CS + Kreme can’t be explained succinctly. The constrictions of genre don’t really do them service. The duo from Melbourne, Australia make often-improvised experimental music that feels psychedelic in a way that has less to do with any well-worn tropes and more with the manner in which the music swirls around the listener's brain. They exist in a foggy corridor between styles and traditions, one where shapes and pathways reveal themselves momentarily only to become obfuscated.

The duo’s new record, The Butterfly Drinks the Tears of the Tortoise, is a continuation of this approach, using folky acoustic guitar as a jumping-off point to explore a range of tonalities. We were able to send over Conrad Standish and Samuel Karmel some questions. Give their answers a read, and listen to The Butterfly Drinks the Tears of the Tortoise, which is out now on The Trilogy Tapes, below.

Tell us about the new record. There seems to be a real emphasis on a sort of folk music language on this one, is that right to say?

 

Conrad: That's definitely fair to say. I don't really want to call it a folk record per se, but CS + Kreme have always had these sort of things running through the DNA, through our records, and sometimes it shows a little more than at other times. It's also due to the fact that I had my brother-in-law's nylon string guitar in the house for large periods of the last year, and I'd doodle around on it and play cowboy songs while I was waiting for coffee to brew, or doing whatever around the house. I haven't got that guitar anymore so maybe that's it for the folky stuff?

Samuel: With the new record, we were searching for something that was easier to digest than Orange, yet retaining depth, multifaceted and flavorsome. Con seemed to have a guitar by his couch during that period and kept on naturally writing very deep folk-like guitar lines—I kept getting phone messages with crudely recorded melodies of gold, we leaned into it and just let it happen.

 

What percentage of your music comes out of improvisation? How do you navigate sonic space when you are improvising together?

 

Conrad: Improvisation is pretty crucial to the whole thing. In the early days we were probably more jammy as a band. Even if a fairly fully formed idea has been brought to the studio, it's what we do afterwards together as a duo, where the improvisatory spirit comes to the fore, which is basically accepting there are no rules to this—no one is getting precious, and getting to the finish line by whichever means possible is the key. Allowing yourself to suck, and be vulnerable in order to transcend.

 

Samuel: These days most things start from a planted seed such as a melody, beat or sound of merit then we rabbit hole away until the dish is ready to be served, often the flavors come out completely differently than the initial idea alluded to. Ice cream on a cone might end up as a Spicy Taco.

 

“Corey” has a nice balance of traditional instrumentation and more contemporary electronic moves. How do you know when a song like that is done?

 

Conrad: That track was originally intended to have another singer on it but I ended up doing it myself, which I guess gave it another sort of a feeling. It hits me as a very emo track and for me that comes from the weird sub-bass to breathy-release thing that Sam added. As far as to when things are done—things are never really done.

Samuel: There's a little wren in the neighborhood that flies over to the studio window and starts tapping it. When the glass cracks we know it's time to stop.

How do you approach collaboration with outside voices?

 

Conrad: Generally it will be for something that we aren't able to do ourselves, but as far as how the collaborators get chosen, we're very lucky to have quite a deep pool of friends and associates that we can draw from. We generally just tell people to do whatever they want on a track, and then we'll reconfigure that to suit our particular needs on the other end.

Samuel: We generally just ask them kindly to play over material that we send through but are open and clear that we may alter their original playings substantially when we receive it.

Do you ever go back and listen to your own music? If so, what does it sound like to you, removed from the process of creation?

 

Conrad: I only really listen to our own stuff whilst we are writing a record, and then I do it a LOT. Once things are mixed, mastered, and released then I rarely listen to them again. 

Samuel: I don't usually go back and listen but when I do I'm often pleasantly surprised, I think when you have heard things a billion times during production it's hard to fully ever have a fresh outlook.

 

How did your relationship with The Trilogy Tapes come about? How do you feel like you fit in with that label?

 

Conrad: We were intro'd by our mutual friend Biscuit in about 2017. As far as fit goes, that's really not for me to say. If Will is putting out a record or a tape on TTT, then it fits! It's a testament to his fluid vision that so many disparate artists have found a home there. We don't sound like Rezzett and they don't sound like Bass Clef, who doesn't sound like Jack Sheen, who doesn't sound like Beatrice Dillon, who doesn't sound like The Gerogerigegege. But we all fit. It's been very easy and a joy working with Will over the years and we feel honored to have been a part of the story.

 

What music have you been listening to this week?

 

Conrad: Some classical stuff, Nidia & Valentina, Merope, we just saw a great Still House Plants show in Aarhus, Denmark—it's really refreshing to see a group like that—Shawty Pimp, some GRM bits.

Samuel: Monteverdi’s Madrigals, Kenny Larkin and Ustad Zia Mohiuddin Dagar.

 

Is there something that music can do that other creative forms fail at?

 

Conrad: That is a very difficult question. Obviously a painting is going to affect you in a slightly different way than a song or a film or a dance piece or whatever. I think the thing that I'm generally looking for in music is the ability to be put in some sort of a trance, whether that's psychedelic or emotional. I don't think other art forms fail at this at all, but it's generally just music that hits me the deepest. It doesn't have anything to do with proficiency or talent or intellectual theorizing or cleverness, if it hits you—it hits you. It's also just so cool to me that human beings actually try to create music, and the different things that people are compelled to make, whether that's by making sounds with their voice or by using their fingers to play an instrument or make a rhythm. What a beautiful and cool thing to do.

Samuel: Ruining lives and dancing.