I’d like to tell you all about The Capstan Shafts mastermind Dean Wells, but I’m afraid that there isn’t much to tell you. There’s a deplorable lack of information about the project available on the interweb, and Mr. Wells doesn’t seem to mind the mystery. Here’s what is known at present:

Dean Wells lives in Vermont and records albums and EP’s at an alarming rate. The music contained within is usually of the fuzzy four-track ilk, and every song is uniform in their amazing shortness. The songs start, give you exactly what is needed for you to digest it as a definable ‘song’ and then they end. Sometimes there’s harmony. Sometimes there’s the illusion of a full band, even though it’s just Dean tinkering away on his home taping equipment. Said songs can be poppy, psychedelic, rockin’ or just plain weird. There’s really no telling what you’re going to get when you pop in a Capstan Shafts release, and when you combine that with the fact that few people know much of anything about the guy… the project becomes the stuff of legend.

We at RetroLowFi are proud to have tracked Dean Wells down for a short email interview, hoping to gain some insight into one of the most mysterious projects today’s bloggers have ever tried to decode. We won’t be editing his answers in the least. The way you see ‘em is the way he typed ‘em, and that’s because his typed responses seem to speak volumes about the far-from-linear mindset Wells approaches his fascinatingly condensed music with. So, without further ado…

1. Okay, you write a lot of songs. What’s your writing process like on an average day?

“mostly its put on the coffee, additionally i sit by the four track making stuff up until i like something, I almost always play with the headphones on so writing and recording sort of blend
there’s no dedication involved I just really enjoy the process so its pretty much an everyday thing………….. like pornography”

2. Your style’s been compared to Robert Pollard (of Guided By Voices fame) and Neutral Milk Hotel. Are they big influences on you musically? Who else would sit in the Capstan Shafts Hall Of Fame?

“bob is the king of rock and roll
everyone digs nmh but I’m as likely to listen to the mountain goats or the Beatles early and late respectively, everything popular blows unless I like it then it means I recognize quality
whatever the stigma
which is not the same as stigmata ( I learned that the hard way)”

3. How many albums/EP’s have you actually completed and released? Which would be your favorites/least favorites?

“there are ten eps and five ‘full lengths’ with a sixth that is done but i don’t know when it will be out…. and there are piles of disorganized bits that i call my ‘musical’ , because i can change the lyrics later to make them fit some theme…. everyone likes themes.
So far I like them all, the albums, ( I could lose some of the ep’s without suffering too much)”

4. Have you been the only presence on the Capstan Shafts albums, or have you worked with outside musicians on any of the material?

“Paine wrote ’society is a blessing, government a necessary evil’
thats how i feel about music and musicians
but then,I don’t get out much”

5. In this day and age, nearly everyone has a detailed web presence. A simple Google search of the Capstan Shafts brings up a ton of album reviews, but very little detailing the history of Capstan Shafts. Is that a deliberate move in the interest of being mysterious?

“I was a Jandek fan, and those albums seemed like little miracles but mostly I just lacked computer access and/or skill and/or a clue regarding visual representation
its remains difficult to think in those terms…….. doing the recordings always seems to make perfect sense….. then everything gets silly…………….. fun though”

6. What else do you do with your time when you aren’t writing and recording?

“same as everyone, used book stores and 2$ drink nights………… also hello kitty”

7. I can’t find much record of you doing live performances. So, do you play live much? If so, what’s an average show like?

“7.a see 4……7.b no I never played out .I will though (I keep thinking)”

8. What are your intentions concerning Capstan Shafts in the future?

“see 7.b”

And there you have it. Turns out that Dean Wells is just an average guy that makes a lot if not-so-average music. He likes cheap beer, good music and Hello Kitty. And apparently, he’s considering trying his hand at the whole ‘live performance’ thing that the kids are so fond of these days. In the end, all we can hope for is that he keeps churning out those great records… and keeps sending them our way, of course.

Speaking of which, the latest Capstan Shafts release has just been released on Asaurus, a neat little CD-R label. The disc is called Her Versus The Sad Cold Eventually, and believe me when I tell you: it might not be Dean’s Bee Thousand, but it could easily pass for a Propeller. (Holy GBV metaphor, Batman!). Some tracks dial down the recording hiss and replace them with slide guitar and understated washes of keyboards, quashing a bit of one-dimensional issues that plagued some early Shafts records. Not to mention containing what may be the longest song Dean Wells has ever recorded - it runs two-minutes and fifty-seconds!

You don’t hear a ton about the low-fi genre much anymore, but the mythos and music eminating from the entire Capstan Shafts project is enough to put it back in the forefront of today’s indie rock mindset. All you have to do is listen, and the tape hiss will guide you.

Tracks from Her Versus The Sad Cold Eventually:
Capstan Shafts - Wilds Of Gloryville.mp3
Capstan Shafts - Lauren Behold (A Discussion With A Stripper Over Canadian Style Health Care).mp3

Tracks from older Capstan Shafts releases:
Capstan Shafts - St. Paul?.mp3
Capstan Shafts - Worst Lessons.mp3

Purchase a copy of Her Versus The Sad Cold Eventually from Asaurus!
The totally unofficial Capstan Shafts MySpace page has links where you can obtain some of the older albums!