The Whigs: Alive and kicking

For Parker Gispert, the singer-songwriter from highly touted garage rockers the Whigs, spending time at home is almost as exciting as being on the road. “I’m literally getting a kick out of doing laundry,” he says with a laugh from his home in Athens, Ga., where he lives with the band’s drummer, Julian Dorio.

Gispert’s domestic bliss will be short-lived. He, Dorio and new bassist Tim Deaux return to the road this year in support of their second album, “Mission Control,” a record filled with even more punchy guitar hooks and thunderous drum fills than their self-released debut, “Give ‘Em All a Big Fat Lip.” That debut, which the band recorded in a frat house on gear they bought on eBay, prompted Rolling Stone in 2005 to call the Whigs “perhaps the best unsigned band in America.” (They’re now signed to ATO Records, home to fellow Southern rockers My Morning Jacket.)

In between batches of laundry, Gispert talked about lineup changes, onstage pratfalls, near-death experiences and other hazards he’s had to face on the road to indie rock success.

You’re on your second album and you already have a new bass player. What happened to your original bassist, Hank? Why did he decide to leave the band?
I always feel bad putting words in his mouth. So I don’t know exactly.

There’s no official Whigs line? Creative differences or something like that?
No, no, we don’t do that stuff. We’re still buddies. Hank’s touring with MGMT now—he’s their touring guitar player.

He was originally a guitar player, right? Not a bassist.
That’s true. I’m not really a big fan of people who play bass like bass players, especially for what the Whigs do. I’m real strummy. There’s only three of us, so the guitar usually is more strummy and straight ahead and the bass is where a lot of the melodies are. We can’t have someone just holding down the low end. The bass player needs to be someone who’s used to playing guitar and used to playing melodies.

Your new bass player [Tim Deaux] even plays some lead guitar during your shows.
Oh, yeah, Tim’s done a great job. We were super-fortunate to find someone who can play keyboards, play guitar, play bass and sing—which isn’t the easiest.

You do quite a bit of jumping and leaping around while you play. Have you ever actually fallen off a stage or knocked over an amp or anything?
I’ve only hit the deck once. We were playing in Memphis and I just tripped and fell into my amp. But amazingly, no one seemed to notice—people didn’t even see it happen. But yeah, I get excited. It hasn’t always been that way; I stood perfectly still for a long time. But the more comfortable I get with the songs and just being on stage in general…I’ve loosened up a little bit.

When did you first get into songwriting?
I got a guitar when I was in eighth grade. And I immediately was writing songs. That was the reason I got the guitar; I never really had any aspirations to be Steve Vai or do wailing guitar solos or anything. I just liked writing songs and the guitar gave me a way to do that. Then, when I got sick—that was after high school and you know, obviously that’s a time in anybody’s life [when] they don’t really know what they want to do. And getting super-sick and almost kicking the bucket definitely helped me focus: “Alright, what do you like to do?” “I like to play guitar and write songs.” “Well, why don’t you do that?”

You say you almost “kicked the bucket.” What were you suffering from?
I was just really sick in general. I was a pretty unhealthy person. I had some weird viral stuff where my throat would kind of swell and I had a few emergency room trips. And then I got mono, and then I got hepatitis, and then I had liver failure. And then on top of that, shingles, and I had an abscess in my neck that they had to remove. And it was all during a two-month period—it was real fast.

Wow. Do you feel lucky to be alive, having gone through all that?
Yeah, for sure. I’ll get down on myself if I’m partying a lot and not treating my body well. ‘Cause when it first happens, you’re real safe, and for the year or two afterwards, just doing what you should be doing. I still am—I’m not freaking out or anything. But I’ll feel guilty about even basic things like drinking a lot.

Just having a few beers?
More than a few beers. [Laughs] It’s easy when you’re in a bar every night.