Sonic Youth Gossip - short Nels Cline interview in our alternative weekly

http://www.c-ville.com/index.php?cat=121304062461064&ShowArticle_ID=11431 210071536440

excerpt follows

Great. Hey, do you listen to an iPod?

I don't. I do not.
(ed. I'm with him on that.)

Well, what's in your CD player right now?

I think the main recurring listening experience for me has been my obsession with the Indian slide guitar, [particularly] Shawnee slide guitar. I've been interested in Indian music since I was a boy. It's something that feels right for me, and also [seems like] a fairly unattainable mode of expression.

The sad thing about me is that I listen to the same people all the time, as far as bands go. So I'm kind of one-note in that way. I'm always listening to Sonic Youth. Either that, or earlier bands that have always sounded good to me, like The Byrds or Jimi Hendrix.
(ed. Correctly, it's Jimi Hendrix Experience or The Jimi Hendrix Experience.)

It's been fun to hook up with the guys in Wilco because they like a lot of stuff that I didn't think anybody liked, from my high school years, like the British band Padow. Mike, our keyboardist, his dad was a recording engineer and recorded a lot of what would now be called smooth jazz, like Bob James, so as a result of that he has an awareness of Weather Report. And certainly early Weather Report—just like the '70s Herbie Hancock—is always kind of in my aesthetic realm. Along with, you know, Miles Davis.
(ed. Don't really know what the fuck he's on about here, as Herbie and Miles both sold out to jazz fusion cheese in the '70s. They both did outstanding work in the '60s though.)

I saw on your website that you list 200 guitarists that changed your life. Who would you like to work with that you haven't?

That's kind of an interesting question—I can think of people who I had swift brushes with, but then didn't play enough with. One of them is a drummer in New York City, Paul Motion—
(ed. Paul "Motian" is the correct spelling, c-ville weekly rag)
somebody with whom I played very briefly in 1983 but I have amazing regard for. Somebody I haven't played with since the '80s is the Argentine bandonian master Dino Palucci. I would love to do more with Dino. But I don't really spend much time thinking about who I'd like to play with, because my life is so, frankly, filled with remarkable humans.

What kind of influence do you draw, or inspiration rather, from outside of the world of music?

Well, I'm kind of an art guy, although I've kind of lost the handle on contemporary art a little—started touring a lot. [A] lot of the artists that I've admired my whole life continue to inspire me, like Franz Kline. ...[A]nd then, you know, I like really dumb things.
(ed. I like Franz Kline too.)