Cloud Cult

When facing a season of significant loss and divorce in recent years, Minowa found his way on a daily basis to a tiny woodland cabin within which he invited introspection and inspiration—his best attempts to find a way forward through the grief. The results of those sessions can be heard in a new set of songs that together comprise a new Cloud Cult release entitled Alchemy Creek.

We recently sat down with Craig to hear more about his creative process in the face of hardship and the magic of turning his days over to the muse in this rustic transformative space. Here's the story of Alchemy Creek.

Analogue: The description of the new album is that it was birthed out of a difficult period of loss. Did you look up to see you had enough songs from processing a hardship and then decided to record? Or do you know it's time for an album and decide to process the moment you're in?

Craig Minowa: It was first and foremost about trying to find some kind of emotional survival, and for me, that's always been through music. And yeah, it was an extremely difficult, it has been an extremely difficult time of life, so music is always my go-to as a safety net when everything's falling apart. And I think in the process of sharing weekly on Patreon with that process of healing, because everybody's had losses of different types and grief of different types, I think that there's a way to share that music in a way that's direct and it's a personal story, but something that other people can take in and use for their own personal journey.

So although the music was definitely written for personal medicine, I'm always very conscious about not bringing the direct personal narratives into it. So anything that would have been a day where I needed to just vent or something like that is something that goes into a cardboard box and nobody ever sees, but if it's something that's working on some kind of inner issue that I have control over, then it's something that I can share.

Analogue: You mention the differentiation, but it also brings to mind the songs that connect the most for me. They'r the ones that include all kinds of details I can't understand. It's maybe Adam Duritz of the Counting Crows writing about "Sullivan Street" or Bruce Springsteen describing the car driving away from the town I've never even been to. It's the naming of people and places that I'll never know that somehow feels way more connective than keeping things accessible and too general. So how does that come into play with this set of songs?

Craig: I don't think it's a matter of keeping it too general. I think it's a matter of if you're going to have a narrative, it doesn't bring actual characters into it. So a Bruce Springsteen story, for example, or a Tom Waits narrative, you know, sitting down as a fiction writer, that might be a different kind of way to approach it.

So for me, going into that tiny cabin by the creek each day, I kind of visualized it in a way where I was—and this is the way I actually articulated it to the Patreon supporters—was that I would try and set myself aside and wait for a knock on the door from a song spirit. And this is a traveler that's come down the creek that's been on this adventure in the world and has something to share. It's my job to sit down with a notepad and pencil and ask poignant questions and bring that story out of the song spirit, catch it all, and put that song together, and then send the spirit on its way.

So in a way, it's a collection of narratives, but not specific to pointing a finger at an actual person and saying this is their story.

Analogue: Was that a daily practice of setting up in the cabin?

Craig: Yep, for sure. Yeah, that's my favorite part about this entire profession is the songwriting process, going there. There's a specific ceremony to the whole process of the morning where I get there and wash my face off in the creek and try to imagine that I'm washing Craig off, and that I walk out into the woods and gradually try and walk my story off as I come back to the cabin. I try to come back as that empty notebook that's just listening and waiting.

I think the best songs for me on this particular album are the ones that arrived in full clothing that I wasn't expecting, and you just catch it all, and 24 hours later you're like, 'What the heck happened?' But you feel so much better. At the same time, it's like a stranger visited that you had no plans with and shared some wonderful stories with you.

Analogue: Has that always been the M.O. for you, or is this a learned process?

Craig: I think it's gradually refined itself. I think over the years, I've gotten to have a better understanding that not having an intention and not having an expectation can actually reap huge rewards, whereas if you come there expecting and planning and strategizing what you're going to create, you just mess up the whole dang thing. It's kind of a mixed bag because songs like the first song on the album, I had no understanding or no expectation for any of that, and it just wore me out.

I don't get to eat, I don't get to drink, I don't get to go to the bathroom. I get so exhausted. I just start to hurt because I'm sitting in the same spot just grabbing instruments.

And it's wonderful because you, me, Craig, disappear and all my problems are gone for a while, and this whole thing is unveiling itself. And it's such a blessing to have that come through you at the same time when it's all done. You listen to it and you can't pat yourself on the back because it doesn't feel like you actually made it.

A lot of artists talk about that. It's being in the zone, I think. You as a writer, you know, everybody experiences that in their own way in their own lives. And as a songwriter, it's something that is the highest intention for me. If I can get to that place of self-removal on stage or in the songwriting process, that is the goal.

Analogue: So how many days in a week would you say you were successful at sort of getting yourself out of your own way to come away with something lasting?

Craig: Well, the goal was to have something shareable, a new different song shareable every week for Patreon because basically they were putting food on the table as this transition happened and there wasn't any touring going on. So, you know, as a career aspect, my goal was to have at least one shareable piece. There were a lot of shoddy pieces that just went to the garbage.

So you kind of expect as an artist that you're going to be a professional failure in the sense that you're going to make a lot of crap, but you're going to make an occasional good thing. And you just have to be good enough at failing and picking yourself up and failing again and picking yourself up until you actually have something shareable. So I went in every day working on it, whether or not I walked away with something shareable that day is a different story.

Analogue: You mentioned an emptying of self to then meet the stranger who comes, as you said. So when you talk about processing or healing during a painful time of divorce, does part of that healing just come because the songwriting provided respites from even thinking about it? Or are some of these songs like actually deeply working through the trauma? Do you know what I'm saying?

Craig: Yeah, I don't totally understand the process of it. I don't know if it's because when we're in certain moods, we call in a certain type of thing. I mean, obviously, when I go to the studio and am in a mood where I just feel like, 'How am I going to make it one more day?', it's not like I walk away with a really poppy, upbeat song in the key of C major. The vibe of the song definitely always meets the wound that I have that day.

So I'm sure that as much as you're setting yourself aside, there's still a piece of you that's left there to receive and listen. I think you're probably specifically tuning into certain stations of the ethers depending on what you need at that point in time.

Analogue: What role do the rest of the band members play in this? Are they speaking at all into this song craft?

Craig: It's kind of set up as a touring band. They'll come and do the recording in the end. Then next week, we have our first rehearsal in two years.

It'll be our first time seeing each other since the Metamorphosis tour. We'll be working on getting a good set together for our first show next week. But the writing process has always been kind of a hermit in the woods thing.

I lean on them for opinions on pieces and guidance when I have questions. I'm a super introverted fellow. It has been ideal to go to this little tiny cabin and work out my crap because I've got plenty of crap to work out.

Analogue: Is that your cabin? Is that a family cabin? Is that just something you stumbled onto?

Craig: A tiny home. We had some family members move in with us who were in time of need a couple of years ago. In order to expand space, I found that tiny cabin.

It helped give us extra space. When the divorce happened, I needed the space to record because I was leaving this regular recording studio behind. That became the emergency spot.

The tone of that little space, there was something about it with the very first song I started recording. That really surprised me. It allowed me to sing in a much more intimate way than I was used to.

Analogue: You just mentioned the two years span. Then you're going to get together to rehearse. How does that feel?

Craig: We've been together so long. They're all like brothers and sisters. When we see each other, it's just family getting together.

For me, being a person who prefers a day in the woods, going to bigger cities can be really over-simulating for me, especially a run of cities, one after the next, can be super over-simulating.

One of my biggest life preservers is just how tight of a family we are as a band. During that time on the road, we'll all catch up on each other's lives and rebuild a lot of the I-got-your-back bonds that we've had for a decade. It's more exciting to see them and know that we're all going to be up there. Then, you know, the people that come to the shows, just to see those smiles and to see them have the same reaction to the songs.

We love this entire process. That's what makes it sustainable for us.

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