Mariella Luz:

Hello, my name is Mariella Luz and I am here in Olympia, Washington on March 6, 2023. And we are interviewing for the Olympia Music History Project. Tae, would you like to introduce yourself?

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Tae Won Yu:

Yes, my name is Tae Won Yu. I was born in Seoul, Korea. On July 19, 1968. I emigrated to the United States with my parents in 1975, settling in Flushing, New York. And I moved to Olympia in springtime of 1992.

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Mariella Luz:

What brought you to Olympia?

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Tae Won Yu: 

Well, I had first visited Olympia in 1991. At the invitation of Candice [Pederson] and Calvin [Johnson] to play at the International Pop Underground, and at the time, my band Kicking Giant, myself and Rachel Carns. We were based in New York. And we said yes, and we took a train across America, and ended up in Olympia, Washington for a few weeks. We played a show. It was our first time in [the Pacific Northwest] and in Olympia, and it was really an eye opening experience and very positive one. And that memory lingered long after  I returned to New York. I had just graduated from college. Rachel and I, we both went to Cooper Union, and didn't really know what to do. It seemed that my opportunities if I were to  stay in New York was very foggy, there wasn't really any job prospects [and the possibility of moving to Olympia] seemed too interesting. And I really wanted to keep playing with the band, and how there was a certain energy there  in Olympia. It was very seductive too because we were  there in late summer, when IPU was happening, and it was so beautiful. So I think that even while I experienced that, in real life, it really took on  a sense of romanticism and a lovely memory when I went back to dreary New York, to suffer through fall and winter. So I think over time, I convinced myself that for lack of anything better to do I should go with my instincts and resettle and move to Olympia with the idea that I could continue to play music, and and who knows what.  But it felt like Olympia held a lot of possibilities for me. Specifics, I couldn't really name but it felt very true to myself. It's as if I had found something I recognized in the people and the activities that were going on in Olympia in1991. And I wanted to basically join forces with it and see what I could make of it. So those were some of those reasons that I was thinking about when I moved to Olympia.

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Mariella Luz:  

Did you and Rachel move together at the time?

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Tae Won Yu:  

No. I believe maybe she was a year younger than I am. And maybe she had one more year or so,  I don't remember.   But I moved first in 1992 and I believe she maybe moved down to DC. I remember she was playing in a very early version of Slant Six. But she moved maybe later that year maybe or maybe 1993. 

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Mariella Luz:  

Could you give us some information about you as an artist, both as a visual artist as well as being in a band?

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Tae Won Yu: 

Well, I am an artist.  I’ve had artistic leanings since I was a child. I practice art as a way of learning about myself. I paint and I make collages. I make paper sculptures, I do some graphic design. I basically work in all media. I basically hold a beginner's mind and really consider myself a student at all times. I feel like I've always continued to try to learn new techniques and new modes of expressing myself. And I think there's always that debate in my mind, as to whether I could really sustain myself as a true artist, as opposed to getting a job and trying to attain some financial security, and general security my life. And I think this is also a reflection of my upbringing. Being an immigrant from Korea, and settling in America, I definitely was conditioned by my parents with a lot of worries about making and having a stable life in this new country. So there were lots of worries that I had inherited from my parents, and part of it was that being an artist was  something akin to being self indulgent. And it felt that I may be neglecting some very real responsibilities, if I were to just continue to [pursue art as a career]. So I found a way to build on my artistic instincts and started working in graphic design. And part of learning to do that was actually something that I had a chance to do in Olympia.  I worked with K Records, at the behest of Calvin and Candice.  I  designed some early record covers, [T-shirts] and newsletters and things like that.  I continue to do so making my own things and in later working for Built To Spill’s records. And so that was really an important part of being able to earn my keep as a commercial artist. And that led me to continue to do graphic design. And now I work as a designer at a children's book publishing imprint.

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Mariella Luz:  

Yeah, I have two of your new books and  they're wonderful and I've gifted them to lots of people. When did you start playing music? 

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Tae Won Yu: 

I started playing music fueled by a lot of my fantasies, I think probably around 13. And I think it wasn't until I moved out of my parents’ house and I was in college probably 18- 19 that I began to sort of get it together and start playing music and recording and  making baby steps towards  performing. But I was actually really inspired by Calvin [play in New York in 1989.] Actually even before seeing Calvin [and Tobi and Billy playing in] The Go Team, I saw Sonic Youth play at the very first Knitting Factory in New York. This would probably be, I don't know, maybe 88’- 89’. And I was up really close and, and seeing them really just go for it, you know, with their entire body and really going full force on their guitars and things like that.  [Seeing that show] really  demonstrated how one could actually do it, [not just intellectually but instinctually, physically.] And I think very soon after, I was able to purchase a four track cassette recorder and I started with just recording myself and basically kind of  copying Sonic Youth and that type of guitar arrangements. And, and that's how it started. I think within the year, I saw another show that also really affected me, which was seeing The Go Team on tour playing in New York with Some Velvet Sidewalk, and Mecca Normal, and Galaxie 500.  They were playing at a show that was presented by my friend, Mike McGonigal who had a zine called Chemical Imbalance. And he put on the show, which was very unusual show for New York, for me anyway, in that it h was not at a bar or club, but taking over a basement yoga studio on 10th St.  That was really eye opening as well. Kind of the seemingly non pro, very accessible, very immediate. And there wasn't much of the kind of attempt to be cool, or really deliver any sort of theatrical performance.  It really was, as if you were just going to see someone, like a friend's band practice in a basement. But I really loved all the spirit and the sound of all the bands that night and that made me really want to learn more about what was going on in Olympia, and what was happening at K Records. In addition to that, I think the other thing that really affected me was the single by The Go Team that I had received, some time between the two events, which was called The Milk Toast Brigade. I think it was a song written by Jeffrey Kennedy. He sang it and The Go Team backed him up. I thought that was just really one of the best songs I’d ever heard. And I really love, really, really love that record. And, and I don't know, I just saw that I could insert myself into that. And I wanted to play music like that. So with those kinds of experiences related to Olympia, and the bands that were being put out by K records [they all inspired me and gave me a sense of direction with my music.] .  I really kept thinking about it and you know, sort of connected the dots when I had the opportunity to go to IPU and visit and see Olympia for myself.

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Mariella Luz:  

When did you and Rachel start doing Kicking Giant?

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Tae Won Yu: 

That must have been maybe '89 or '90.  We had been hanging out almost every day. We would get together at her apartment and smoke cigarettes, talk and eat chocolates and just hang out. I don't know, it just seemed like we were almost having this platonic love affair. We were really kind of inseparable, it felt like that for me. So I think It was  just a natural outgrowth. We were more like siblings, I think,  but we were best friends and I really found a true partner. And it felt very natural that we would want to do something like play music together,  it was just an extension of us hanging out.  I think I was able to find  a floor tom that we basically wedged into a stool.  Just one drum and guitar, and we would just kind of make our attempts at making songs together. And, yeah, that's how it started. Just playing in our apartments together.

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Mariella Luz:  

That's awesome. And I saw that you might be playing some shows this summer. So a pretty long running collaboration.

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Tae Won Yu: 

Yeah how fortunate I am. [To] have a long friendship with this really extraordinary person. Yeah, it’s really hard to imagine, to realize that we've been friends since we were 18-19. And I'm going to be 55 this year. That's a long time.

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Mariella Luz: 

Do you want to tell us about some of the projects I have them listed here, but that you worked on? Well, I'll say that  I moved here in the mid 90s. And your artwork, in my mind was the aesthetic of the mid 90s. I think that you worked on Yo Yo Gogo, and you did a [Olympia] Film Fest cover and of course you said like you mentioned you did some work with K.  Do you want to talk a little bit about some of those projects?

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Tae Won Yu:  16:57

Yes, yes. In Olympia I guess I became identified as a person who was interested in doing graphics and went to art school and has some background [in the arts.] I didn't have much experience  doing graphics, but I was definitely a fan of graphic design. And I think it was actually when I moved in 1992, within the first few weeks, I was just hanging out at K when they had their office above the Chinatown, the Chinese restaurant [on 4th Avenue.] I think Calvin just asked me to make some posters for Tiger Trap’s first EP [Sourgrass], and Lois [Maffeo’s] Strumpet. I just made myself available. And it was all very casual. I was paid for the work. But I also did a lot of work for free. And also just really a great opportunity because they had a copy machine, and I could do my work there. It was a really open and generous  environment. And I was able to just take advantage of that and just learn as I went. I kind of picked up on the graphic design techniques that basically Calvin was doing, which was [how everything was done] , pre-computers: [rubber cement,] Letraset, and Photostats. And making negatives and things like that. But even that was really great to learn. And yeah, I really enjoyed it. It was a really great learning experience. I felt like I was continuously working. I think, looking back, I realized I was really prolific.  It was a very ideal situation for me because when I was young, I was as much a fan of punk graphics as I was of  the music. And, you know, record covers, house designs by [labels] like Fast Records in England and Rough Trade and Factory and 4AD, you know, some of these records I recognized [as statements of style.] I understood early [that there was] a sort of a dual transmission of the spirit [of the music] and [a mission of]  regional documentation that was going on in both the music and the graphics involved. So I felt that, especially in punk, graphic design was equal to the music.  It was really an extension of the community spirit that was being engaged at the time. I really appreciated that, on one hand what Calvin and Candice were doing was that they were documentarians [in a way.]  They were keeping and making a record of what was happening in their community. And a  part of making that record was also to try to capture in another dimension, aesthetically and graphically, what was happening [in the community.]  [Subconsciously I was trying to make]  an accurate reflection of  the vibe of the community and the spirit of all that through colors, and textures, and references and things like that. So it was really an incredibly formative time for me, and really exciting to work there. And, you know, before moving to Olympia, being in New York, I had a lot of fantasies and ideas in my mind about what was happening in Olympia, and what I imagined K Records would be like.   Anecdotally I can tell you that when I was living on First Street and Avenue A, and I would correspond with Calvin and send him cassettes, I would imagine that, Calvin lived in a log cabin, where that [the Celestial Seasoning] Sleepytime bear tea, might have lived.When I moved there it was a little bit different. But still, it really did fulfill a lot of my hopes and dreams: lot of creativity, a lot of openness and a lot of  positive kind of “can do” spirit.  That no one was actually waiting for the “right” opportunity or money or anything,  it was really just getting it done getting it out. And moving on to the next project.  Further on, I think that momentum, just like kept going after IPU.  Pat Maley,  Michelle Noel, Kento [Oiwa] and all these other people, Diana Arens, worked to put on these yearly festivals, Yo Yo Gogo. And of course, I raised my hand.  I wanted to work with that. And I continued to make posters for them, and passes and things like that. And Transfused was again, another really incredibly ambitious project that was happening, you know, made by kids. And I mean, even now, I am still just amazed by just the fearlessness of all these people just willing to stick their neck out and just, like get things done, and they were all so short lived,  but it really, I think it really changed people's lives for all the people who witnessed it. And I feel so fortunate to have that opportunity to work with all these people. 

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Mariella Luz:  

I interviewed Nomy for this project. And when she was talking about it,  with regard to The Transfused  and maybe with Yo Yo too,  it didn't even like really occur to them that they couldn't do it. You know, like when we look back on it now 20 years, we're just like “How did you put on our full rock opera with all these people, with these professional sets and this huge cast and crew?”   The mindset was like, “Well, people were into it. Why wouldn't we?”

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Tae Won Yu: 

Yeah, I think that when we're young and we don't have any experience and we haven't really been defeated, or pushed down,  or denied as much as we may be in the future. We have our plans and dreams and ambitions, it just seems like we're just looking for the next cool thing to occupies ourselves with.   Like the next song that we're going to write,  the next band that we're going to do, the next show that we're going to put on.  Everything just seemed very natural that we would plan for the next thing without any fear that it's going to be too much work or that we're going to lose money or, you know, we're going to fail and come home with our tails between our legs.  All these things are definitely possibilities. But it didn't seem that threatening to us. It seemed that if you could dream it, there's a good chance that it could happen. And I think part of it is that there's ringleaders, and then there's lots of support casts and different levels of the people who really just want to be involved. And it's that incredible alchemy, the combination of people, like the dreamers, and the organizational minds,  the people who can talk to people and get things for free and make plans, and gather people together, and keep people in line, you know, all these things come together, and somehow we pull it off. The other thing I remember, was that part of the punk ethos was, like, “we're doing it for the kids,“ meaning for ourselves, but also for kids who are coming up who are younger than us.  If we kind of examine that, that, you know, that little statement. To me, it means that as a punk, as an artist, as somebody in the community, we have a responsibility to provide a demonstration of how to do things and what can be done to somebody who was just like us couple of years ago.  Kind of, like, wishing that we could do more, but by kind of opening the door, and letting people in,  I think that we, all of us, held a very important criteria, that this was actually part of the civic responsibility as artists and as members of this community to not only create culture now, but also plant the seeds for the next generation. I was always heartened by the fact that we played as many all ages shows that we could and we really tried to engage kids and people of all ages really. I think that's a very important point. I think that if we didn't do it, no one else would. 

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Tae Won Yu: 

It’s so different from the kind of situation that I find myself in now being older and being around people who really didn't experience that [spirit of “make it ourselves]. A lot of people I’m friends with these days, you know, they're very cool but the idea that we can  get a space and put a show together? I don't find that many people recognize that as a possibility. But it's definitely a shared experience from all the people I spent time with in Olympia during those years. Yeah.

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Mariella Luz: 

You talked about it a little bit before, but do you have any memories or impressions of the International Pop Underground Convention? That was sort of like the festival that a lot of folks are pointing to as this sort of moment in our collective Olympia Independent Music History.

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Tae Won Yu:

Sure. Yeah, my memory of Olympia during the week of the International Pop Underground was that it was beautiful weather.  And there was just like hundreds of punks, recognizable people I'd seen on record covers.  As well all these people, I recognized as music lovers, and people who love punk culture, all gathered together.  And it was just like, very strange (laughs). Like the streets were just crowded with kids. And the energy was high and there was like, this open door kind of feeling at the Martin.  Everything about it just was like experiencing utopia. I couldn't really believe it. It was so so happy just being around friends, new friends, old friends. You know, people I knew  through fanzines, and correspondences,  and obscure records. So the experience of it was like being suddenly transposed into this environment where the thing that I sustained myself in my isolation, which was music, and thinking about music, and listening to music playing music, somehow [I] was thrust into this environment where everybody else was like this. And so this is really like the most kind of most obvious embodiment of a community. That was on the other side of my interior experience. And I think that was just like spiritually so heartening that this was even possible.  I can say that in some ways, it was really a dream come true.  I think my own interest in art and my pursuit of art, was partially modeled on some of the historic accounts that I would read about everything in the  turn of the century Paris, to early ‘80s Athens, New York City in the ‘70s, Akron, Ohio in the mid to late 70s, Detroit.  All these places, I would romantically just fantasize about, like being in a community of like minded  people who are into what I was into. And I was f always seeking it and hoping that I would find it and, when I went to Olympia in 1991, for IPU, I think I recognized that I or made myself believed that this was it. And I think that it was partially true. That certainly the potential for this explosion of  artistic expression,  and in projects,  and bands, and music,  and art. You know there's so much that happened, ultimately did happen, but when I first encountered it, when I first came to Olympia it was mostly hope.  I was just hoping that that would be it, but I decided definitely to take a chance on it. Because the only thing I knew to be a sure thing was that I would end up at a job I probably hated in New York. But if I went to Olympia, I wouldn't know what was going to happen. But whatever happened will probably be more in line with what I wanted to do, than  if I had stayed in New York.  What else do I remember about it? I don't know. It was really just intense. I mean, I think it was just,  kind of the overlap of, of being young and really sort of like not knowing what to do with yourself. Not knowing how the person you are at the time, how can that possibly translate into a place for yourself in the wider world.  It seemed that it was very difficult, it was gonna be very difficult. But I found that I had the experience when I was in Olympia during that time that I had found another home, another community, another family, another environment in which I felt like I could really be myself. Or, you know, a good place to actually figure out who I was going to be.

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Mariella Luz:  

And how long did you live here? 

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Tae Won Yu: 

Yes, I lived in Olympia from 1992 to 2002. So 10 years.

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Mariella Luz:  

And what made you decide you finally had to go?

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Tae Won Yu: 

Well, I think the reason I left Olympia was because I moved back to New York in 2002 [misspoke in recording and said 1992.] And the immediate reason was that my father was sick. And so I wanted to be back, to be with him, but also After 10 years, I realized that I was kind of spinning my wheels. I think I was having trouble growing into the next step and it seemed like the time was right to move back to New York. I found that back in around 2002. You know, for me, kind of thinking about the decision to  leave Olympia or not and I think one of the reasons I think I did move away was that I needed harder challenges. I think for me, one of the great aspects of Olympia is thee very real community support that exists.  It supports your art and your ambitions.  You could fulfill these projects in Olympia with some ease,But then I found that there's such a thing as too much support, or lack of [competition and harder questions] or criticisms that could actually help you. And I found that some rejection and picking yourself up is necessary to grow. But there's a lot of places to land that’s kind of soft in Olympia. And I felt a little frustrated, because I didn't have the tools to really push myself. And so I think I just need a new environment to learn more things. And yeah, see how far, see what else I could do?

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Mariella Luz:  

While you were here, was there anything about the built or natural environment that influenced your work? What spaces were significant to you during your time here?

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Tae Won Yu:

Hmm. Well, for the majority of the time that I was living in Olympia, I lived with Nikki McClure. And she's a native of Washington State. And she was somebody who is very connected with the natural world. And just being around her and following her rhythms, and observing how she interacted with nature really did affect me. But I could say that being a city kid, and really not having had much exposure to nature, before moving to Olympia, and then suddenly being thrust into this world where there's old growth forests not far from where we are, and next to the sea, etc. I felt the sense of my identity as a New Yorker become more pronounced. And I found that artistically anyway, I could write about New York, or memories of New York so much more clearly being in Olympia. If only as a contrast to what was around me, I couldn't really, I didn't feel like I could really write about nature, it would take me a long time to actually process that into my work. But my immediate reaction to being in Olympia was how different it was from New York and my upbringing. And so, those memories of growing up in Tokyo, and growing up in New York, became very objectified to me. And I could actually see it as a subject rather than experience it as something that's inseparable from myself, and being able to see it as an object,  sort of like details of, of living in the Lower East Side and things like that. All these things were kind of in my memory banks in Olympia and I found that they became really rich well of inspiration and subject matter for me to write about.. So in some ways I really love being in Olympia and I love being in the forest and going on hikes and being outside all of that. But the effect that it really had was that I began to observe my experience of the city in a compartmentalized way, that was really useful for the music that I made in Kicking Giant. If only  to kind of differentiate myself, to actually use that as a jumping off point to what Kicking Giant is/was and who I was as an identifier, like, I'm from New York. So that was definitely part of the experience of this very pronounced nature environment of Olympia.

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Mariella Luz:  

Ian Svenonius once was telling me like “Oh, well, you know, you Olympia punks. You're just like, so different. Like you Northwest punks, you're just like these weird like hippie punks. So different from all these other punks,” He's from DC, like, and I just sort of crack up at that, because it's true.  Like, as much as we sort of, like have our anti-Evergreen, or some people like anti Evergreen hippy-ness, then when we go into the world, and we're like”Is there a co-op anywhere that we can stop?”  Like, you know, we're just also set in our, in our, in our funny ways that's one of the things that I love about being here.

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Tae Won Yu:

Yeah, well, I think that's a reflection of how really separate the Olympia environment is from a lot of other places, really different from most places in the world, I would think.   But definitely such an anomaly for a place that is so close to nature, has a West Coast, sort of hippie legacy informing it.   Which goes to show that like punk doesn't have to be an industrial wasteland, you know, like, punk can really happen anywhere. I find that to be just really, really heartening. So it's a wonderful aspect of seeing the vibrancy and the potential of punk. Demonstrably showing itself in its own strange projection. That's very particular to Olympia, you know. But one of the things where it’s…there’s nothing bad about like, eating good food, organic food, and cooking, and taking it easy, and being a little bit more relaxed than an angst ridden situation that you might find in DC, or New York, or Detroit or something.

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Mariella Luz:  

Totally. Not feeling like we have to be quite so hard. But yeah, love that. My next question is like maybe a little bit harder. So one of my interests in this archive project is how, how, how different stories are told, and how and maybe you can tell us a little bit about you know, being a person of color and an immigrant has not been told through punk. This scene has been pretty historically predominantly white male, and of course, as our culture is, but then even just as I think we're seeing more now, trying to have more voices of bipoc folks and queer folks.  And you've been participating for over 30 years, do you have stories about how you've navigated telling your own stories through punk?

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Tae Won Yu: 

Sure, um, well, as a punk being an immigrant, first generation immigrant.  I realize that my experience as a first generation immigrant was distinctly different, certainly from native born, white you know, fellow travelers, but also different from some of the other Asian punks that I met. And actually, the first thing is that I was very surprised to see so many Asian faces in the West Coast, because there's Rop and the Yao sisters, and Giant Robot/Martin Wong, especially in California. I definitely encountered and I was surprised to see that there were other Asian kids in the scene. But I also realized that their experience, and their attitude towards being Asian was very different from mine. Most of the kids that I encountered who were Asian, while I was living in Olympia, and, like, sort of traveling in these circles was that they were second generation or later, I mean, they were native born in the States and their parents had been in the States for a while. And so I think experience wise, I didn't really have much in common with them. And, for me, you know, my experience as an immigrant, definitely defines so much of how I see the world. But I think  that experience and my discovery of punk, punk music and in the potential of punk was that I had something to do while I was isolated.   That while feeling isolated, the distress and the anger, and the fear, and all these kind of negative kind of feelings that I might be feeling [could be channeled somewhere.] I had a difficult upbringing, I didn't speak the language, I didn't speak English very well, for a very long time. And I was definitely victimized because of my race also. And all these experiences led to a lot of negative feelings. And definitely, when I was younger, I was really desperate to try to find a safe place and try to either go unnoticed, unbothered, or to just like, you know, fit in somewhere. And part of it was that, like, punk rock also kept me company while I was alone.  And the sort of like, the joining factor that I could kind of share with other folks who were Asian, white or otherwise. And, certainly, the people in that scene were far more accepting and just happy to have you. So all those experiences were very positive. But also, I realized that during that period of when I was living in Olympia,  I was one of the very few Asian folks in the scene. But I almost didn't really even think of myself as Asian because there was really no one to share my Asian-ness with. And so I was just Asian by myself. You know, and so, I think that there was always that sense that, like, no one really got me, you know.  No one really had an access point to really understanding what I was going through or what I had been through, or what I was thinking.  And so I had a lot of, it wasn’t frustration, but I had a lot of feelings I didn't know what to do with. But fortunately, I was playing music. So I was able to channel that through music,  through my graphic design.  I was able to bring in my own kind of awkward way, trying to find some sort of references through Asian history and Asian experience through the lens of 20th century punk graphics that I was also wanting to swim with. But I don't know if I really achieved anything, other than just like sticking around long enough to see all the changes happen. And I wasn't really politically astute or informed, to really, I don't know, to really express myself in ways that maybe could be understood by the greater world, but I certainly had those feelings.  And I tried to figure out ways to reference that in my  music, and my graphic design.  The title of Kicking Giant’s record that was on K Records is called Alien ID, which is essentially what they used to call it, the green card. And I don't know, if that was ever referenced, you know, it's never been referenced that [the album has an] Asian centric agenda, in the title. But to me, it's like, a sense of being an alien, not only of an alien in the US as an immigrant, but being an alien, as a punk, an Asian Punk in this white world. To be an alien, that has to be like certified, given permission to stay. Being from outer space, speaking a different language.  All of these things were kind of like subjects I wanted to touch on, but I couldn't figure out how to directly address it. So I just kind of like, you know, found places to leave these kinds of clues. Whereas references to myself, on the back cover of Alien ID is a very old photograph from the historical archives of the very beginning of the Western contact with Japan, where a Japanese man dressed in western clothes. And I felt like that was actually like me, this is my legacy is being Korean and coming from a completely different culture. But I was putting on these clothes, I was kind of like, being a poser, I was posing to be a white punk, or just a punk, which most people were white. And in some ways that was a way to embrace the difference that I know that I'm not white, I know, this is a white world, but I'm also here. I think at that stage in my life, I didn't know how to openly express it. Also, because, again, like, there weren't anyone who had my experience that I knew of. And so it didn't feel like I could . . . there was no point in sending these messages out into the airwaves. Kind of like knowing there was very few people who actually understood it.  Over time, there's a couple of people who found resonance in some of my graphics and music and have accounted their contacts with my work, you know, much later on. But these were all kind of like secret messages only to myself or to myself in the future. Because I definitely wanted to touch on it or acknowledge it, and I felt that it was really something subconsciously it was forming and creating energy for what I was doing. But it was all just as trying different things, I guess. But perhaps in another sense,  in answer to your question - that was reason enough for me to basically try to insert more Asian faces in my graphic design, my posters and things like that.  Maybe it's like a way of like, subconsciously trying to multiply Asian presence, if not an actual, you know, persons then images on the covers and things like that. But at the same time, I felt, you know, I didn't really experience overt racism, from any people I shared the community with, I definitely experienced racism when I went on tour. But that was really par for the course. I mean,  it wasn't really any different from how I experienced my life, from, you know, age six through 18. So I don't know. I mean on the whole, I can kind of say that it's being Asian American, being a first generation immigrant, I felt very alone. But I think it also gave me a very strong center from which to just try to find my way to communicate with the outside world, because I felt desperate to connect. And by connecting, not just connect, trying to connect with people like me, but trying to connect with everyone.

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Tae Won Yu:  

It's also just a natural extension of, of myself, my presence here, and that I am not the same. You know, my experience is different, and it's okay that the people don't share it. It's okay, you don't have to understand it. But the way I express myself and the things that I do,  the way I behave, the things I make is informed by that. And yes, in whatever small way, I'm glad that I made this. I made those commitments. When I was making that work in Olympia.

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Mariella Luz:  

I associate you with Buy Olympia , and your work with Pat and Aaron there. Have you guys worked together a bunch?

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Tae Won Yu:

Well, I work very closely with Pat. And he was always there for me when I was involved in designing album covers later on. After kind of graduating from the cut and paste world, 1993 -1994 K record studio, we started being able to use computers. And I didn't know how to use a computer at the time.  Pat was also incredibly instrumental in supporting so many of us, myself, Stella Mars, Nikki McClure, Pat Maley.  He was so generous with his time. And he was really, really instrumental in just like, educating all of us about how to use computers and the potential for it. And so, like, with Buy Olympia, I was kind of involved peripherally.  I volunteered some products, and they sold some stuff. But, my connection with Buy Olympia is more about my connection with Pat Castaldo. He was really my teacher in how to use computers, and also just helping me and being a good friend,  and like having another eye and another brain to work in design with. So we kind of learned that between the two of us together.  Buy Olympia in itself is also, you know,  a product of Olympia and the punk ethos.  Supporting community artists,  supporting the people, local people, around you, basically going to help themselves, but here's, like another helping hand.  If you're going to do it by yourself anyway, here's some more tools that you can use. I mean, just similar to what K Records provided too.Buy Olympia and Pat, and Aaron too,  they were punks in their own way. They didn't start bands, but they definitely built a scaffold upon which we could really climb higher so they're really important.

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Mariella Luz: 

Yeah, like, I think you mentioned earlier, you know, we have to have the dreamers. But we also have to have the people that are behind the scenes doing all the infrastructure stuff, and absolutely Pat and Aaron as some of the organizing influences that helped. 

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Tae Won Yu:

Yeah. Incredibly reliable, incredibly generous with their time and expertise. And yeah, I don't think things would have lasted as long or looked as good if it weren't for them. You know?

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Mariella Luz:  

That's awesome. So, do you want to tell us about some of the things that you're interested in today and things that inspire you and how some of your some of the things might have changed over the last 20 years and some current day stuff?

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Tae Won Yu:  

Well, um, you know, Olympia still looms very large in my work, and the way I view the world.  I mean, in the same way that I felt very much more New York-y, New York-ish, when I've lived in Olympia, I feel a very strong sense of Olympia while I am living in New York. And, and I think that it's part of it is that the way that it shows itself is like, in my work, I design children's books, books for children, and we would have these brainstorming sessions and making up ideas and things like that. And a lot of it does come from f the attitudes that I observed in Olympia. The sense of civic responsibility, the sense that you have a medium, —  you think about how it affects the community, and how we can look forward and back. I think one of the biggest lessons that I learned and took with me, from Olympia to New York, is that there is a rich well of perspectives and inspiration that is below the surface. Because in Olympia, we all knew that whatever we were doing was generally ignored by the greater media. But we knew that it was incredibly rich. And even though it would not have immediate resonance,  it didn't make anyone that much money, some bands obviously went worldwide, but generally speaking, all the stuff that was basically happening on a weekly basis in Olympia.  And it's the world's loss that they didn’t know, they couldn't experience this themselves. And sort of like working so actively, so prolifically, and so ambitiously, below the radar sort of taught me that it's worth doing, even if it's on a small scale. And that success isn't measured by its traction, or monetary rewards, or external validation, that we might get it to spread outward, and transmit itself into the greater world. That's a bonus if it happens. But the primary thing is in the belief in yourself and the belief in the benefits of what you're doing. And that it's okay to work small, where it's okay to do it yourself, it's okay to make a zine or make a cassette or play a show at a house. You don't have to play at a bigger club, or get published by a publisher, don't need a record company. They're all just different versions of the same thing with greater structure offered, things done more professionally, but that it’s not necessary.  The real thing is the idea and the spirit with which it was created and put forth, in the fact that you could actually do it yourself. And so I kind of bring that attitude to my professional work now. And I try to always look for something that is less obvious.  Ideas that may offer a similar experience of how a punk record, perhaps like, the perfect example is the Milk to Toast Brigade single, which I just really came across completely by accident. And that record was, to me, like one of the greatest records I've ever heard. And it's a treasure and wasn't advertised, no one else knew about it, certainly. But it was a hugely important record. And so that experience of actually finding something on your own,  and you own it as something of your own,  and you own your experience to it, you own your special relationship to it. I believe in that experience to be as meaningful as a book selling 200,000 copies, or a book that gets turned into a movie, or something like that. That you could actually make something that is completely life altering to somebody. But the important thing is that you actually make it , one and that somehow you try to get it out there and try to sort of let it lay in wait for the right person to find it. And that's okay. Which is basically, you know, another way of saying that we don't need immediate rewards, we don't need external validation on a grand, in a larger scale. That we can actually create, even commercial work that may sort of like lay in wait and sort of sit obscured until it actually gets discovered. And that's something that I really believe as a sort of a foundational truth about how we interact in our jobs and in the greater world, and in ourselves as artists to, to the public.  So, yeah, I don't know, I think that those are some of the things that I took with me from Olympia. But these days,I continue to work at the publishing company.  In the last few years, I designed a series of books called The Antiquarian Sticker Book. And those were these kind of, strange hardcover books full of bizarre printed ephemera from the 19th century. And that was a case where I created a book that really didn't have that much precedents, and really didn't make sense to too many people in the publishing company, but actually found traction and found resonance in the greater world.  I believe, like, I love these images, and I love just like, looking at a picture without any explanation. And I just trusted that there has to be somebody like myself. And apparently, there was more than a few people like myself, who like doing the same thing. So, you know,  that's just part of my work. And, and otherwise, with my art, I continue to paint and make collages. But, generally speaking, I'm still learning.  I'm still learning how,  just putting in my time and trying to discover, like, what I'm good at, I guess. And I, and the way that I tried to discover what I'm good at is like, is to just put in my time and kind of fail by not meeting my expectations. And then looking at that failure, and then seeing maybe inside the failure, there's something that is actually me in there. And so it's a process. But that's an aspect of my art practice that I do.

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Mariella Luz:  

I'm just gonna say for the record, I am a huge fan of your work. And it's hard to imagine your interpretation of failure. I have some of your older work like my studio, I have one of the Kicking  Giant, large newsprint in my studio, as well as one of your newer cardboard record player prints that I got from someone gifted me. And then like years ago, you had a show at the old B&B (Batdorf and Bronson Coffee Roasters).. And I have some of those prints that are framed as well.  I find you incredibly inspirational. And in your “failure”  all these different iterations of your work over the years has been absolutely inspiring to me. So thank you so much.You know, the sticker books,  the way that you have them organized, they're so fun to look at. There's a joy in them that is sometimes hard to explain? Because you're just like, Oh, it's a sticker book and people like a sticker book? But then when I brought them or gifted them to people, everyone's just like, in awe.

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Tae Won Yu: 

Thank you. Yeah,. That's that sense of discovery, the surprise element, something unexpected. And that always, you know, recurs in this entire story that we're trying to tell.  That you can't predict where you’ll find, where you recognize an aspect of yourself, because you may not even know aspects of yourself until you actually see it. And that you may actually see it in something like a sticker book or an obscure single, or you know, just a chance encounter. But it's out there and you can't really even look for it.  It’s one of those things where if you keep an open mind, you may just cross paths with it. And if your antennas up, you may actually recognize it and, and what a joy that is. As an artist I think that's something that I tried to do my best to create opportunities where that type of chance mid encounters that may spark inspiration. And as kind of discovering aspects of self could happen that's actually part of my intention or my agenda as an artist.

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