Low’s seventh and loudest album, The Great Destroyer (Sub Pop), challenged perceptions of the Duluth, Minn., band as a mild-mannered Mormon couple (vocalist/guitarist Alan Sparhawk and vocalist/drummer Mimi Parker) and its secular-yet-polite bassist (Zak Sally). While Low has often been recognized—and sometimes maligned—for its musical restraint and delicacy, the band’s trademark slow tempos often worked as a sedative to the drama and tension. It’s only by comparison, then, that Destroyer shakes the sanctuary rafters.

On close inspection, the lyrical content of Destroyer songs such as “When I Go Deaf” (“We won’t have to speak/And we won’t have to lie”) and “Walk Into The Sea” (“Do I have to stay alive/Just to keep our dresses white?”) is devastating. Unfortunately, such sentiments can also be read as harbingers of Sparhawk’s nervous breakdown in May 2005. Diagnosed with everything from bipolar disorder to depression to post-traumatic stress disorder, Sparhawk ended up canceling Low’s summer dates. He continues a frustrating battle to treat his symptoms—which include feelings of restlessness and loss of contact with reality—with prescribed medication.

The band was dealt another blow in October when Sally announced his departure after 12 years of service. He’ll be replaced by Matt Livingston, a member of the Retribution Gospel Choir, Sparhawk’s side project that sometimes counts longtime friend Mark Kozelek (Red House Painters, Sun Kil Moon) as a fourth member.

After his daily run, Sparhawk took a breather and spoke to MAGNET from his home in Duluth.

Tell me about the Retribution Gospel Choir—I heard Mark Kozelek is a part-time member.
He joined us for a tour last month. We’re a core band of three people—myself, Matt Livingston (bass) and Eric Pollard (drums). They’re guys that I’ve known in Duluth for years, so we started playing together. It’s very loose. We have songs, but we also improvise a lot. It’s kind of guitar rock, but we’re trying to destroy it a little bit, I guess. But Mark Kozelek and I have known each other for years, and every once in a while we’d talk about doing a tour together—get up onstage with our acoustic guitars and bore everybody. In May, we talked on the phone and I told him I had a band and we should play loud. He was into that.

Do you perform any Low or Red House Painters songs with this band?
Yeah, we were doing a few Red House Painters/Sun Kil Moon songs, and some covers—Genesis, things like that. Also some things I had written recently and every once in a while we’d do a Low song like “Lazy.” Mostly we stuck to originals. It gelled well, though. We had a hard time making sure we didn’t sound too much like Neil Young & Crazy Horse, but I think we pulled it off.

\I just heard Kozelek’s Sun Kil Moon album. It’s all covers of Modest Mouse.
Yeah, we did a couple of those on tour. I think the record sounds great, but it’s pretty bold. Now Alan Sparhawk will do an album of all Shins songs. [Laughs]

I was just thinking there’s a parallel between Low and Sleater-Kinney in 2005: You both recorded with Dave Fridmann and signed with Sub Pop. And you put out albums that changed up your sound a bit, giving the band a necessary injection.
I would agree. This last record is really the first time we took the lid off the jar and let ourselves go outside the rules as much as we wanted to. It’s a really personal record on a couple levels. We’re always trying to push into new territory, but this is the first time we figured out how to really open it up. Which is good, because it was during a time when ... the songs I was writing are a lot more harsher and negative.

In some interviews I read with you earlier this year, you admitted to being angry. And plenty of musicians display their anger, but it was something that seemed different for you.
Well, the Sleater-Kinney record is pretty intense, too. Which is weird. I mean, we’re both bands that have kids now. Maybe it’s a parental anger that’s coming out, or being an adult and realizing how completely fucked you still are. Since we were out touring on this record this year, I haven’t been doing so hot. I have a hard time looking back at that record because it’s almost become a little too prophetic in my life, like a road map of what’s going on.

I realize this may be a difficult thing to talk about, but in May you canceled some shows and posted a message on the Low Web site indicating that you needed a break. May I ask how you’re feeling now as opposed to then? Have you gained any perspective on what made you feel that way?
It was a lot of things happening at once: just bad health, stress and getting older and not being able to ... I had to come home to the hospital for a while and it took a while to figure out how to stabilize myself.

Do you feel recuperated at all?
[Laughs] Fuck, I don’t know. Does anybody ever feel recuperated? I don’t think anybody recuperates. You wait for the dust to land and see what’s still there. It’s hard to go into. It takes way too many words to explain what’s going on, or at least it’s difficult to find a few words to put it down in a way so that it’s not meant to sound like yet another complaining, white, guitar-playing whiner talking about his medications and stuff. I can’t get too obsessed with what my problems are because there are people who don’t have houses right now. I’m very lucky that I was around my family at that time, even though it was very difficult for them. We were touring Europe, we were having good shows and it was going really well. For some reason, we do really well in Spain. We had our last few shows there. So it was weird to then get home and it kind of dawns on you how out of touch with reality you’ve gotten, whether it’s sleep deprivation or medication debacle ... and then just being a pedigree of mental instability.

Did the touring make you feel particularly displaced?
Fuck displaced, man. Nobody’s displaced when you get there. You’re very at home when you’re losing your mind. You know exactly where you are all the time—unfortunately, it’s not real. I only feel displaced when I’m healthy [laughs].

Maybe you should cut back on the running.
[Laughs] No, running is the best damn thing going. I think the worst thing a person can say when they’re fucked up is, “I’m doing better.” That’s the sickest thing that can come out of someone’s mouth because most of the time they don’t really know. If you say you’re doing better, chances are the next day you’re gonna be in a ditch somewhere or you’re gonna be down in the basement with a power cable. I’ve learned to not assume your mind will be there with you whenever you get wherever you’re going.

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