Astronautalis plays this year's Bumbershoot Festival in Seattle. Photo by Megan Thompson.

Anyone who’s ever attended a music festival will tell you that one of the most enjoyable elements of the entire experience is the eclectic mix of people, fashions, and musical styles. Where else can you see long-haired heavy metal fans moshing to the Black Eyed Peas, or hip-hop fans lining up in front of the latest indie guitar rock gods? Music festivals are more than just a chance to catch your favorite bands in the open air – they’re an opportunity to find new favorites, and to dip your toe in any musical waters that take your fancy.

Seattle’s Bumbershoot festival is no exception, and this year’s Bumbershoot lineup contains a wide variety of musical directions and tastes. Few artists mix them together within one show as successfully as Andy Bothwell (aka Astronautalis), however. The latest Astronautalis album, This Is Our Science, blends elements of indie rock, folk, and even an epic rock anthem – all while never straying too far from the path of mainstream pop and hip-hop. Throw in collaborations with Tegan Quin and members of both Midlake and The Riverboat Gamblers, and it becomes one of the most complete amalgams of musical styles that you’ll find. And it never loses sight of Bothwell’s incredible talent at its core.

We were lucky enough to chat with Astronautalis prior to his set at Bumbershoot, to ask about his influences, the new album, and what we can expect from his festival appearance.

Dan Coxon: This Is Our Science feels very autobiographical in places. Was this intentional, or did the material simply lead you in that direction?

Astronautalis: It was quite intentional. My last record, Pomegranate, was actively non-autobiographical, and written as a collection of short pieces of historical fiction. While previous records involved elements of my own life, they were never the focus of the albums, and were often heavily coded in prose and metaphor. After touring 8-10 months a year for the last seven years, and putting around 500,000 miles on the road, I had amassed a pretty good collection of my own stories, and I felt it was high time to set some them to song.

Writing about myself, and trying to remain objective and interesting turned out to be much more difficult than writing about old dead revolutionary war generals… I am really proud of the result on this album… but this whole “self-indulgence” thing is totally overrated. Hmmm… should I have used “non-autobiographical” or “non-autobiographic” there? Curse my public school education!

Astronautalis - This Is Our Science.

DC: I heard that you started out as a battle rapper, so on behalf of the uninitiated everywhere I have to ask… is it anything like the Eminem movie 8 Mile? Or have we all been sold a Hollywood fantasy?

A: Before that movie made rap battles the new open mic night for every college town in America, you had to go to some really sketchy places to battle. More times than not… they would end with a fight, or at least a lot of shoving and chest bumping, and my skinny white ass had to learn how to run through alleys in the dark because I couldn’t fight a cold.

While I do feel there is a great element of truth to that movie… my mom never came busting into our trailer late at night with an armful of groceries and a new found hope for life shouting, “RABBIT!!! RABBIT!!! I went to bingo… AND I WONNNNNNNNNN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”. Sorry to shatter your dreams.

DC: Some of the songs on the album are clearly hip-hop tracks, while others are outright indie rock. Why the eclectic collection of genres? Does this reflect your own listening tastes?

A: I had the good fortune of being born in 1981, which made me 13 the year that Girl skateboards released the Spike Jonze-directed ‘Goldfish’ skate video. While many folks will say that ‘Video Days’ is the most important skate video ever made, I was 10 when that came out, so it didn’t mean shit to me. ‘Goldfish’ however, was totally mind-blowing, and while I have since entered my retirement years with skateboarding (I can’t even land a kickflip anymore), the one thing that I will always retain from that video, and hundreds of others from that era, was the musical diversity in the soundtracks. You could be watching Marc Johnson doing a run and the score could seamlessly switch from Polvo, to Wu-Tang, to Woodie Guthrie.

I learned so much about music from those videos, and more than anything, it was amazing to see your heroes not be beholden to once scene or one style. There are certainly countless other things that have lead me to feel comfortable with the genre hopping I do, but that golden era of skate videos most assuredly set the stage for both my listening tastes and my musical style… or lack thereof.

DC: Moving on to Bumbershoot, have you played the festival before? What’s your connection to Seattle?

A: Never played the festival before… but I saw T.I. there a few years back. He put on a great show, but in hindsight, it makes sense that dude was arrested for buying all those guns. He took his shirt off halfway through the set and he is so skinny he made me feel good about my bird chest. He looks like Christian Bale in the third act of The Machinist. It is nice to know that not all of the pop rappers got jacked on HGH like 50, Busta, and Timberland. Oh… yeah… and I lived in Seattle for three years. That too. Next question!

DC: In addition to playing the Fountain Lawn Stage on the Saturday, I see that you’re also moderating the ‘Why This? Why That? Why Now?’ panels. Without making this sound too much like a job interview, what do you think you can bring to these discussions?

Astronautalis. Photo by CA Bothwell.

A: The panel is a series of discussions comparing and contrasting interesting cultural trends/oddities of the last year. I think the best way I could answer this is by addressing my personal expertise on each topic individually:
Why Nerds? Last night, instead of hanging out with a cute girl, I stayed up till 4:00am reading a 1000 page fantasy novel.
Why Old-timey? The most popular song I ever wrote is about the Washington crossing the Delaware.
Why 3D? I am saving up money to buy a 3D TV just to watch Jackass 3D on… and to ONLY watch Jackass 3D on.
Why Auto-tune? I make rap music for a living.
Why censorship? I make fucking rap music for a living.
Why Revolution? This one… yeah… this one is going to take some research.

DC: In the spirit of the panels, I’d also like to ask: Why Astronautalis? Why hip-hop-indie-rock fusion? Why now?

A: Because if now isn’t the right time for indie-artsy-introspective-autobiographical-historical-science-fiction-folk-hop, when is? (Don’t answer that.)

DC: And finally… for those who haven’t seen your live shows before, what can we expect from the Bumbershoot set?

A: It is just like going to a church service with the Pentecostal Snake Handlers… only with less snakes, more rap, and the exact same amount of whiskey.

Astronautalis plays Bumbershoot 2011 on Saturday September 3, on the Fountain Lawn Stage. He will also be moderating the three ‘Why This? Why That? Why Now?’ panels, one each day of the festival. Check the official Bumbershoot website for an up-to-date festival schedule, and to buy Bumbershoot tickets.