Mike Doughty: Solo talking

Mike Doughty performs Saturday night at Knuckleheads, 2715 Rochester. Showtime is 8 p.m. Advance tickets are $25. For more information, call 816-483-1456 or visit knuckleheadskc.com.

For several years in the 1990s, from the outside looking in, Mike Doughty seemed to be right where he wanted to be: in a successful band on a major record label, touring the country. It turns out he was in a much darker and more insidious place

The band was Soul Coughing, a quartet that fused indie-rock, hip-hop, beat poetry and other elements into a sound that Doughty (pronounced “doty”) once described as “deep slacker jazz.”

The rise of Soul Coughing in the mid- to late-1990s coincided with Doughty’s descent into drug addiction and alcoholism, a dark and turbulent whirlwind he chronicles in “The Book of Drugs: A Memoir,” published this year by De Capo Press. The book describes Doughty’s youth, growing up near West Point, N.Y., in a military family, and his years with Soul Coughing, which he calls an “emotionally violent marriage,” hardly the things dreams are made of.

The writing process, he said, put into perspective a time in his life he’d been talking about for years but had never assessed in its totality.

“The book is essentially stories I’d been telling people over dinner for years,” Doughty, 41, told The Star recently. “So there wasn’t anything difficult to dredge up, except perhaps some of the stuff about my family. So I already know I was all messed up about it. But looking at the galleys and reading them to myself, it struck me that I could not really process how bad those years were.”

Those years began in the late 1980s, when Doughty moved to New York to attend Lang College at New School University, where Ani DiFranco was a classmate.

He was later hired as a doorman at the live-music club the Knitting Factory. That’s where he met the musicians who would join him in Soul Coughing (where he referred to himself as M. Doughty), all of whom were about a decade older: keyboardist Mark de Gli Antoni, bassist Sebastian Steinberg and drummer Yuval Gabay.

Soul Coughing quickly became a cult band acclaimed for its fetching musical brew.

“Driven by M. Doughty’s stream-of-consciousness poetry,” wrote Steve Huey in the AllMusic Guide, the band’s sound was a “willfully idiosyncratic mix of improvisational jazz grooves, oddball samples, hip-hop, electronics and noisy experimentalism.” Though it arose amid a small herd of other “quirky, unclassifiable bands that emerged in the post-grunge era, including Morphine, the Eels and Cake,” Huey wrote, Soul Coughing was “too avant-garde to cross over into the mainstream, keeping one foot planted in the downtown New York scene.”

In 1993, the band signed to Slash Records, a subsidiary of Warner Bros. In 1994, it released its first album, “Ruby Vroom.” It would release two more studio albums, including its most commercially successful, “El Oso.” That album reached No. 48 on the Billboard 200 chart in 1998 and contained the band’s highest-charting single, “Circles,” which hit No. 8 on the alternative charts. But by then, the band was already in a deep, dysfunctional state — a place Doughty was very familiar with.

“I grew up in a turbulent household,” he said. “I look at my family’s behavior now, and it looks absolutely psychotic. But I used to look at it and just think they were jerks. If you’re the kind of guy I am, you grow up and you find that family again and re-create that environment as an adult.”

His band, he said, became its own psychotic, dysfunctional marriage and family, one whose internal chemistry — a cauldron of resentment, spite and passive-aggressive behavior chronicled in “Drugs”— damaged not only his own psyche but the band’s music, too. Twelve years after Soul Coughing’s break-up, he can’t bear to hear or perform any of its music. The music, he said, can’t be separated from the experience through which it evolved

“No, I can’t separate the music,” he said, “but even beyond that is the fact I’m so disappointed with those records. It seemed to me that my bandmates were making musical decisions largely out of spite. It’s crazy to look back at it. It could have been a lot better. It’s not what I wanted it to be. So it’s very strange to talk so somebody who’s a big fan of something that’s so disappointing to me.”

But the experience was not a complete waste of time, said Doughty, who went into rehab after the band broke up and has been clean and sober for more than 11 years.

“From a basic level, it was the start of my being a musician and making a living at it,” he said. “Getting around the country four or five times is what got me an audience. And, thank you, Warner Bros., for paying for a van.”

He rediscovered that audience, and a new one, after Soul Coughing broke up. And Doughty thanked Napster, the file-sharing service, for helping spread the word about a record he’d recorded in 1996. In 2000, Doughty self-released it.

“After I left Soul Coughing and Warner Bros., I had made an album called ‘Skittish’ that was an acoustic record that had got rejected, and it got onto Napster,” he said. “People were pissed off at first; they did not want to see an acoustic guy. But there was this nugget of a crowd that had come to hear the ‘Skittish’ songs. Napster and the people who downloaded it saved my life. ”

He has since released 12 recordings, including several EPs, live albums and a “Skittish” bonus CD. In January, he released “The Question Jar Show,” a live two-CD compilation of songs and Q&A, with accompaniment from cellist Andrew Livingston. The questions were submitted by audience members on scraps of paper and pulled from a jar, questions like, “How come there are no songs written called ‘Bridget’?” “Can you name 27 Jennifers, first and last names?” “If Bono were here, what would you say to him?” Answer: “I’d say, ‘Go get me a soda.’ ”

Doughty said his audience has grown steadily over the past decade, to the point that references to his former band have almost become extinct.

“I can genuinely tell you that the audiences are there to hear just the stuff I’ve been making for the past 10 years,” he said. “Those other people left a long time ago. Oh, on occasion some confused person wanders in and wants to hear ‘Super Bon Bon.’ I tell them very respectfully, ‘God bless you and thank you for coming. But I think you’ve come to the wrong show.’ ”

As a songwriter, Doughty said, he has abandoned whatever voice or spirit he tapped into when he was with Soul Coughing. He has become a committed solo artist. “Join another band? No, never,” he said. “Who does that?”

He does, however, acknowledge that the process that almost ruined him is in great part responsible for getting him where he is. These days, he sounds like a guy who is exactly where he wants to be.

“I feel like I’ve become the artist I always wanted to be,” he said. “I’m so engaged with what I’m doing. I put out records that are exactly what I meant to say. I feel so vital and fiercely into it. It has really been amazing.

“My life is pretty terrific at the moment, and it’s pretty directly based on experiences I had, some that were very negative: going through what I did and getting into recovery. If I didn’t have those experiences, I don’t know if I’d feel as good as I do now.”

To reach Timothy Finn, call 816-234-4781 or send email to tfinn@kcstar.com

Comments

[Geordan]

I need to pipe in, as I finished Mike Doughty's book about two weeks ago and although it's an entertaining read, I lost a pound of respect for Mike due to the way he so completely trashes his former band mates. I realize that most bands fight and are dysfunctional, and add in the fact that Soul Coughing ingested more drugs than a handful of Jam bands back in their day probably accelerated the hostility. But if you believe Mike, his band mates were absolute buffoons who could barely function as people. I'm surprised none of his former band mates haven't pummeled him for the vicious things he has written about them.

But to me, that only says a lot more about Mike than it does his band mates. He even admits that he was the least accomplished musician in Soul Coughing, but if they would have only wizened up and given him the creative reigns to the band, Soul Coughing could have been, in his own words, up there with Led Zeppelin, and could have "beaten the Beastie Boys at their own game." Wow...now THAT is a healthy ego. But Rock & Roll without narcissism just wouldn't be as exciting, of course, and Mike's book is almost a case study in that respect.

I read Doughty's book because I really liked Soul Coughing, this band that Mike apparently despised (and still despises) so damn much and is delusional enough to want us to believe that his solo work is completely miles ahead of. Soul Coughing's debut, "Ruby Vroom," was an original breath of fresh air when it arrived out of nowhere in 1994. Their final two records also had good stuff on them and their song, "$300" was one of the coolest things I heard in 1998, when their final record came out. Soul Coughing's bassist, Sebastian Steinberg (now playing with Fiona Apple), did brilliant work throughout the band's career and it's hard for me to buy that he is as moronic as Mike describes him in the book.

I bring this all up because just days before starting "The Book Of Drugs," I finished Bob Mould's recent memoir, "See a Little Light: The Trail of Rage and Melody." Another interesting read, but like Mike, Bob Mould also trashes his old band mates and also claims to hate most of his old band's music and is trying to forget that period of his life. That's upsetting for me to read, as Husker Du was one of my favorite 80's bands, so I finished THAT book losing respect for it's author and his passive-aggressive smearing of a band whose music meant a lot to a good many people.

In hindsight, I almost regret reading both books now. Again, I do realize keeping a band together must be a herculean task. Add addiction to the mix and it would seem nearly impossible to have a normal relationship with the guys you spend all your time roaming the country crammed in a van with. But to not only dismiss your past, while trying to convince us your solo work is so much better (in Mike AND Bob's case, I just don't hear it) is a hard pill to swallow. No, I won't be making Mike's show this weekend, but I will still enjoy the hell out of his work with Soul Coughing.

[Bob L.]

The guy in this picture looks just like Moby!

[Darrell]

Geordian - were you at the gigs or on the bus with Bob Mould or Mike Doughty? I'm sure these people attempted to tell the emotional truth about their life experiences. I'm sorry if their versions of their stories shattered any illusions about band life you may have had.

Just because a guy plays a mean bass, it does not make him a kind and benevolent human being by default. I learned that precise lesson myself years ago.

"Trust the art, not the artist."

[-phil.]

Also Geordan, if you're at all shocked that Bob Mould hates his former Husker Du bandmates, you have been living under a rock for decades. It's been common knowledge since just about when they broke up.

[Geordan]

Oh, SNAP! You really schooled me there, Darrell! Could have spelled my name right, though......Look, friend, I read both of the aforementioned books and merely offered an opinion. I don't need to ride on a tour bus with these guys to know a smear piece when I read one. After long years to mull it over, neither artist had anything positive to say in their books about their former band mates. Zero. Zilch. "Emotional Truth??" C'mon, man......

Hell, I have divorced friends who wanted to murder their spouses when they split, but in hindsight, almost always they come around and at least remember the good times and the positive things about the person they once loved enough to want to marry. To harbor ongoing hatred and bitterness is one thing, but to publish a malicious book trashing those who got you to your level of fame is pointless and solves nothing. Without their former bands, I would have had zero interest in either book, quite honestly.

There is just a petty and bitter attitude towards most everyone in both books, not just former band mates, that again, says more about the authors than it does their subjects. It doesn't even take a Psych 101 student to figure THAT out. Doesn't change my feelings about their music one bit. It's just a little disappointing, is all I'm getting at. But thanks for the counterpoint, Darrell. As for your quote, keep it. Maybe I'm naive, but I tend to want to trust both the art AND the artist. But that's just me.......

[Geordan]

....oh, and phil, I didn't really know about Bob's hatred of his old band mates, as I haven't bought an album of his SINCE then. Now, I'll crawl back under my proverbial rock........

[pellboy]

Geordan, I'm with you, especially in reference to artists completely trashing the work that their fans first fell in love with and in many cases continue to adore. I understand you've grown and matured as an artist, but that earlier work was all part of the process and shouldn't just be tossed aside. Those artists received some fame and fortune from said work, so why belittle it and in essence your very own fans for admiring it?

In the case of Doughty, was never much of a fan of Soul Coughing so his comments against his bandmates and their output would have little affect on me, but sometimes those in recovery overcompensate in trying to downplay their past and maybe that's the case with him. Not excusing it, just trying to rationalize it some.

[Bewlay]

The Pitch's story on Doughty has comments by former Soul Coughing members. I didn't think much of Soul Coughing and wasn't impressed by what I've heard from Doughty either.

[Darrell]

http://www.robertfulford.com/Artists.html

[Corky]

And here I was, kicking myself for not being able to go see the show last night. Tim's articles ahead of any coming show usually pique my interest, and this one looked to be at least someone important that's going to make great music.

We see some pretty major egos at Knuckleheads. Sounds like this guy was possibly one to miss.

And Darrell, are you the feller from C.C. in Ks?

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