Interview: B Dolan on his new album, “The Wound Is Not The Body”

Matt Horowitz catches up with B Dolan to talk about his new album, The Wound Is Not The Body, which came out in May, production, the impact of the death of Alias in 2018, and more. 

When did you start creating the songs that became The Wound Is Not The Body?

I actually started some of these beats and ideas in 2018, but the real writing didn’t properly begin until 2020. During the pandemic lockdown is when I started just clearing out all of the concepts and beats I’d been meaning to get to and seeing what could be made of them, at which point they started to really accumulate with no clear finish line in sight. Getting side-tracked from touring allowed me to really dig in without ever picking my head up for a while.

Who provided production work for The Wound Is Not The Body and how did you find/connect with them initially?

A few of the beats were mine;  “Ice Cream Wars” and “Turn A Mill” were two beats I’d produced that I knew I intended to work with. So, those were two of the first to get vocals. I also reached out to Widowmaker, at some point, and Small Professor as a fan of his work. Ant [from Atmosphere] I connected with on the road years ago and the songs we did together came out of a week I spent writing and working with him at his crib years back.

Is this one of your first times delving into production work for your own music?

Not at all haha. I’ve been making beats since 2000. I produced on my first album, The Failure, in 2008. My first proper Rap production credit is on my House of Bees, Vol. 2 mixtape; a song called “Tin Soldiers.” Then, I produced all of my 2016 album, Kill The Wolf, and songs on my House of Bees [Vol.] 3 tape. Then, I produced several songs for Epic Beard Men, including “Dumb A$$ Kids,” “Hedges,” “Foresight,” and “Take A Break.” Then, I produced a film soundtrack for the movie Vault… I’ve been doing some production work, Matt!

Who or what would you readily cite as some of your greatest sources of personal inspiration and influence while making The Wound Is Not The Body?

The poet Adrienne Maree Brown wrote a poem called What Is Unveiled? The Founding Wound, which is where the title is sampled from. Kayln Hefferman of Wheelchair Sports Camp sent me a book during my recovery from surgery that helped get me back to myself after a number of pretty fucked up changes to my life and body in 2020. My recovery from spine surgery and the people it brought me into contact with have been my primary source of personal inspiration and influence on this one. The work of care workers and healers has inspired me a lot.

What did your typical writing, recording, production, creation, etc. processes entail?

I got very into math while writing some of these songs. I, also, was spending a lot of time just DJ’ing records in my home studio and started to get much more focused on the arrangement of songs. A little bit of that provided some new structure to the way I was thinking about lyrics and songs, which has given me some fresh ways to approach things that felt really good. All of these songs started as demos in my home studio, then, got sent to DS3K, who handled mixing the album and has mixed most of my projects since 2012. On certain songs, I knew I’d need some additional players or vocals and all of that was sort of recorded piecemeal with different sessions musicians I know. All of it remote, which felt kind of incredible and was surprisingly fun.

What can you tell us about the music videos for and concepts behind “The Rock Cried Out” and “Fantasy Baseball?”

I was approached by Fable Studios after streaming the demo for “The Rock Cried Out” and they came with that idea ready to go. The process of photographing my head for a 3-D model was pretty intense and took a couple tries. I love how they brought it to life though. As for “Fantasy Baseball,” I’d been wanting to work with Rakugaki Animation Studio for years and approached them to do a couple animated projects. The idea of an illustrated baseball team with some of my favorite rappers and an arena full of fans who are missing the point… combined with, like, a devotees’ perspective, which is much more like the Doc Ellis L.S.D. trip baseball game… like, we’re not playing a game, we’re watching larger than life characters and stories play out and do incredible things… “Who gives a fuck what the score is?” That was the concept for that one.

How would you say your overall sound, musical style, approach, etc. has changed and evolved since your last proper solo album with 2015’s Kill The Wolf?

It’s changed a lot like my approach to life has changed. I was reckless when I was younger and trying to move as much energy as possible. In the course of doing that, I might’ve been doing too much, at times, and wasting energy or muddying the water for myself. With age, I think you slow down a little, but learn to move more energy with a focused, mindful effort. I’m always trying to improve and reduce things to their essence when it comes to my process of doing things. I used to only rap densely until I started listening more to production. I used to only produce densely until I started listening more to the mix. So, I’m always in a process of refining and sharpening what I do, which, sometimes, means doing less. A lot of the process with these songs was about tearing down and building back up.

What prompted you to trim the album down from 27 tracks on the tour-exclusive version of The Wound Is Not The Body from 2023, to the final 9-track album version?

I’ve given the folks who came back first and strongest since the pandemic an early peak at the whole collection of songs, but, ultimately, we decided that 27 songs was going to be far too many to focus on and great songs were going to get lost in the sauce, if we just let them all go at once. The decision was made to split it into two albums. This one I privately kind of think of as “the pre-op.” The one that will follow it contains a lot of the heavier and darker stuff that got written during that time.

How did you go about recruiting Symphonic Distribution and Speech Development Records/The Orchard to co-release The Wound Is Not The Body in the US and UK, respectively?

I’ve never tried self-releasing a record at this level, but the new realities of indie music sort of dictated I had better learn. Patreon and Bandcamp with their crowd-funding functions, also, opened my eyes to a lot of what is possible, if you’re willing to interact directly with the folks who care the most about what you’re doing. Scroobius Pip released my last record in 2016 and put me in touch with The Orchard, via his label, Speech Development. Patreon and Kickstarter allowed me to press my own records and merch without taking advances from a label. There’s a learning curve to distributing your own music, but the benefits of retaining ownership and control over what I’m making is the most important thing, at this point.

Who designed the image seen across the album cover for The Wound Is Not The Body, what’s the significance behind it, and what is its relation to the themes heard across the album itself?

Janine Shroff did the design. She’s an incredible painter, designer and illustrator, who I was introduced to via a mutual friend. I sent her an image taken by the plastic surgeon a week after my surgery, which was my first look at my back once the bandages came off. The original photo is pretty damn gory. Most of the nurses in the hospital told me they’d never seen a cervical spine scar that big.  When we started working on the cover, I talked to Janine about a time I was on mushrooms under a big decaying tree after Alias died. I was looking at this big Goth tree and thinking it was like a cathedral, and about how Bren (Brendon Whitney/Alias) would’ve dug it and it was sad that it was dead. And, suddenly, I locked in to all these ants that were moving in and out of this dead tree and realized this whole structure was brimming with life as it was being torn down and turned into new things. From there, the idea developed of this wound that’s regenerating and growing things, even though it’s green and infected and open.

When can we expect a follow-up to Epic Beard Men’s 2019 album, This Was Supposed to Be Fun?

Probably never, would be my guess haha. Never say never, but this feels like an OK time to say it. There’s certain indie rap team-ups that are like that, though. I think, at the time, we both knew those albums and tours were for posterity… for the sake of all the people who said we should do it, we did it. Those records exist as a marker of that time and, really, our whole time together. It was a detour for both of us though and life has gotten even less personally and financially conducive to detours like that in the time that’s passed. We’re both in very different phases of life and business these days with plenty of solo work to get to.

What do you have planned next to share with the world?

A ton more music. My schedule will determine whether the rest of these songs come out later this year or in the first quarter of next year. Right now, I’m writing to beats Alias had sent me before he passed for a follow-up to Fallen House, Sunken City (2010) we’d been planning. I’ve got some exciting tour plans for the year, as well, including tours with some great openers and presentations I’ve never tried. People can sign up for Patreon to hear and see work in-progress, as always, or hit the email list at IAmBDolan.com for tour announcements and release news. Thanks for the interview!

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The Wound Is Not The Body is out now – get it here. Follow B Dolan on X, Instagram and Spotify. 

Matt Horowitz has been a hip-hop fan ever since he first heard Wu-Tang Clan’s Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) back in the mid-90’s, which positively or negatively changed his life ever since, depending on who you ask. He single-handedly runs online music publication The Witzard, and has been fortunate enough to interview Eothen ‘Egon’ Alapatt, Guilty Simpson, Ice-T and Mr. X, Dan Ubick, Career Crooks’ Zilla Rocca & Small Professor, Cut Chemist, and J-Zone, amongst countless others. He enjoys writing about and listening to hip-hop, Punk/Hardcore, and Indie Rock on vinyl with his lovely wife, while drinking craft beer, red wine, or iced coffee. To paraphrase both Darko The Super and the Beastie Boys: “Already Dead fans, they want more of this… I’m a Witzard like my man Matt Horowitz!”. Follow Matt here.