A Lifetime of Sound: A Conversation with Jalipaz Nelson

By Luke, The Folkpunk Archivist

As the year 2019 comes to a close, I now spend practically all of my free time listening to and researching any sort of music that even approaches what people call “folk-punk”. In 2009, I was a teen that had recently gotten into this band from Phoenix, Arizona called Andrew Jackson Jihad, and quickly fell down the proverbial rabbit hole. In what has become a common practice for me in the subsequent decade, once I had exhausted all recorded audio by the band, I began to look outward, to bands they had shared local stages with, projects involving their collaborators, and eventually to a small logo on the back of my CD that said “Audioconfusion”.

As I accumulated physical copies of AJJ’s releases, I quickly realized the same phrase popping up again and again in the liner notes: “Recorded and Mixed by Jalipaz at Audioconfusion”.

I quickly learned that this was Jalipaz Nelson, the studio wizard behind Audioconfusion, and the man that recorded and mixed virtually every track that AJJ released from ‘Candy Cigarettes and Cap Guns’ through ‘Knife Man’, as well as practically every other interesting Phoenix band at the time.

Back in the present day, having just mixed AJJ’s upcoming album ‘Good Luck Everybody’, Jalipaz was kind enough to make time for a phone interview with me. In what was a great conversation, we touched upon everything from his recording/mixing process, the Phoenix music scene of the mid-00’s, and his unique perspective from his more than fifteen-year involvement with the music of Sean Bonnette and Ben Gallaty.

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Folkpunk Archivist: You ended up living in Arizona during a pretty stellar time for DIY music. Could you trace your perspective of how you got involved this scene from the beginning?

Jalipaz: Well, when I started recording in the valley, I was recording a lot of pop-punk, a lot of emo, screamo, hardcore Christian metal, and that’s not my favorite stuff.

Then one day I was recording Asleep in the Sea [featuring Owen Evans, AJJ’s current drummer and longtime collaborator] and I realized this was my type of music. Prior to that, when I’d been asked if I had any interest in starting a label, my response was always “why?” because there was nothing I heard that I’d want to put out, but Asleep in the Sea changed that.

I still didn’t really want to start a label, but I thought, how about a collective? The idea came to me because I’d recently watched ‘24-hour Party People’, which is about Joy Division’s Factory Records; they wouldn’t sign a new band, unless all the bands already on the label supported it. I was also really into the Elephant 6 Collective. I just loved the idea that if I looked at the back of an album and saw the Elephant 6 logo, I kind of knew what to expect. And that’s how I got the idea for The Audioconfusion Manifesto.

Once I had Asleep in the Sea on board, I needed more bands. So, being the Myspace era, I would search “indie rock, Phoenix/Tempe/Mesa” and I would just listen through everything, waiting for something, even on a poor recording, to catch my ear as interesting. I’d then write to the bands explaining what I was doing and invite them in to record.

To put this in perspective, this is all right before the venue, Trunk Space, opened, which really became the hub for this whole DIY thing.

FPA: How did you initially come into contact with AJJ?

Jal: So a bit before I’d fully formed my idea for the collective, Ben had hit me up, since I had worked with him on his hardcore project, The Sub-Standards, to tell me about this new project he was doing, that he described as “there is acoustic guitar, I play upright bass and there might be some drums”. I went to see them practice and I was just floored; I’d never heard anything like it. As soon as I got home, I called them up to explain my idea for the collective and they were on board for it.

FPA: When you brought the band in to record that first album ‘Candy Cigarettes and Cap Guns’, had you heard any of the prior recorded demos, or just that live practice?

Jal: No, I don’t usually like to listen to anything before I record. I like to approach it with fresh ears. In most cases, I don’t even hear a band live prior, although in this case I did see them rehearse.

Where I saw them rehearse was actually this place called Willow House [a local coffeehouse and meeting place], where they were able to practice because they both worked there at the time. Also, don’t hold me to this, but I believe the photo on the cover of their second demo was captured there, as well [Photo by Laurel Cyr]. I think it must be because that was really the only place they played that early on. There was another place, called Modified [referenced on AJJ’s track “Scenesters”] but it wasn’t really as accepting of newer artists.

FPA: Do you know what made the band decide to taper down into a two-piece?

Jal: I don’t think there was any bad blood [with original drummer Justin James White] or anything; I think it was just easier for them, particularly in the early stages of the band. They just had this mindset: they were close friends who had started the band, making them the core of it, and they would just recruit the people they needed to play on the albums. Remember, at the time, they were still touring as a two-piece, until years later when Deacon [Batchelor] would come on as their first full-time touring drummer.

FPA: The current Audioconfusion studio was being built at the end of 2005, which would be after the release of ‘Candy Cigarettes and Cap Guns’, so where were you recording those early sessions with AJJ, Asleep in the Sea, Peachcake, etc.?

Jal: The place where I recorded Asleep in the Sea and Cap Guns was my house prior to my current house. It was a workshop/garage that had been closed up, and I just added a control room onto the back.

Audioconfusion as it exists now is a standalone structure that I built from scratch behind my current house. In doing so, I was able to control every element of the space. Although, to be fair, I didn’t get exactly what I wanted because I still had to follow the laws of the city, but I got really close so I’m not complaining.

FPA: Having been involved with AJJ virtually from the start, are there things that you view as the “main sonic tenants” of the band that you believe have to be kept in place at the core, even as their instrumentation and sound expanded over the years?

Jal: Well, it’s not as black-and-white as that, but I’ll say the thing that has changed the most is my own ear. I mean, it should go without saying that, generally speaking, the more you do something, the better you get at it, right? So that’s changed! Haha! But the thing that hasn’t changed, and the thing that I think AJJ needs on all their albums is playfulness. I tend to think that all of the AJJ albums I’ve done with them have had this sort of looseness that comes with the feeling of friends getting together to play.

In my recordings, I like to really hear the room, and when that’s introduced, you can picture a whole environment in your head. For example, when you hear gang vocals on the recordings, you can hear the fun that’s being had.

FPA: So a less sterile sound that better conveys the experience. Less like a musician clocking into the studio to track their part, and more like a band bringing their friends down to record an album.

Jal: Yes, exactly! And a great example of this idea is “If You Have Love in Your Heart” [from ‘Knife Man’]. That was all live, including the vocals.

Also, just little things like keeping coughs and blabber creates this environment that really makes the listener feel like they’re there, and part of the experience. I even love when like Sean will cough in the middle of a vocal take. I think the first one we ever did is on “Love Song” on Cap Guns and I remember specifically asking if we could keep it in there.

FPA: I think that’s really fortuitous too because that song [Love Song], is probably the most emotionally vulnerable of their early material. I also know that, while they’ve long disavowed a large portion of their early lyrics, this song is one that they are still willing to play.

Jal: Exactly! Even though every time they played live, everyone would ask them to play “Fuck White People” and they NEVER WILL! It got so frequent that they wouldn’t even address it and just flat-out ignore it at early shows. Haha!

FPA: In recording/mixing the band, have there been decisions that you’ve liked in the moment, but after the release of the album and letting it sit for a while, you’ve became dissatisfied with to the point that it ended up influencing your approach to that same decision on subsequent recordings?

Jal: I don’t think so; I don’t really worry about things in that way. I mean, it’s really important to me that a recording sounds as best as I can make it, but otherwise I try to let things go a lot.

I don’t do any auto-tune or drum replacement. All my recordings are pretty raw/natural.

I guess the only thing I would say that’s pretty interesting (I don’t even know if the band knows this), is that I’m not 100% satisfied with “American Tune”. That mix got away from me a little bit. We did a lot of stuff on that song; there were two drummers and I had to get creative with the editing.

And I may not always be 100% satisfied with things when I let them go, but that’s not always the point. Think of a painter: they could just keep adding layers to it forever, but at some point they still have to just step away from it. Mixing is similar, in that you don’t want to over mix something and it’s often better to step away before you do too much to it, as long as it’s at a point where the band is satisfied with it.

FPA: In the past, you’ve touched on this idea of mixing in terms of soundscapes, and that maybe your interest in noise music as well as ambient noise may affect your approach. Could you explain that a bit?

Jal: At the end of the day, I’m into audio, and I’m into sounds, more than anything. That’s why I can do this. I can record pretty much any band because 1) I’m not into lyrics, so I have no ties with their politics or any of that because I really don’t know what they’re saying and 2) If I can just get one really killer sound, I can ride that through the whole album. Like, if there’s a really cool mistake on the guitar that creates a strange percussive noise, that’s something that will drive me to want to work on the entire album. Or if the people in general are cool, that will drive me. I just need one little thing and I’m into it!

But going back to the sound stuff, I’m not a musician, and I don’t do anything artistically except this (I used to paint, but I’m not good at time management so I’ve been on a recording kick for the last…twenty-five years!). So I spend a lot of time with tone before I hit record on the instrument itself, and I spend a lot of time with tone when I’m mixing. Tone is one of the most important things for my work. For example, ‘Candy Cigarettes and Cap Guns’ has no added reverb on it, and there’s no compression either because I didn’t compress at that time. Everything is about level, the room, mic placement, EQ, and panning; hardly any effects. And that’s how I recorded at that time because I didn’t have any good compression so I just didn’t use it, and I controlled my dynamics with EQ or level. So if I heard something stood out too much, I would reach for the EQ, whereas now I compress and add reverb and all that stuff. Ultimately, I think this is for the better, however I do miss those days when I didn’t do that; the lack of necessity would make it harder for me to go back and use that method as efectively as I did back then because it was so labor-intensive. Like, Sean’s vocals on that album is me running his vocals out of a speaker in the live room and then re-micing it and blending it in, giving it that reverb/echo-y sound.

The things I spend time on mixing, people might think I’m crazy about, but this is my creative outlet. I’m mixing for myself just as much as I am for the band. My stuff may sound pretty raw, but I do spend a lot of time to get that sound! Haha!

FPA: Looking at the band’s upcoming album, ‘Good Luck Everybody’, this was your first time mixing AJJ without also having recorded the material. Did this create any new challenges/alter your mixing process?

Jal: This album was probably the easiest of theirs to mix because it’s always easier for me to mix other people’s stuff, as I’m not judging my own work. It’s actually annoying that about 90% of what I mix is stuff that I recorded because I’m really hard on myself. When I’m mixing other people’s recordings, I’m not thinking about “why did I do that?” and even if I do wish they had recorded something in a different way, I know that there is nothing I can do about it so I don’t end up dwelling on it. It also helps me to have that fresh perspective that I mentioned earlier.

Basically, I first get a static level mix, and then if something I hear pushes me in a certain direction, I go with it. From there, each thing I change leads me to the next thing.

It’s definitely true that you’re your own worst enemy, so this separation really helped keep me from getting frustrated with the tracks. I usually do my mixing work alone because people would just see me running around yelling at myself. It’s rarely ever that bad anymore, but there have been times…

It’s also a very manic process because I’ll be working on a mix and in an instant find myself going from “YES YES YES!” to “NO NO NO!”. Haha!!

FPA: You’ve mentioned in the past that Sean and Ben are very hands-off/relaxed with opinions in the mixing process. Is that still the case, or have they grown more opinionated, particularly having self-recorded this new record?

Jal: Hard to say, since I didn’t really see them in person during the process this time. I can say that I didn’t really get a lot of notes. And I never really have from them in the past.

The difference however is that this time I think it was a good thing. In the past, they wouldn’t give me any notes and I’d be like “c’mon, I know it’s not right yet!” but since Sean and Ben have been dabbling in their own recording setup (which is why they recorded it themselves), I almost think that they’d be more opinionated if it wasn’t their project. Like, I think they’ve realized the importance in letting certain things go with their own work, similar to what I was saying about over-mixing.

And that’s something that Sean and Ben’s laid-back disposition has given them from day one: they don’t really try to fight what’s happening with the sound.

For example, Stormy Rabbit [“A Song Dedicated to the Memory of Stormy the Rabbit”], where the cacophony of sounds starts to explode, I thought that was a mess! It just didn’t make any sense to me when we were tracking, like they’re just doing random notes in some spots and I…was just scared of that. And then when it came to mixing, I was like “alright, let’s just push the faders up and see what happens” and it just sounded so good right away! And I didn’t even get it, I was like “how does this even work?”. Again, I’m not a musician, so they could just be crazy smart with arrangement and I just don’t get it. A lot of times I don’t know why things work, I just know that they don’t.

I don’t know man. I don’t know why Stormy works, but it does, and it’s one of my favorite songs of theirs’ ever. That’s the magic of music for me.

Also, I don’t know if you noticed, but in the beginning, when it’s just the glockenspiel and Sean, can you hear music in the background?

FPA: You’ve stumped me. I actually have no idea what you’re talking about.

Jal: So, originally the song opened up with that full cacophony that ends up coming in later, and we decided after the fact to just open it with Sean and the glockenspiel, but we had the headphone bleed from when Sean did the vocals with the original loud opening bleeding out into the vocal mic, so you can kind of hear it in the final product. I hear it every time.

It was annoying for the first few years, but it’s turned into one of those things that I really love.

FPA: The lead single, “A Poem”, starts off very classic AJJ, but from the first chorus, it bursts into that bigger sound that AJJ has built into over the past couple albums, the difference is that the voices don’t sound tinkered with. Were you taking into consideration the very public critique that fans had to how jarringly the vocals were mixed on the prior two studio albums?F

Jal: Not really, I just didn’t think that it needed anything. I thought that it sounded better left alone. And I tend to think that way most of the time.

I don’t really think I have a sound, but if I did, it would be called “leaving things alone”. I’ve mixed, or rather “not mixed” a lot of albums, meaning that I didn’t do much because

I didn’t think they needed it. And like I said, I spend a lot of time getting tones in the mixing process and I do it for myself as much as I do it for the band, so if I don’t touch it, that’s because I genuinely think it sounds good.

FPA: Is the bigger sound on “A Poem” what we can expect on this album, or will there be a re-visiting of their more classic sound, in-line with this album’s theme of a “return to the desert”?

Jal: To me, it’s like old AJJ, but more mature. And that goes with songwriting and production.

I’m excited for people to hear it. I’m proud of it, and I think they’re really proud of it.

FPA: To sort of end this interview where we started, I wanted to ask you, as someone that has been an involved participant in a music scene that has reached the point in its evolution that people talk about it as a defined scene that people look back on, what’s your take on the value and process of archiving and preserving the physical remnants of that time and those people that were involved in it?

Jal: I feel like it’s been done really well. There is this guy that has been around since day one, Eli Kluger, who is a comedian, had a short musical project and is also a filmmaker. He made a DVD [Phoenix Rising] that was footage of Asleep in the Sea, AJJ, and a bunch of other bands who were heavy-hitters at the time in Phoenix, and I believe that he is also writing a book about it.

I’ve always just felt like there were a lot of people celebrating that time while it was happening. They were celebrating it like they knew it was something special even in that moment. It’s always going to be a time that I remember and think back on fondly, nostalgically, reminisce, and wish that things were the same way now.

It was just so powerful. It’s such an amazing thing to know, when it’s happening, that you’re a part of something that’s really special. Too often, when something special happens, you find out about it later, but I knew right away that this was a special time. I just soaked it all in, and was involved as much as I could be.

There were just crazy shows going on. Like, Phoenix is on the way to Coachella, but bands would miss us and go to Tucson. So, some people started throwing shows called “The Real Coachella” and we all really embraced that. It was at The Trunk Space, and they would have bands playing inside/outside and it was just a fun Saturday all-day thing.

Trunk Space truly is a huge part of the scene. It was a hub; it was the epicenter of it all. It was our “Cheers” because you went in and you knew everybody and everybody knew you; it was a home away from home.

It was just a really special time and I was glad to be aware of it while it was happening.

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AJJ’s seventh studio album, ‘Good Luck Everybody’ will be self-released on January 17th, 2020 via AJJ Unlimited LTD. and is available for preorder through their website.

Jalipaz Nelson, in addition to his work on ‘Good Luck Everybody’, has recorded an upcoming release for Playboy Manbaby, as well as Diners’ new album, ‘Leisure World’, which Ben Gallaty has already proclaimed “best record of 2020″. For any recording/mixing/mastering needs, you can Contact Jalipaz through Audioconfusion’s website.

The Folkpunk Archivist is an independently run preservation and research project by Luke Pizzola, taken public in January 2019 via their page on Instagram @folkpunkarchivist