filmmakers go I think another one who impacted hard on me was Robert Bresson. (Pickpocket, Diary of a Country Priest, L'argent) he really rejected the concept of movies as filmed theater and in a sense is kind of a polar opposite, a 'cold' filmmaker compared to a director like Cassavettes. What unites them in my mind is a strict adherence to an uncompromising (though very different) personal aesthetic that they defended despite the difficulties they faced getting their work made.

q: Considering that Fugazi is well known for supporting grass-roots, independent social causes, it's surprising that your lyrics have been (with obvious exceptions) so apolitical. End Hits, though, has more transparently political themes. Was there a conscious shift to political lyrics?

guy: I always am blown away by the variety of responses to our lyrics and specifically as to how they are weighed "politically." Some people think the earlier records were far more straightforward and politically didactic, others say the same thing about the later stuff. As far as we are concerned there was no conscious shift in either direction; We've always just written about whatever we wanted. To my mind we've always had a lot of songs that addressed so-called "political" themes but I also think we would probably have a pretty large umbrella over what we consider political. Ultimately the lyrics work or don't work in the ear of the listeners- that's the beauty of interpretation.

q: Do you think political lyrics are effective in rock music?

guy: If the question is whether lyrics themselves create social change, of course not - that work must be done by people, and certainly writing a song is not a substitute for engaging in real political action. That said, it's also true that people draw inspiration and fuel from music so it's kind of like a mid-wife position, I guess. It can stoke the engine for the work at hand.

q: Fugazi has a really dedicated fan-base. Are you aware that there are people who consider you heroes? And if so, how does that affect your ability or willingness to keep doing what you do?

guy: I think It's a natural thing for people to get into bands and draw a lot of energy from them. Music really encourages an atmosphere of reciprocal give and take between the musician and the audience. It's a mutually feeding transmission. Certainly when I was younger I drew a tremendous amount of power from seeing bands like the Bad Brains or listening to groups like Black Flag, and that gave me some of the impetus to want to make my own sound, find my own outlet. The only time i think that kind of dynamic becomes kind of fucked up is when instead of inspiring more activity it serves to kind of paralyze someone so that the source of inspiration becomes the only voice and there is no answering energy, if that makes any sense. As far as affecting my ability or willingness to do what I do, I really don't think about it too much. I'm happy there are people out there who listen to what we do and get off on it but I don't let the consciousness of that hang me up or really shape the way we work. the work kind of stems from a different impulse- it's a creative thing and once it's materialized then its ready to be shared. The sharing of the statement doesn't really intrude on the shaping of the statement.

q: If anything, I think the sharing would enhance the shaping of the statement...

guy: Well it does when we are performing live... That's when we really work off the crowd and there is kind of a reciprocal thing happening. But when we are writing or practicing its really a lot more of an insulated vibe. We're working off each other and there isn't a lot of consideration for how it's going to go over with the people who listen to us. I don't mean that disparagingly, it's just that attempting to please everyone isn't a good ethic to write songs by- it's too stifling.

q: has it been more difficult to function as a band since other members have to commute cross-country to get to practice, or have settled into more stable, conventional, 'adult' lifestyles?

guy: Actually, we no longer have the commute cross-country dilemma we faced back in '94 when Brendan [Canty] was living out in Seattle. That was a pretty difficult thing to pull off but Brendan actually moved back to DC a few years ago, so that's no longer a problem for us. It is true that since Brendan got married and had a kid that his family obligation has prevented us from the massive long term touring we used to do over the last ten years but we are just finding different ways to attack it. We just have to be a bit more strategic in our scheduling because we respect the time he needs to set aside. As for having settled into more stable, conventional, "adult" lifestyles, I'm not sure I'd buy that as a premise. It is true that, like all human beings, we've aged biologically - whether or not that makes us conventional or "adult" is up for debate, I guess.

q: you used to tour 6 months a year...have you missed being on the road, or are you happy to take a vacation?

guy: Personally I do miss it a little bit. I like to travel and playing shows has never lost its insane charge for me, but there are some good aspects to not leaving all the time. I love DC and I love being able to record more bands here. It's nice not to always be struggling to maintain some semblance of good health.

q: i've heard heard that it's from a reference to a pizza parlor in allen ginsburg's howl, and that it's military slang for "f'ed up situation." what does fugazi mean?

guy: Its a military slang term similar to something like "snafu." Ian found it in a book called NAM which was a collection of GI's reflecting on their Vietnam experiences. It does mean "a f'ed up situation," coming from this breakdown: F'ed Up Got Ambushed Zipped In. The word turns up in a bunch of other places, like in Howl. People are always sending us strange sightings of the word and its many uses, particularly in other languages. Our collection grows daily.