After you’ve seen a comic dupe dozens of customers into trying feces-flavored frozen yogurt, hatch an elaborate plan to take down Best Buy, and tightrope in the skin of another man—all in the name of entrepreneurial altruism—the real might seem surreal enough. Of course, the distinction between Nathan Fielder and “Nathan,” his character on Comedy Central’s cult favorite “Nathan For You,” is a crucial one. But the latest web-series from director Dean Fleischer-Camp (“Marcel the Shell,” “Catherine”), which debuted all five installments at once last week, might have pushed Fielder and his fans even further outside of their comfort zone.
“David” is a bleak but hilarious mini-binge of a series from Super Deluxe, starring Fielder as the titular character. We first meet David in a psychic’s office, as tarot cards reveal what he already knows: his life’s in shambles, after losing his job, wife (played by Jenny Slate, Fleischer-Camp’s own ex-wife and frequent collaborator), and friends in rapid succession. The psychic provides an important revelation, though: Apparently David is lugging around a black rock in his chest that will force his body to decompose in five weeks, unless he can find a way to expunge it.
The whole affair sounds unbearably heavy, but Fleischer-Camp’s Lynchian affectations and stilted dialogue steer the series away from being a complete downer. From the first few frames, airy synths by Will Wiesenfeld (aka Baths, Geotic) reveal themselves to be a vital supporting character. Wiesenfeld’s score glides and weaves along with few ominous interruptions, even as David’s thought bubbles drift towards his impending doom. “David” marks Wiesenfeld’s second scoring project, following his work on a 2013 episode of Natasha Allegri’s animated web-series, “Bee and Puppycat.”
The Los Angeles-based musician has kept a lower musical profile as of late, hard at work on new music for Baths—his take on crackling electronic that veered morbid on 2013’s Obsidian—and the ambient side project Geotic. He says that a dancier Geotic record is due early next year, with new Baths music a bit further out on the calendar. We spoke to Wiesenfeld about writing to someone else’s tone, why he doesn’t need retro synths, and what’s next.
Pitchfork: How did you become involved in “David”?
Will Wiesenfeld: Dean reached out to me directly, which was super flattering because I had seen “Catherine,” his other series, and I was obsessed with it. My bandmate Morgan and I, we watched the whole thing on tour as it was coming out, ‘cause it was like one episode at a time. We saw the first two or three and were die-hard fans for it.
Had you seen all of “David” before starting work on the score, or did Fleischer-Camp give you a rough outline of what the tone would be?
It was actually a bit of both. He had a very clear vision of what he wanted, so he was able to dictate a ton to me before ever seeing it and already had some music suggestions that were very specific and great. But then, I think within a week or so, he was able to show me bits of the short, and I was messing around with scenes and tonal concepts, because I was trying to meet the tone that he was talking about, and then sort of got there by the time the shorts were ready for me to start working on. As I was working on them, I got closer and closer to what he wanted after a couple drafts.
Will Wiesenfeld
“David” seems to exist during this nondescript time that isn’t quite the present, mostly because everyone’s reading newspapers. Did you use older synthesizers to contribute to that effect?
I have a philosophy about this sort of thing: In the way that I make music, the end results are more than the journey. I don’t have a bunch of old synths, I don’t have a bunch of resources. I’ve always just made do with what I had. So it was a lot of really smart editing on synths that were probably not right for the project in the first place, just making sure that things sounded correct and a lot of high-pass filters and low-pass filters to make otherwise “outside of the David realm” synths sound more like “David realm” synths. I had a lot of stuff from Reaktor on my computer and worked with what I had. So it’s just a lot of editing, but I think that’s been the challenge my entire life. Especially with the very first [Baths] record, I had like no resources, but I think it makes me a better editor. I’m very comfortable with telling people I had no cool synths.
This score comes at a point when scene-setting synth scores are having a big moment on TV, with the success of S U R V I V E’s “Stranger Things” soundtrack, and it could continue next year with the new season of “Twin Peaks.”What do you find most appealing about the interweaving, minimalist synth score?
I think the appeal is that it’s more in line with how I like to think about music—that it’s like you’re meeting an atmosphere. In terms of what I put in or what I take out, the thought process is always, Does this make sense, or is it way too abrasive and contradictory to what I’m working on? So working on a minimalist score is the most distilled version of that. It’s a lot more decision-making, whereas the stuff that isn’t really minimalist, there’s still trial and error but it’s a little looser. When it’s small, you hear everything, so you have to be really decisive about the stuff you put in.
You posted recently that you’re working on the new Baths record. Did you pause that to work on “David,” or has it all been ongoing?
I’ve been working on the Baths record in a very comfortable way for more than a year and a half. There are bands that say, “Oh, we’ve been working on this record for four years,” and to the outside world that seems like every day, but if I say I’ve been working on it for a year and a half, it’s not like that. It’s been in the works for a really long time, and then when this project came about, it was comfortable enough where I could put the Baths record on hold for a little bit and get to work on this.
It was more difficult and very different from how I normally write [working on “David”], because it was a lot more notation. So it was kind of fun and inspiring, because it made me go back to my own material with a more meticulous spirit. I wanted to have more notes going on, and more chord changes—probably in subtle ways. It’s very easy to get trapped in your own devices or ideas, and you just recycle things without even thinking about it. So this was a really good, total left-field thing for me, and it got me out of my own head a little bit. And then when I went back to recording, I already had some ideas to change the songs I was working on. I wouldn’t say it directly inspired the Baths record, but it inspired me to try harder.