Paying Attention: Interview with Superchunk’s Mac McCaughan

Mac McCaughan informatively lifts the lid on Superchunk’s second epoch of operations and new rarities box set

Whilst there is much to discuss and document about Superchunk’s early history between 1989 and 2001 – that is thoroughly interwoven with the US indie-rock golden years and the establishment of the still-thriving Merge Records – the North Carolina-based band’s even longer second act has been just as interesting, if not more so at times.

With continuity and adaptability at the heart of the ensemble’s ongoing journey, the sonic goods have been consistently delivered through a ‘less is definitely more’ operational approach, after a restorative early-to-late-noughties hiatus. This has been through the long-running line-up of Mac McCaughan (vocals / guitar / et al.), Laura Ballance (bass), Jim Wilbur (guitar) and – until he recently left – Jon Wurster (drums).

In Superchunk’s full-length album furrow this has brought us the hyper-melodic rejuvenation of 2010’s Majesty Shedding, the agile power-pop of 2013’s I Hate Music, the politically-tinged propulsions of 2017’s What a Time to Be Alive, the lushly-unplugged self-reinventions of 2019’s Acoustic Foolish and the hybridising communalism of 2022’s Wild Loneliness.

In the group’s prolific parallel non-album recording fields, an embarrassment of riches has been ploughed-up too, through a steady stream of seven-inch singles, EPs, compilation contributions and download-only releases, that have been replete with standalone anthemic nuggets, acoustic/alternative versions, inventive covers, collaborations and off-piste detours.

Conscious of such satisfying recorded material being scattered over the digital and Discogs ether, both loyal fans and late-comers have now just been served with the fifty-track Misfits & Mistakes box set by Merge Records – which follows in the fine and healthy tradition of the three preceding essential extracurricular compendiums from Superchunk’s pre-hiatus years – to round things up into one comprehensive bounteous bundle.

With such a landmark release (in our world at least) and a rare well-received UK/EU tour to coincide with it (and to celebrate thirty years of 1993’s On the Mouth LP), this writer happily conversed with the ever-affable and eternally-youthful Mac McCaughan over email, to examine the rewarding second era of Superchunk and more.

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At my time of emailing, you’re about to embark on Superchunk’s first UK and EU tour in quite some time. Has it become a lot harder for you to set-up tours in recent years outside the US, with and without pandemics?

Yes, touring anywhere but especially getting overseas has become prohibitively expensive! We still wanted to do it because it’s been five years, which is a long time, and in the meantime we released a new album and now have a box set out. So, we may lose money or hopefully break-even but I think the shows should be fun, and it’s the most UK shows we’ve done probably since 2001 — normally we’ll do London and one other show or something. At this point we essentially are looking to play shows and do tours we think will be fun or different — we’re obviously not in the mode of trying to ‘break it big’ or whatever! But yeah, hotels, airfare, fuel, all that stuff is obviously pricier than it was when we toured for On the Mouth in 1993….

Whilst Laura no longer plays bass live with Superchunk, Jon is also now absent on drums. Has his departure related to him being double-booked with commitments to other bands?

I think it has a lot to do with how many bands Jon is in and juggling all those responsibilities. Also, I think the rest of us are up for doing stuff in a more DIY fashion when required in order to make shows happen, which I completely get that after thirty plus years of that, it could be exhausting – and loud! Laura King on drums was our good friend before she joined and she’s a monster drummer and a joy to be around. On these dates we’ll have Betsy Wright (Batfangs, Ex Hex) on bass, and she too is just an awesome person to be around and a killer bassist. It’s a really fun line-up.

Has it been fun working up fresh arrangements with them?

Yes! We’ve been playing some songs — especially from the box set and On the Mouth — that we literally never played before or have only played once or twice in our history, so that’s really fun. And they both sing harmonies which adds another new dimension to what we’re doing.

Given that it’s been a while since you’ve made it across the Atlantic and the vastness of the Superchunk back catalogue, has it been a Herculean task to decide on what songs to prep in rehearsals for the setlists?

I love writing setlists — I actually go back and see what we played the last time we were in each town even if it was years ago to make sure we don’t accidentally play the same exact songs — but we have been talking about just how difficult it is to write a setlist that incorporates songs from Misfits & Mistakes, Wild Loneliness and of course On the Mouth – for the anniversary – without leaving off key tunes from other records…. it’s a challenge! And when we put out a call for requests, naturally we get asked for the most obscure, songs some of which I definitely can’t play or remember the words to…

The tour follows straight on from the release of the fifty-track Misfits & Mistakes Superchunk box set, rounding up singles, B-sides and rarities you’ve put out between 2007 and 2023. Do you feel that such a comprehensive and generous bundle satisfyingly joins the dots between being your own curator as a label co-owner, the leader of Merge’s ‘house band’ and rewarding your loyal fans?

It was a really fun thing to put together and sequence; if we let it go on any longer it would be longer than four LPs and that’s a little over the top. I’m glad we arrived right at fifty songs! Also, kind of cool to prompt us to learn how to play some of the B-sides like “Sunny Brixton” that I really like but we never played after we recorded it.

Given its scope, was it something that took a lot of planning and coordination to pull together? Was there much left behind, due to space and other technicalities?

I mean, I hope we didn’t leave anything behind! Maybe a couple acoustic versions or something but it’s fairly comprehensive… it did take a lot of researching to see exactly when and where we recorded some stuff, and it made me realize we should take more pictures in the studio.

The gathered material precedes and runs in parallel to the five studio albums released since your hiatus after 2001’s Here’s to Shutting Up LP and it ostensibly covers the second half of your group existence to date. How has this second epoch of Superchunk felt the same as well as different to the first? Overall, to me, it appears like you’ve forged a more than comfortable convergence of your most energetic impulses, a lack of shyness towards your most melodic gifts, studio dexterity and guest collaborations.

Thanks, that’s very kind. Yes, I think the break we took before Majesty Shredding allowed us to assess what we liked about Superchunk songs and what kinds of songs we liked to play and record, and that was a good starting place with Majesty Shredding and going forward. I think in the second half of our existence we have been both less precious about what we’re doing — record a John Cale cover at home for a Mojo covermount CD? sure — and also more focused because when we get together to work that’s all we’re doing, and we have limited time together because then everyone is going back to their other jobs and their families. By the end of the first ‘epoch’ if you want to call it that, we had been in the album/tour/album/tour grind which can definitely devalue the experience.

Do you think that the material on Misfits & Mistakes represents a distinct side of Superchunk’s personality, that sustains the spirit of the three previous volumes of rarities from your earlier era?

Well, it definitely covers more ground musically and in addition to whatever it represents about us, represents the digital age in the sense that to release a song during this era, all you had to do was hit ‘upload’. Meaning, we could be even more prolific than before. I like the symmetry of our four comps each being one LP longer than the one before.

The collection rounds up a lot of material previously released as singles. Do you consider that seven-inch releases are still a potent artform-meets-artefact for Superchunk? Do you feel that the status of singles has generally become somewhat distorted due to manufacturing costs, Record Store Day and streaming?

I still love the format and thinking about songs as singles and B-sides as valuable pairings for A-sides. But yeah, I think putting out new singles now is hard unless you have an audience that’s already paying attention and as attached to the format as we are.

There are some seriously infectious and mighty A and B-sides from various singles – such as “February Punk”, “This Summer”, “Sunset Arcade”, “There’s a Ghost”, “Sunny Brixton” and “Good Morning” – that could have been true standouts on Superchunk albums. Do you have any regrets in not holding some of them back or does having this compilation rescue them retrospectively offset any such qualms?

No regrets about not including those tunes, for all different reasons they just didn’t fit on an LP before now.

As well as some different-but-still-plugged-in single versions and mixes of album tracks, there are some awesome alternate acoustic demos and reworkings of some songs too. Is it a mark of your strongest writing in how well certain songs sound translate between the amplified and unamplified?

I have always appreciated when bands like Yo La Tengo release different versions of their songs — there’s a Go-Betweens recording that’s an acoustic version of the entire 16 Lovers Lane album that’s especially inspiring — so we’ve tried to do a bit of that as well. It doesn’t work for every song but when it does it’s cool. We get some practice playing acoustic in-stores in record stores on tour.

The most carefree – but not careless – charms on the collection come from the multitude of cover songs that are scattered within. Whilst you lean into your noisiest influences and tastes with takes on The Misfits, The Minutemen and Circle Jerks, the greatest revelations arguably come through your makeovers of Destiny’s Child’s “Say My Name”, Bananarama’s “Cruel Summer” and John Cale’s “Child’s Christmas in Wales”. Why do you think that Superchunk have become so adept at remoulding other people’s material?

I don’t know how adept we are but I do like the challenge of taking a song in a completely different mode and turning it into a guitar-y punk song. we’ve been trying that trick since we covered “100,000 Fireflies” by The Magnetic Fields! Sometimes it works better than others… 

The Misfits & Mistakes collection feels like quite a substantial punctuation mark in the Superchunk catalogue. Do you have any ideas already brewing for the next writing and recording steps or is a mini-hiatus on the cards?

We have some new tunes and some top-secret plans…

Do you have any solo or other non-Superchunk recording projects in the pipeline?

Nothing at the moment, been too busy with Merge and Superchunk stuff really!

At this point, to what do you attribute your longevity, in such rude creative health, both inside and outside of Superchunk?

I don’t always feel especially healthy or young but I think being mentally young and still getting to play in a band — plus working with much younger artists at the label — goes a long way.

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Main feature photo credit: Jason Arthurs