Dean Wareham on Warhol's Screen Tests

Can you explain how your involvement in this Warhol project began?

With a call from Ben Harrison, Curator for Performance at the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh. He described the project and of course we said yes. . . not quite knowing what we were getting into. It has taken over our lives, but it's worth it. I never imagined I would get to collaborate with Andy Warhol.

Your professional relationship with film has a long history. You composed the soundtrack for The Squid and the Whale. Your 2003 album is called L'Avventura. Luna worked on multiple film projects. Why do you work so well with film?

People have long told me that my music is cinematic, and I'm never quite sure what that means. Part of composing for film is learning to keep out of the way, and not to hammer at people with your music.

I have to say that I couldn't do this on my own. But scoring film with Britta works really well. We have different methods, I write on the guitar, while she writes on the keyboard, but Britta does the arranging, adds orchestration and mixes all our film tracks.

Had you ever done live accompaniment for a film before? Is it a different experience playing live when the band might not be the central focus?

Never have, and it has been a challenge. We have scored film, and of course have performed live hundreds of times, but playing a show where we have to hit cues and time things out to the second is tricky. We had intensive rehearsals with our band (Britta, myself, Matt Sumrow and Anthony Lamarca), watching these Warhol films on a computer screen as we worked.

What was the last film you saw?

Let the Right One In - a Swedish coming-of-age/vampire film. It's beautiful, reminds me of Cronenberg or early DePalma.

What albums are you into at the moment?

Kraftwerk's Ralf and Florian album. The new Crystal Stilts album. And a couple of things being released on our Double Feature label -- one by an Australian flower-punk band called the Sand Pebbles, another really beautiful record by Cheval Sombre (that one will be out in April).

What's next for Dean & Britta?

More of these 13 Most Beautiful shows, and, at some point this year, finishing a new album.

Emergen-C that Groundhog's Day hangover.

When: Tuesday, February 3rd, 8:00PM (tickets here)
Where: The Palace of Fine Arts
Why: Pretty faces.