The Obelisk Questionnaire: Lindsey Baker of Guts Club
The Obelisk Questionnaire is a series of open questions intended to give the answerer an opportunity to explore these ideas and stories from their life as deeply as they choose. Answers can be short or long, and that reveals something in itself, but the most important factor is honesty.
Based on the Proust Questionnaire, the goal over time is to show a diverse range of perspectives as those who take part bring their own points of view to answering the same questions. To see all The Obelisk Questionnaire posts, click here.
Thank you for reading and thanks to all who participate.
The Obelisk Questionnaire: Lindsey Baker of Guts Club
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How do you define what you do and how did you come to do it?
About 10 years ago, I was making multiple series of lo-fi music videos that I organized by clubs. There was Big Mistake Club, Sad Club, Types of November Rain, Therapy Club, Feelings Club, and more. The music was bedroom recordings of various cover songs and the visuals were found footage from YouTube with really terrible animation. These videos sandwiched a series of long movies where I essentially extracted audio from rock ’n’ roll biopics (8 Mile, The Doors, and Elvis and Me) and replaced then with “normal people” covering the music.
Then came a series of videos actually called Guts Club. Instead of covering batshit ’90s hits like “Everybody Hurts” and “Nothing Compares To You,” like I had done in previous videos, I wrote these really extreme love songs. I was newly in love and as an obsessive scorpio, I thought it would be a great idea to send my new girlfriend these completely insane little videos with songs about stuffing loved ones in the trunk or drowning them. Weirdly, it worked — we’re married now. (We all have our own strange love language!) She thought the songs were cool and sort of pushed me to make the first album, The Arm Wrestling Tournament.
In my mind, The Arm Wrestling Tournament was an extension of what Vic Chesnutt had done with songwriting. I don’t think anyone really picked up on that though — more and more, I don’t think that’s what I was actually doing anyway. I slowly started adding musicians and made two country-leaning albums, Shit Bug and Trench Foot. Playing louder felt amazing and shortly before the pandemic, I started messing around with running my guitar through two amps. Obviously the pandemic sort of shattered everything I had been working on and completely destroyed my mental state. About a year into it, I had reworked what would become CLIFFS/ WALLS, found the current lineup, and somehow ended up playing super heavy music. I blame it on the pandemic and the rise of fascism.
Describe your first musical memory.
It’s a toss up between being completely terrified of the timpani in “Also Sprach Zarathustra” and just simply seeing Bruce Springsteen’s jeans-butt.
Describe your best musical memory to date.
Like any musician, I love playing music to rooms of engaged people. But, I’m also a sound tech at a venue in New Orleans. When women, queer, or nonbinary folks tell me how happy and comfortable they feel when I mix their show, I feel like there’s a point a to all of this.
When was a time when a firmly held belief was tested?
Buying a used car with low mileage doesn’t mean it won’t be a complete piece of shit.
Where do you feel artistic progression leads?
I’m not sure but for right now, I’d like to keep pushing amps and breaking my voice. I’ve never had so much fun or felt so completely happy playing music until now.
How do you define success?
I don’t think there’s one answer for that. Universal healthcare, free college, federally paid parental leave, and universal basic income would allow for each of us to discover that.
What is something you have seen that you wish you hadn’t?
I hate seeing pieces of people’s homes flying through the sky during hurricanes.
Describe something you haven’t created yet that you’d like to create.
I’d like to hear Guts Club with a baritone sax. Come to think of it, maybe some timpani too.
What do you believe is the most essential function of art?
Another one with more than one answer. For me at least, art functions to create culture and community.
Making this type of art has also helped me build confidence which is something I struggled with when Guts Club was a solo-project and even when I started adding musicians. Creating this type of music through the pandemic and playing it with Ronna and Alex has weirdly and magically helped me overcome so much of what I had previously wrestled with.
Something non-musical that you’re looking forward to?
I’m a runner and I’m SUPER excited for the temperature to drop a bit in New Orleans so I don’t have to carry 80oz of sports water on my back just so I can run 10 miles.
[Photo above by Dalton Spangler.]
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