KEVIN SHEA: ...in classical music. There are no windows necessarily in Tibet. [EXPLETIVE] a, you know what I’m saying? This is just as much classical to you lounge green light back room [EXPLETIVE] Sting plays in the back room, and his back room is this size, but we don’t give [EXPLETIVE] because guess what, Madison Square Garden doesn’t have windows. We don’t have windows either.

[MARY HALVORSON AND KEVIN SHEA PERFORMING]

GRETCHEN HASSE: Talking about touring and you’re really kind of in the middle of kind of -- You’re going a lot of places obviously [INDISCERNIBLE] [LAUGHING]

MARY HALVORSON: Yeah. Yeah.

GRETCHEN HASSE: And something for a non-musician again that I am just sort of fascinated with because you have to play new venues every night and you get there and you’re not a doing a sound check tonight.

MARY HALVORSON: Right. [LAUGHING]

GRETCHEN HASSE: So you got there and you’re like okay, so it’s a garage, we’ll play here or whatever.

MARY HALVORSON: Yeah.

GRETCHEN HASSE: So, how do you deal with -- I guess could you describe maybe one of the best acoustic situations you’ve had and then whenever where you’ve walked in and you’re like, “I have no idea how we’re going to play with this.”

MARY HALVORSON: Yeah.

GRETCHEN HASSE: This is stripped down obviously so [OVERLAPPING]

MARY HALVORSON: I mean you know immediately like you set up and just the amp could sound terrible or could sound great.

GRETCHEN HASSE: Mmm hmm.

MARY HALVORSON: It’s very weird like it can be you can be using the same amp in a different room and it can sound like an entirely different amp.

GRETCHEN HASSE: So, can you tell by now like you can walk in and say, “Okay, this is going to be a great room or this is not going to be a great room.”?

MARY HALVORSON: I can usually. If it’s not going to be a great room, I can sometimes tell. But sometimes I don't know if it’s going to be good until I actually play. I tend to like smaller rooms like if it’s a huge open space that doesn’t have much sound, you know, sound barriers or I don't know. I don’t really understand that much but, you know, acoustics in the space, but if it’s a big room, I feel like a lot of times it gets lost, and I also really don’t like reverb on myself. I don't like playing with reverb. I like it to be really -- What’s the word I’m looking for? What’s the opposite of reverb? [LAUGHING]

GRETCHEN HASSE: Non-reverbing? I [INDISCERNIBLE] [LAUGHING]

MARY HALVORSON: Yeah. I know. I’m just I really like to have a dry sound.

GRETCHEN HASSE: Yeah.

MARY HALVORSON: Dry is probably the right word, so I kind of like rooms that give me more of a dry sound. I don’t like it when the sound is just getting lost in a room or if it sounds to echo-ey.

GRETCHEN HASSE: Like if it sounds all over the place and --

MARY HALVORSON: Yeah. I don’t like that. So -- But then sometimes the amps will sound just randomly terrible or sometimes amps will feed back, especially with my other guitar or like in certain rooms the amp will feed back more. In certain rooms it will and it’s really hard to predict.

GRETCHEN HASSE: What kind of amp do you use?

MARY HALVORSON: I have a Fender Deluxe ‘85 which is just like -- It’s actually not that good. I actually really want to get a new amp. It’s not that great of an amp but I can’t afford it right now, but I want to get a Fender tube amp like a Fender Deluxe Reverb.

GRETCHEN HASSE: I was going to ask you about what you like.

MARY HALVORSON: I really like tube amps, Fender tube amps. I think that’s what I would get.

GRETCHEN HASSE: Yeah. What does it -- I mean this is kind of obvious but what is it about tube amps that you really like?

MARY HALVORSON: Just a nice -- It’s like a warm sound. I like the sound that they get. I don't know. It’s sort of hard to explain. I do have. I am playing out of one tonight. It’s not mine. I do have one that because, you know, playing a lot of gigs in New York City and I don’t want to pay for the car services so I have this little amp. It’s a Matrix and it weighs about three pounds and it’s about this big, and I can carry it on the subway and it actually sounds good.

GRETCHEN HASSE: A matrix?

MARY HALVORSON: Yeah. It’s a tiny little amp.

GRETCHEN HASSE: Is that a manufacturer?

MARY HALVORSON: Yeah. That’s the company. It’s called -- Or maybe I don't know. Yeah, it’s just called Matrix. That’s all it says. Someone gave it to me. I don't even know where it’s from but it sounds really good and I mean it -- You know, it doesn’t sound really good but my guitar, for my Guild it’s -- It almost doesn’t matter what amp I play because it’s -- it has such an acoustic sound and it’s so loud that all the amp is doing is really like turning up the volume a little bit, so -- Especially if I’m doing like sort of quiet improve thing, the amp matters much less. So, I can kind of play out of any amp like I’m not too picky about it.

GRETCHEN HASSE: So the Matrix. [LAUGHING]

MARY HALVORSON: [LAUGHING]

GRETCHEN HASSE: Like -- I don't know. How is -- How big is the speaker on that? Like is it --

MARY HALVORSON: It’s tiny. I mean it’s, you know, probably [SIZES UP WITH HANDS THE ESTIMATE DIMENSIONS OF THE SPEAKER IN QUESTION] like that big.

GRETCHEN HASSE: So it’s like -- And does it have...

MARY HALVORSON: It’s tiny.

GRETCHEN HASSE: ...like a bunch of different settings and stuff or is just sort of an in and out and a volume?

MARY HALVORSON: It’s -- It has an in, it has treble, bass, and volume I think.

GRETCHEN HASSE: And that’s it?

MARY HALVORSON: And there’s another amp. There’s this club called Barbes that I play in in Brooklyn sometimes, and they have an amp there that I use when I play there and it’s a Valve Jr. You can get this amp for $100. I was actually thinking about getting one although I haven’t, but it has one knob.

GRETCHEN HASSE: [LAUGHING]

MARY HALVORSON: And it sounds amazing. I like -- It’s as if there were 10 knobs it would be exactly how I would have turned those knobs.

GRETCHEN HASSE: [LAUGHING]

MARY HALVORSON: But it’s just a volume knob and it sounds great.

GRETCHEN HASSE: I think I heard that before.

MARY HALVORSON: And it’s a small little amp. I really like that amp too. I mean that’s something I might get, you know, to carry around because the Fender tube amps are kind of heavy. I mean ideally I would like to play one of those but if I’m lugging things around in the subway, I can’t get picky.

GRETCHEN HASSE: You have that [INDISCERNIBLE] made there or make up [INDISCERNIBLE] or something [LAUGHING]

MARY HALVORSON: Yeah.

GRETCHEN HASSE: Or I think put wheels on them or something.

MARY HALVORSON: Yeah. That would be -- That’s a good idea. Actually, they should put wheels on the amps like that.

GRETCHEN HASSE: They should out wheels on amps like that.

MARY HALVORSON: Yeah.

GRETCHEN HASSE: They should create them intelligently. It is a surprise that they haven’t done that. Anyway --

MARY HALVORSON: [LAUGHING] Yeah. I’m not too picky about amps in general especially for that guitar. If I played this guitar through that little Matrix amp, it wouldn’t sound this good. Something about my Guild, it’s just such a nice guitar that the amp matters less if that makes any sense, or that’s what I’ve noticed.

GRETCHEN HASSE: So, the Epiphone matters more what kind of guitar you’re playing?

MARY HALVORSON: I think so. I think the amp matters more because it’s not as much of an acoustic sounding guitar, you know. You don’t get as much of the acoustic sound of the guitar when it’s amplified.

GRETCHEN HASSE: Okay.

MARY HALVORSON: You know what I mean?

GRETCHEN HASSE: I think yeah. So, the amp that you’re playing with tonight again is -- or --

MARY HALVORSON: It’s like a Fender Reverb or something, a tube amp.

GRETCHEN HASSE: Okay. So, that will be giving you more of a warm sound?

MARY HALVORSON: Yeah. Exactly.