Losing his religion

“A part of me thinks if you don’t want to think about this stuff, just cover your ears—don’t listen to it,” singer David Bazan says. “But at the same time, I think people should interact with information as it comes down the line. And if something new comes to light that contradicts their old way of thinking, they’ve gotta let the chips fall where they fall.”

He pauses and adds, “I don’t wish anyone any discomfort or inconvenience.”

Despite his wishes, Bazan’s new record, Curse Your Branches, is bound to make some people, namely Christians, uncomfortable. Especially the ones that bought Pedro the Lion albums back when Bazan felt, um, differently about religion, back then he sang about his unwavering faith in God. Now he sings about his skepticism. Though he once called himself a Christian, he now labels himself agnostic.

How did this former man of God come to write songs that all but dismiss everything he used to believe in? Simple: He finally started to question it all.

“There’s a way of living, especially in the Christian faith that I grew up in, that your faith in the philosophical ideas that you live by aren’t ever really exposed to any real serious scrutiny,” Bazan says. “It’s a lot of people agreeing and backing each other up and whatever. That kind of solidarity can be great, but when all of a sudden one’s ideas are exposed to serious scrutiny and they maybe don’t hold up, that can be really frightening.”

Bazan was born into a religious family in Washington state—his father was a pastor at the local church—and began his music career in 1995 when he formed Pedro the Lion. The band went on for nearly a decade, going from playing for church youth groups to touring Europe, before Bazan started to lose his footing. The Seattle band played its last show in October 2005, and after that, Bazan spent the next year boozing and not realizing what he was really doing.

“I was always Mr. Good Intentions, but the wake of destruction that I left was pretty brutal,” he says. “Good intentions aren’t really enough if you want to be a good friend.”

Needless to say, it was a rough time for him and his family. But in 2006, Bazan managed to turn his tumult into a collection of songs that he self-released as the Fewer Moving Parts EP. From there, he began moving in a more productive direction.

His recently released first full-length under his own name, Curse Your Branches, is an honest autobiographical narrative, recounting Bazan’s struggles with alcoholism and abandoning religion. One of the most harrowing retellings is on the track “Please Baby Please.” On it, Bazan sings about calling his wife while on tour begging for a drink—please, baby, please—then fictionally fast-forwarding to when his daughter (who’s 4) is 23 and asking for forgiveness—please, daddy, please—after driving drunk and killing a mother of three.

“Those words just kinda came out. And really that’s how it happens a lot. That was, like, maybe 18 months after the event that I was making reference to,” Bazan says about writing the song. “Usually, things simmer in my subconscious for quite awhile before they come out in lyrics.”

Bazan unexpectedly used his own life as inspiration for all the tracks on the record. You’ll hear references to his wife, father, mother and daughter: the people most important to him. Most of the songs address moral and ethical concerns that seem to perplex Bazan the most. On Curse Your Branches’ first track, “Hard to Be,” Bazan sings about the difficulties he faces trying to “be a decent human being.” Without a strict set of moral guidelines, he’s been left to navigate through life on his own.

“I feel like we each have a set of obligations to people, mainly, that are either implied or we explicitly have with people, like marriage. Just kind of knowing all of those things that I have outstanding and what obligations I have to people,” Bazan says. “I guess the bottom line is just to treat people how I’d like to be treated.”

It may have taken awhile, but it seems Bazan has at last reached a good place. He’s comfortable with the stances he’s taken, and he’s even able to drink a beer here and there. He’s a pretty simple guy. He wears a black T-shirt and jeans every day, he’s been married to his high-school sweetheart for 10 years (they just had their second child) and he’s fairly comfortable with his path.

“I still am on, whatever you’d call it, my journey. I don’t even like that word. I’m still collecting data about a lot of stuff. So, every now and again somebody will bring up a point, and for me, I really have to not take everything seriously, but I sometimes think, Maybe they’re right—maybe I am trying to have it both ways.”

As for his religious beliefs (or lack thereof) and taking heat from people about his changed ways, he’s diplomatic. He’ll listen to what they have to say, but it’s unlikely he’ll go back.

“To conscientiously proceed from here, I can’t ignore potentially valid criticism. But, if it’s baloney, then I can only do so much.”

David Bazan plays with Say Hi on Saturday, Oct. 3, at The Casbah. www.myspace.com/davidbazan.