Indie rock star Father John Misty reveals all on his mysterious stage persona

BORN Joshua Michael Tillman forty years ago, he is better known these days as Father John Misty.

But who is this elusive character? This is my attempt to at least scratch the surface.

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Today marks the release of the fifth FJM album, Chloë And The Next 20th Century, a ravishing if dark magnum opus exploring the human condition through the prism of the ultimate gilded cage, Hollywood.

By drawing on the big band era, on classic Seventies singer-songwriters like Harry Nilsson and Randy Newman and by using his indie sensibilities, he creates a world all his own.

It’s like being transported back to the Forties, to a parallel universe where Misty, scotch on the rocks in hand, is sharing sad late-night tales with The Rat Pack.

The songs are populated by vividly realised fictional characters, even a made-up cat called Mr Blue, but the sentiment, you sense, is real.

This approach is hardly surprising from a performer who likes to keep everyone guessing.

For Misty, I guess we should be thinking “Mystery”.

When I ask how his stage persona differs from the Josh Tillman within, he replies: “They’re both sort of arbitrary constructs, aren’t they?

“I’ve never glimpsed naked reality but I’d say one is as untrue as the other.”

Now perhaps you’ll understand my challenge — even he can’t separate the man from the myth.

We do know Tillman spent his early years in Rockville, Maryland, not far from Washington DC, the eldest of four children in a devout Christian family.

By 12, he had learned to play drums and guitar.

After moving to Seattle at 21, he worked in a bakery by day, but, at night, followed his dream of becoming a recording artist.

Discovered by the exceptional yet under-the-radar singer Damien Jurado, his first solo albums were of intimate, sparsely-arranged folk and released under the name J.Tillman.

From 2008, he spent four years as drummer with Fleet Foxes and, for the past decade he has been known as Father John Misty, which, given his religious upbringing, has a distinct whiff of irony about it.

Adopting the alter-ego had a profound effect on Tillman’s music. It became more ambitious, more strange, more varied, more lush, more thought-provoking, more everything in fact.

Suddenly, the singer had found a transcendent path to his creative goals, once again distilled on Chloë And The Next 20th Century.

The album cover shows a bare-footed FJM dressed in a smart suit, reminding me of Paul McCartney walking across Abbey Road.

Sadly, there’s no Beatles reference, as Tillman points out: “It was just better for the composition of the photo if my feet weren’t blacked out.”

As for the showgirl under a spotlight also featured in the black-and-white image, he adds: “The girl in the artwork is supposed to represent this canon, the sound, the history, the things I can’t get away from.”

It is four years since his last album, God’s Favourite Customer, and before the Covid lockdowns kicked in, Tillman had a rewarding time on the road.

UNSPOKEN RULES

“We did some touring in 2018 and ’19 which included our first trip to South America,” he says.

“It was incredible to see the fans there finally, and really fun to play in front of an audience who’d never seen us before.”

As the pandemic hit, Tillman had already written and recorded “some things in varying states of completion”.

He remembers a conversation with some unnamed person about whether songs can be anything more effective as when they say “I love you”.

He recalls another about “the intense bond that forms between people in conflict; whether the history of the world is a love story”.

In typically enigmatic style, Tillman says he doesn’t have any fixed ideas about the outcome of these discussions.

But the questions thrown up got him “writing a few different things”, namely the songs Kiss Me (I Loved You) and The Next 20th Century.”

For Kiss Me, he employs his most delicate of vocals, piano, percussion, horns and dreamy strings to evoke the last desperate embrace of parting lovers.

It conjures up visions of Clark Gable and Vivien Leigh in Gone With The Wind or Deborah Kerr and Burt Lancaster in From Here To Eternity.

It is also a serious stab at making the perfect love song.

When I try to get to the bottom of his album’s Hollywood vibe, Tillman explains it very briefly by saying: “I’m a big Bruce Wagner fan.”

Wagner is a celebrated author and screenwriter whose unflinching work takes aim at Tinseltown to highlight human frailties. Oh, and he co-wrote the script for A Nightmare On Elm Street 3.

I don’t know what makes something ‘deeply funny’ rather than just ‘funny’ but my best guess is that it’s probably a first-hand account of extreme human misery.

Joshua Michael Tillman

If that helps explain Tillman’s thinking behind the album, it’s important to know how he achieved the retro-styled soundscapes to frame his songs.

Chloë And The Next 20th Century represents a full reunion with his go-to producer Jonathan Wilson, himself a fine artist noted for effortlessly fluid guitar playing.

Tillman explains: “From the point after which the songs are written, everything is a full on collaboration with Jonathan.

“I think he gives me a version of his playing that nobody else gets on their records.”

He talks of his special chemistry with Wilson, “the real specific set of sensibilities and unspoken rules we’ve developed over the years”, and the joy of recording with him.

“This was the first record I’d done at his new studio,” says Tillman.

To be out in Topanga (in the hills above LA), the world unspinning, making this totally obsolete, alternate timeline music together was surreal.”

To further enhance his aims, he employed the services of orchestral arranger Drew Erickson.

They had worked together on the FJM covers EP, Anthem +3, the lead track being a heavenly take on Leonard Cohen’s classic, complete with the immortal lines “there is a crack, a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in”.

Tillman says: “Working with just Jonathan and Drew on the Anthem cover made me wonder if we could pull off a whole album that way.

“It took a few days to find the (right) song,” he continues. “I brought in some real weird ones, stuff that’ll never get released.

“After we had Next 20th Century, Kiss Me, We Could Be Strangers, and Buddy’s Rendezvous up and running, I could see the latitude Drew’s arrangements gave me to write a certain kind of story song, like Chloë.
‘Pretty thrilling’

“The record’s identity and central theme became very clear after the first session and the rest of the songs came quick.”

Last night, at London’s Barbican theatre, he realised the live potential of the album by performing with a full orchestra, The Britten Sinfonia.

The appeal of my music has grown steadily more narrow since the first album.

Joshua Michael Tillman

Only two such events have been planned so far in a much bigger tour.

“The total commitment represented by the symphony shows is pretty thrilling,” says Tillman. “Especially with a record like this where I’m not sure it (commitment) actually exists.

“The appeal of my music has grown steadily more narrow since the first album, and to inversely scale up its presentation this way makes it all increasingly dreamlike.

“Particularly with songs like Funny Girl or Chloë, which are so lightweight they’re vapour. I’m doing it just for the sake of doing it, just to hear it.”

The sequencing of the album is crucial, from the shamelessly 1930s jazz lounge atmosphere of opener Chloë to brooding closer, The Next 20th Century, with its squalls of electric guitar.

“I always knew I wanted The Next 20th Century as the last track,” says Tillman.

“I’d like to think once you’ve heard that song, the next listen through the album is pretty altered.

“The intro to Chloë in particular is an extreme next listen, just so gratuitous. I couldn’t resist putting it first.”

Don’t be fooled by the song’s easy-listening sound, however, because the titular character doesn’t get out alive.

The last lines find Tillman crooning: “Her soul is a pitch black expanse/Summer ended on the balcony/She put on Flight of the Valkyries/At her 31st birthday party/Took a leap into the autumn leaves.”

Another key song is Goodbye Mr Blue, on which we find a Turkish Angora pedigree cat symbolising the only bond left in a broken relationship.

“I think the cat is more of a pain in the ass for the narrator, at least at the very start of the song,” says Tillman.

“The ex-girlfriend has advanced in her career and is travelling more now and, as such, can’t look after Mr Blue.

The record’s identity and central theme became very clear after the first session and the rest of the songs came quick.

Joshua Michael Tillman

“So he begrudgingly takes the cat because he doesn’t have anything else going on, which seems like a point of contention in the relationship.

“Mr Blue getting sick and dying brings them back to together for a moment, but you get a sense what’s been lost is lost. Fictional cat.”

Airy standout Q4 is classic Father John Misty, its upbeat lilt at odds with its sinister undercurrents.

The song’s title comes from publisher speak for books published in the fourth quarter of year, and it tells of a writer exploiting his sister’s death for a piece of trash but lucrative literature.

Tillman picks up the story: “There are obviously billboards all over Hollywood. Most of them are for things that look categorically unfunny but which are blurbed, ‘deeply funny’.

“I don’t know what makes something ‘deeply funny’ rather than just ‘funny’ but my best guess is that it’s probably a first-hand account of extreme human misery.”

With that explanation in mind, he adds: “Q4 is just a ‘deeply funny’ little song about consensual exploitation and the gold rush to turn autofiction (fictionalised biography) hot properties into limited series or airport paperbacks.”

Over the past few years, Tillman has contributed to albums by high-profile artists such as Beyonce, Lady Gaga and Post Malone, but another, Lana Del Rey, has returned the favour for his new project.

Her dulcet tones take lead on a soul-drenched version of album track Buddy’s Rendezvous for a seven-inch single included in a deluxe box set.

Tillman compares his interpretation to hers, high-lighting his esteemed guest’s individual flourishes.

“Lana can ad-lib effortlessly, and any one of them is strong enough to be its own chorus,” he says.

“There are a few I’m sure I’ll end up singing live.

“For my version, the soulful approach didn’t work, though it was obviously what the track was calling for.

“I let the saxophone do the heavy lifting and picked my little moment at the end. With Lana we muted all that and just let her shine.”

Whatever he may say, I suggest you listen to his elegantly poised rendition of Buddy’s Rendezvous.

It’s a small window into the soul of the elusive Father John Misty.

★★★★☆

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