A Conversation with Daniel Cirera

This is the original transcript of the interview, only minor editing has been applied for readability. This has been the basis for articles but has never been published in the original form.

WORTRAUB: So, this is your debut album – did you think, something like this would happen?
Daniel: Never. First of all it wasn’t intentioned to make an album. It was just my diary things and I put some quotes to it. And I happened to be in a house with my friend and he happened to have some basement space over. He had a very cheap computer, one microphone and his drum kit. That’s how I started out. Borrowing his computer, using his ProTools a bit. Fooling around. Then he said, well that sounds cool, can I add some drums. Sure. I did not think about it, during the months we were making the album. It just started becoming an album.

WORTRAUB: What’s the chronology of events then? When was the break-up?
Daniel: There were several break-ups with her, because it was during so long a time. The most recent one was in 2002. When we broke up in like bold type. I’ve been living in Madrid for a while, before and after that. Then I wrote songs during the several break-ups of course, the after Madrid I lived in Brighton, UK. And then I went to Central America. The some trips in Europe. The most important parts of the album I wrote during my Central America trip. So basically I just needed time to myself. To reflect on things. The only way I could get some reflection on things, if you live in a really small city, like Malmo, you bump into each other of course. So I was at the library one day and started reading this scuba diving magazine, I was like: fuck, look at that water, I want to go there. It said this is the coral reef in Berlize, just outside of Honduras. So I took the money I had, went to the traveling agency and said: I want to go to that island. I just needed piece of mind and just time to reflect on things. I lived there for a while, on that island. I planned to go there for four days and ended up living there a couple of weeks.

WORTRAUB: Did you ever speak to her after the record has been out in Sweden?
Daniel: Yeah, yeah. There was so much hype in Sweden about the record. The radio and this media thing. Of course she got involved in it, even her parents got involved in it. Because you hear „Motherfucker“ on the radio and think, what the hell is this? It was my subjective way of dealing with it. But honestly, I think she was very proud. I loved her that much. If I hadn’t been that much in love, I would never have been able to write this album. People tend to hear „Motherfucker“ the first time and think it is an aggressive song, but it is a love song, no matter what people say. If I had not been in love with her that way I was, I would never have been able to write lyrics like that. Because there is a very thin line between love and aggression.

WORTRAUB: Are you still in contact with her? Have you become friends?
Daniel: Yeah, we are in contact every now and then, but no way we could be friends. That is too much shit in between us. I try to put it behind me put there is a fucking paradox to all of this. Just like this interview, the only thing we talk about is her. Writing an album about looking forward, moving on, and the paradox is, that I constantly talk about her. I have been doing that for two years. Every time I play live it is the same thing. All the pictures in my head. It has its pros, it has its cons. But I am most fascinated by the paradox. I was naÔve enough to think: okay, I just go away to this island and travel and have adventures. It makes you reflect on things, because you are out of your normal element. I was naÔve enough, that going away would give me a head start on life when I came back. There never was an intention to record these thoughts.

WORTRAUB: We talked about catharsis before. Did this work out the way it was planned? Does it get better?
Daniel: I don’t know. Maybe I can answer that in five or six years. Maybe it is working in the sense that I am trying to deal with it. The results may vary. Good results may even come in years.

WORTRAUB: Do you have a new relationship?
Daniel: No, not a real one. Just flings, lots of it. But for the future: who knows?

WORTRAUB: Do you get a lot of that „I know what you mean, happened to me as well“ thing from fans?
Daniel: It happens every show. They talk about the lyrics, they say: I felt like that but I never told anyone. Or I felt like that but did not dare to write it down anywhere. I know for a fact that I am not any different, just like anybody else, just like you. Maybe I am stupid enough, or ignorant enough, naÔve enough, honest enough, whatever, to just share it with people. They either like it or dislike it, either way, I am fine with that. Because I know I am normal.

WORTRAUB: Do you feel vulnerable through that?
Daniel: I think, I am so fucked up, I don’t really care.

WORTRAUB: You spend some time road-trippin through the Americas. What were your plans, how did you manage living?
Daniel: I backpacked, so I was hitch-hiking most of time. I slept on the beach. I am very low maintenance, I don’t care about much stuff. I was there to experience something, to leave stuff behind, look forward. It wasn’t a priority to get a shower. When I lived on the island, I lived in this hammock for almost a month. I was outside. It was a very, very simple life. It is hard to explain, living in Europe, to explain, how simple life can be. It can be really simple, if you learn to walk slow and think slow. In an environment with that kind of people, not getting pissed or stoned every night.

WORTRAUB: You tell me you are not spiritual?
Daniel: I don’t know, I don’t see a person figure in front of me. I can’t really grant my religion. I think in my own. I believe in humanity. I believe that people are generally good, then there are some assholes. And if people are good, than so am I, so I believe in myself.

WORTRAUB: You like surfing, you’re info shows palm trees, yet you are from Sweden. How does that surfing-image go along with a Swedish songwriter?
Daniel: I like surfing, even though I suck at it. I get a gold star for the ambition at least. Even though I look Swedish, I am only half-Swedish, I am also half-Spanish. I have a family in Spain, I am used to the country. I have a divided life. The Spanish part is inside of me, the Swedish part is my exterior. The image thus comes really naturally, when I think about it. I like to portrait myself in an environment with beaches.

WORTRAUB: What do you think of the comparisons to Jack Johnson?
Daniel: I like his music, at least the first two albums. The last one did not have anything happening to it. The songs of that are like the b-sides of the first two albums. I like what he is doing. I am very thankful that he has been around. Sure he has influenced me and a lot of others. Not my writing or guitar playing, that I know for sure. I am a much better guitar player than him. It all evens up, since he can surf better. But he opened peoples minds to other forms of music, than the usual New York or L.A. sound.

WORTRAUB: Do you like his hippy-attitudes? The world is a beautiful place kind of thing?
Daniel: That’s the total opposite of me. It might be fun to do a comparison: I am like his evil twin brother. Like I said, I am a better guitar player, he kicks my ass on the board though. But about the attitudes: I think people are generally good. I believe in that, really. I believe that if I do good to other people, some good will come back. So maybe I am spiritual. I believe in beautiful places, that could be something. I like to experience new places, I like to be in situations I have never been in before, because that makes me feel alive.

WORTRAUB: So what is the next album gonna sound like then?
Daniel: It is basically still me, still diary notes. On the single life. Like reading a chapter two to my biography.

WORTRAUB: Nice idea, what would chapter 7 or 8 look like then?
Daniel: I was kidding about that yesterday. Probably like: miserable, drunk, divorced husband with seven kids, all with different wives. Can I say that? Damn, I just did. Now I am busted.

WORTRAUB: How about being placed in this context of surfin-singers or singing-surfers?
Daniel: I am more of a singer than I am a surfer. Actually, I don’t think I am a singer, I think I am a story-teller. More than I am a singer, because I don’t have a voice.

WORTRAUB: But you are not really telling a story, more like an anecdote, a moment of time, right?
Daniel: It is like random moments. It is diary based. One day is two sentences, one day is nothing and another three pages. It is just anecdotes, a proper way to describe it.

WORTRAUB: You choose quite a different vocabulary. Why is that?
Daniel: Maybe that is because English is not my first language and I have to do some compromises. But I wrote in English, because I was out of Sweden. Or like a mixture: Swenglish. If I have a simple language, it is because I think simple thoughts. This is the key to everything: I don’t see any reason, why I should change a word because it is politically incorrect, or just to please somebody else, if it is what I do. If I think fuck, dick, masturbate than I am going to write it too. For me it is normal, for others it is not. Songwriters try to please everybody by using a different words, for words that they are actually thinking.

WORTRAUB: Also, you like word-plays and a little openly display of irony and sarcasm. How do you feel about language?
Daniel: In regards to irony: I see it as something that shows intelligence in people. If you use it, you don’t take yourself too seriously. I think that is a strength in people, like they can kid themselves and not be stuck up all the time, or high strung. I see that as an advantage in people. I like to use it, because I like the approach.