Q&A: Dave Pirner of Soul Asylum, headed to Purdue
Multi-platinum, Grammy-winning Soul Asylum to perform acoustic set at Purdue
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This edition leads off with a guest shot from our man Tim Brouk …
Q&A: Dave Pirner of Soul Asylum, headed to Purdue
By Tim Brouk / For Based in Lafayette
Hearing loss led to the biggest gain in Dave Pirner’s music career.
Guitarist and lead singer in Soul Asylum, a Minneapolis rock act that started in the early 1980s but gained national superstar status after its hit 1992 album, “Grave Dancers Union,” Pirner had played full blast for a solid decade before noticing some hearing loss as the 1980s gave way to the ‘90s.
“And there I was, you know, sticking my head in a bass drum after half a case of beer when I was 19. That can’t be good,” reminisced Pirner from this Minneapolis home. “But you don’t give a shit. You’re punk rock, man. You’re gonna fucking die anyways. You have this nihilistic thing going on that just doesn’t lend itself to doing anything very smart.”
Pirner switched to acoustic guitar to write songs, one of which became the huge hit “Runaway Train.” The song about kid runaways earned Soul Asylum its first and only Grammy Award and sent “Grave Dancers Union” to multi-platinum status.
While a typical Soul Asylum show has the blending of Pirner’s acoustic with the lead electric guitar of Ryan Smith, the band will perform an all-acoustic set at 8 p.m. Friday, April 10, at Purdue University’s Loeb Playhouse inside Stewart Center. Pirner and Smith will be joined by bassist Jeremy Tappero in a show hosted by Purdue Convocations. Tickets range from $42-$83. Corey Glover, lead singer of Living Colour, will open the show.
Pirner is the only Soul Asylum member left from the “Runaway Train” days. His music career spans more than 40 years where he rubbed elbows with bands like The Replacements and Hüsker Dü, rocked “Saturday Night Live” and gets rock hearing loss advice from Pete Townshend of The Who.
Question: How did you react when you first noticed the hearing loss?
Dave Pirner: I think that when it first dawned on me, I didn’t want anyone to know about it. I’ve been through the whole trauma and the emotional sort of part of it that just led to so many different parts of my brain that it was fucking awful. I mean, it was really bad.
I always think about all the things that your parents tell you and the elders tell you, and then you just go ‘Fuck it. They don’t know what they’re talking about.’ And so in a way, you feel like a dumbass and then you run into people that are like, ‘What the fuck did you expect to happen?’ And then, next thing you know, all my friends are in bands and we’re all kind of ‘What?’ That happens a lot.
I talked to Pete Townshend about it, and he said, ‘Just make sure you’re making a living when you’re fucking up your hearing.’ And I was like, ‘OK, that’s pretty good advice, I guess.’ (Laughs) But I mean, overall, you have to be smart about it and conscious about it.
Q: What steps have you taken to preserve your hearing?
Dave Pirner: Every situation is unique. And sometimes I’ll use one (earplug) in one ear if it’s a jazz show. If I’m going to be right by the (speaker) columns at a Metallica show, both earplugs are in. It took a little getting used to for sure. And I think going through the trauma was the only way that it was going to make me wise up a little bit.
Q: Does Soul Asylum mostly do acoustic shows these days?
Dave Pirner: It kind of goes back forth. We would adopt an acoustic guitar for playing at a record store or playing on the radio. But we didn’t really pursue it that much until “Grave Dancers Union,” where a good chunk of the record was written on acoustic guitar and it became more of a vehicle for me in writing. And what constitutes a good song sometimes means it works acoustically, it works electrically, it works with green eggs and ham, you know?
It’s just been years of kind of adapting to the acoustic situation, which is just a whole different set of nerves and a whole different set of dynamics, which is a pretty big word as far as how loud it is overall and how much variation there is in any given song. With drums and all that, it’s an electric dynamic.
It’s got some more intimate things about it, but yeah, it’s something fun to do and something that we’ve always kind of kept in the rotation of things to do — more places to play and adapting to people eating while we’re playing. That freaks me out. (Laughs) You’re hearing silverware and plates. I still remember the first time I played at a casino, and I could hear all the slot machines between songs. So, you just keep finding yourself in these different situations.
Q: At Purdue, there is a strong house show scene. Did you play house shows when you were college-age?
