Chris Archibald thinks that he likes L.A., although he’s not entirely sure. For almost three weeks, the 29-year-old songwriter has been transplanted in the affluent Eagle Rock neighborhood on the northeast side of the city, a posh part of town that has at times been home to people like John Steinbeck and Barack Obama.

But those famous former residents don’t interest Archibald — at least not today. No, when Chicago Innerview tracks down the Illinois frontman, he’s interested only in the digs of producer Mickey Petralia — a house built by The Dandy Warhols’ Come Down, Beck’s Midnight Vultures, eels’ Daisies of the Galaxy, Butthole Surfers’ Electriclarryland and Imperial Teens’ What Is Not to Love, to name a few records that Petralia has produced.

The two are paring down to a dozen the 21 tracks that Illinois recorded in Petralia’s studio destined for the should-be-spring-of-2008 LP. “I just want to get as many songs out there as I can,” said Archibald. “So what we’re going to do is make it so that when you buy the new album, if you put it into your computer you get like an entire other record of all the extra songs that didn’t make the final cut.”

Although he’s not sure of the exact details for his digital-only brainchild — i.e. the sort of files they will be or exactly how it’s going to work — Archibald does know that he’s been waiting to get his music to the masses for years. As his band’s primary songwriter, he’s recorded more than 370 tracks in his home studio back east.

This sort of productivity makes it a wonder that the foursome’s 2007 EP What the Hell Do I Know? is the much buzzed-about group’s only official release to date. A hybrid of banjo-driven folk pop, lo-fi glam and beat-riddled groove tunes, the seven tracks hint of an act capable of heading in a multitude of directions.

“It’s weird, even if people like us, it seems like critics always have to find something wrong with the music. Nobody can ever just say ‘this is good,’ even if that is the main point of the review,” said Archibald of the whirlwind of press that has followed What the Hell. “Most people want to say that I need to pick a direction. So the point of this record is to show everyone I do have a direction: I have many directions.”

And Petralia is the perfect person to flush out the band’s streams and combine them into a cohesive sound, with a knack for helping experimental pop acts work with their many influences instead of against them. For Archibald, it’s all part of the learning process of being a full-time performer. Having written music since his early teen years, it was only after his mother’s death in 2002 that his songwriting took a more serious shift toward its current state.

“[Illinois bassist] Martin [Hoeger] said he noticed things change in me when I was about 25,” said Archibald. “That’s when things kinda switched from being about dicks and farts to sounding a bit more adult.”

But before this new “more adult” Archibald can head out on the road for a tour that features an extra fifth member to bulk up the act’s live sound, he’ll have to pack up and leave L.A. and Petralia behind. But the 2,500-mile trip home should give him plenty of time to think — and plenty of directions in which to wander.

Chicago Innerview Magazine, November 2007