“Al Schatz, who plays synthesizers, and drummer/vocalist April Camlin confirm that it’s not “woom-ay” or “voom” or “voom-ay” but “woom.” Wume was “Wumme” for about a year of touring after the band formed in 2010, but the duo says the double “m” made the name even more difficult for people to pronounce. “People were calling us ‘Wummy,’” Camlin explains, a panorama of buildings and blue sky reflected in her sunglasses. “But I’m sure that it’s actually pronounced ‘voom-ay’ in German.” (Google Translate says it “voom-ah.”)
“The name comes from the rural German town Wümme, where krautrock band Faust recorded its early music. Schatz was drawn to the name when he stumbled across a compilation of songs from Faust’s early years titled “The Wümme Years.” And though the band is clearly influenced by krautrock, thanks to Camlin’s motorik drumming and Schatz’s layered synths, the name wasn’t intended to describe the band’s musical lineage.
“I think it was more just the idea of that situation that Faust was in when they made those recordings and it seems very idyllic to us, you know, having a cabin by a river and just waking up and recording all the time and writing music,” says Schatz. “That’s something that we fantasize about being able to do someday.”
Schatz and Camlin are often far from that kind of creative isolation. Until recently, Wume was based in Schatz’s native Chicago, where they kept busy: Schatz played in the experimental psych band Bird Names, while Camlin, a Wham City member, was up to an array of things including working as a full-time sewing assistant for artist Nick Cave and playing drums in a 20- to 25-person ’60s girl-group covers band.
“Since relocating to Baltimore in 2013, the pair still have a lot going on. Camlin returned to her hometown to finish her BFA at MICA this past spring, and Schatz tours with Dan Deacon as his sound engineer. But in a way, Wume was able to realize their fantasy of creative autonomy with “Maintain,” though it happened in their Mount Vernon basement studio instead of a cabin.
“We’re kind of control freaks so it really allowed us to have this full autonomy with how we approached the sound and setting it up and recording it,” says Camlin. “We didn’t have to be on anyone else’s schedule.””
~City Paper
Tune into WMSE’s Radio Drill Time program to catch news of the band’s latest LP, Maintain and their fall tour which brings them to Milwaukee this Sunday, November 15th.
