All Smiles

Jim Fairchild is the singer/songwriter and general creator of All Smiles, his first solo outing after his days in the band Grandaddy. His debut record was made along with drummers Janet Weiss (Sleater Kinney, Quasi), Joe Plummer (Modest Mouse, Black Heart Procession, Magic Magicians), Danny Seim (Lack Thereof, Menomena), and Solon Bixler (Great Northern).

The record was almost entirely created on 8-track, recorded in living rooms up and down the West Coast. “It was a no-budget record,” says Jim. “There wasn’t any backing yet. I just set up whatever gear I had in the kitchen of our borrowed house in Portland, and our living room in Los Angeles. It sounds like the places it was recorded in. You can hear the walls, and the floors, and the ceilings, and you can hear the cars, and the trees, and the guys selling drugs outside.”

The album was mixed by Brian Deck (Iron and Wine, Modest Mouse). All Smiles is held together by Jim Fairchild’s spare and decisive sounds, and a resistance to over-embellish. “It couldn’t be any other way. I didn’t want it to be bigger than it was supposed to be.”