Drummer Josh Adams reflects on time in LA & LFK ahead of Abstraction Series at Lawrence Arts Center
Josh Adams. // image courtesy the artist
Once the drummer for local indie acts like Ghosty and Hospital Ships in the mid-’00s, Josh Adams has become the go-to guy for national acts as varied as Beck, Jon Batiste, Vetiver, Jenny Lewis, and Tim Heidecker both in the studio and on the road since his move to Los Angeles. While he returns to the area every so often, and even jammed on Suzannah Johannes’ comeback record, Kansas City: Hanz Bronze Boulevard, just last year, getting to see Adams perform live in KC or Lawrence is a rare treat.
This makes his appearance as part of Love Garden Sounds presents the Abstraction Series in a trio with Shawn E. Hansen and Sterling Holman when they open up an evening of jazz with headliner Gregory Uhlmann all the more special, so we hopped on the phone with drummer Josh Adams ahead of the Saturday, Sept. 12 Lawrence Arts Center show to discuss Lawrence, drumming, and experimental music.
The Pitch: Even though you’ve done these tours and played on these albums and everything, you still maintain a really good connection to Lawrence and KC. What has allowed you to maintain that contact?
Josh Adams: Family still lives in KC, and I still have friends that live in Lawrence. I try to make it home at least once a year. There were a couple of years where I didn’t even make it home, and I just felt terrible. I was so homesick. Lawrence is such a special place. It speaks for itself. Not only do I have a few connections still there–some people still bringing me back–it’s just such a special place. As long as I’m alive, I’ll probably always wanna go back.
Tell me more about the trio you’re playing with and the album this performance is based on.
Shawn–we’ve been talking. We have stayed in touch since I moved away. There’s been some space here and there where we don’t talk, but we always reconnect. I love playing with Shawn, and I love Sterling, too. We play together a lot, but I haven’t played with Sterling as much as I’ve played with Shawn.
This album? God, I’m trying to remember when we even recorded it. I know we did it at J. Ashley Miller’s studio out in the country somewhere outside KCMO. I can’t remember exactly where it was because it’s been over a decade since we recorded, I think.
I really don’t recall a whole lot. I know we set up and we just went for it, really, without too much discussion. So I don’t know. This is just music we don’t rehearse, although it’s nice to get together and just flex that muscle a little bit because it is a different thing. It’s different than setting up and playing prepared music of any kind. It’s really exposing. I feel most vulnerable when I play music. You’re just seeing everyone’s thought process in real time in that moment.
But the show I’m really looking forward to, and Shawn and I have been talking about getting together for a long time ’cause I feel like the last time that we played was probably that recording so this was a great opportunity- Kelly Corcoran throwing this thing together, and my old buddy Ed [Stansbury]–these guys from Love Garden.
The thing you said–that doing a show like this is the most vulnerable you feel on stage. Considering you’re playing with folks like Jenny Lewis and Tim Heidecker and more, is it because you’re in service to what they do and they’re the ones being emotionally or otherwise exposed up there?
That’s an interesting point, and I haven’t really quite thought about the difference between the two. But yeah, the front person takes a lot of pressure off of you but, as a musician on stage, you gotta bring it. You gotta know your shit, especially when you’re playing a rock show or a folk show or a jazz–a prepared music show, and there’s a singer, there’s a front person. A lot of the audience and a lot of the pressure is kinda taken off of you, but you’re still there to support them and make them sound as good as they possibly can, so there is still a lot of pressure.
It’s not necessarily less pressure, but it’s a different kind, and it is a different kind of vulnerability because this show that we’re gonna play at the Lawrence Arts Center–it’s fully improvisatory. We’ll probably talk about how we wanna approach–this trio is gonna record on the 10th. Get our feet wet a little bit, and it’s for ourselves, obviously, but it’s also in preparation for this performance.
Being in so many different studios and on so many different stages, what is your preparation for doing the work in support of others?
A lot of that depends on the material. Obviously, a lot of practicing, if it’s prepared material, learning the music but lately, as I’m getting older, a majority of the preparation on top of practicing, sitting down at the drum set and playing, is taking care of my body, like stretching and getting regular body work and doing that kind of maintenance.
Drums are very physically demanding. Whether you’re playing very loud or very fast or even very light and very quiet, you’re holding a lot of poses, and you’re focusing a lot of muscles, and you’re just working your whole body to support what you do, so a lot of body work.
I started doing acupuncture and myofascial release and trigger point therapy and rolling and doing
a lot of that stuff. It’s gotten to the point where I’m starting to look for physical therapy and, just gotta maintain my body so I can keep doing what I love to do. This lady that I see, she does trigger point therapy, and she’ll press into muscles that kind of activate other muscles, and it’s kinda crazy work, actually.
The number of conversations I have had, just over the course of the weekend and today, about the importance of daily stretching once you hit your 40s has been wild. Everybody has like their tips and tricks and everything.
Of course. Totally. You find what works, what’s keeping your body loose or keeping you less stressed or less anxious, and you just try to stick to that. Actually, I recently got off Instagram and the one thing that I miss is like all the PT stuff and the stretching stuff and, ah, man–but I don’t wanna go back.
When I look at people’s career overviews which look like yours, I always wonder–given that you’ve played so many different things, is there a style of music that you haven’t had a chance to do that you want to try your hand at? Maybe something really heavy?
I’ve actually been thinking recently, or actually, in the past couple of years, about wanting to just get together with some people and play kind of shoegaze music, or even just, like, drone music. Granted, I’ve played rock before, and I’ve played slow, stony rock before, but I’ve never been in a shoegaze band. I’ve kinda had an inkling to do something like that.
There are some styles of music that, like–I know my limitations. I’m not gonna even try metal, but shoegaze sounds fun. It’s like really repetitive, slow, stony rock, but honestly, this show coming up? I don’t get to play a lot of free, improvisational, experimental music out here. There are a few people that I’ve done that with, but it’s few and far between. I’m really excited to get back into this mindset, this approach to music, with Shawn and Sterling. Honestly, I’d love to do more of that out here in Los Angeles or abroad.
Josh Adams plays in a trio with Shawn E. Hansen and Sterling Holman when they open up an evening of jazz with headliner Gregory Uhlmann as part of Love Garden Sounds presents the Abstraction Series at the Lawrence Arts Center on Saturday, September 12.
