“I got caught in the teeth of the thoughts that keep me awake,” Stefan Babcock sings on ‘Paranoid’, a blistering highlight off PUP‘s new album Who Will Look After the Dogs?. Gnawing at intrusive thoughts is baked into the Canadian punk outfit’s DNA, but the despair that pervades the follow-up to 2022’s The Unraveling of PUPTheBand is so visceral that it threatens to throw the band’s signature mix of darkness and snark way off balance. Babcock wrote more, and more alone, than he has for any other PUP record, and while learning to be aware of his headspace was a crucial part of the process, inspiration also struck by practicing the things that grounded and distracted him. If the thought that kept him awake was a song he couldn’t quite finish, he’d binge-watch YouTube. No matter how exasperated or sick he was, he’d look after the dog. And when the titular question felt like a real saving grace, he’d walk a long enough distance for it to feel hilariously overdramatic. When you blow it out of proportion, PUP suggest, the raw truth can ring louder than ever.
We caught up with PUP’s Stefan Babcock to talk about skateboarding, Teenage Engineering’s OP-1, walking the dog for hours on end, and other inspirations behind their new LP, which is out today.
Walking the dog
You specify “ten thousand hours a day, especially in the winter.” Did this habit start in the winter? What’s the timeline here?
I have a dog that is four and a half years old. He’s a husky shepherd mix, so he needs so much exercise. It’s always been a lot of taking him out, doing long walks every day. I found that I was really lonely a lot of the time writing this record, which we’re probably gonna talk about. [laughs] And the dog was kind of the saving grace for me. The way that I coped with a lot of it was going for really long walks with this dog. I say especially in the winter because in Canada, it can just get so brutal, and there’s something really special to me about getting all your gear on and just facing the elements. Something about that makes me feel so much more alive than – it’s April and I’m in California right now and I walk outside in a T-shirt, and it’s not too hot, and it’s definitely not cold. It’s just perfect. It doesn’t quite make you feel alive in the same way as walking out and it’s in the middle of winter in Canada and there’s three feet of snow on the ground and you’re freezing your fucking ass off and the dog’s going nuts and you walk hard and fast to warm up. There’s something really special about that.
I did a lot of walking in big empty golf courses in the winter when there was lots of snow. Being bundled up against the elements and having my AirPods in – it can feel like you’re going into space, you know? [laughs] Like you’re in the moon landing or something. There’s something really introspective about that whole experience to me. That’s where I was able to heal from a lot of the shit that I was going through and where I was able to direct a lot of attention inwards and tune in to some of my deeper thoughts.
I’m curious if the line in ‘Hallways’ came first or if the title was something you already had in mind.
I didn’t think of it as a title till much, much later. I didn’t know I was starting to write a record, but it was the first sentence that I wrote down that would make it onto this album. It was very much the beginning of the journey for me was thinking, “Who will look after the dog?”
What did you learn about your dog during those walks?
I learned that he is actually extremely in tune with at least my emotions. Even though he’s rambunctious, he’s gotta go out no matter my mood, he knows – there were days that I would lie down in the middle of that golf course and just be like, “Right now, I just can’t.” And he would go crazy running around me in circles, and then he would just calmly lie down and lick my face until I was ready to get up.That was the most beautiful, heartwarming thing. I mean, most of the lying down on the golf course was because of intense emotional pain, but there was one day where I had COVID, and it was at its worst. I was alone with the dog. I was like, “Dog wants to go to the golf course – we’re going.” About fifteen minutes into the walk, I was like, “I just need to lie down in the snow – my body can’t go on.” And his first reaction was to try and drag me, grab me by the hood and kinda drag me. And when he realized that that’s not what was happening, he just kinda lay down and waited for me until I was able to get my ass up and keep going. It felt like he was in it with me. He was in all the bullshit. He’s always a happy dog, but I feel like he had a firm grasp on human emotion, and that was the first time that I really thought, “This dog is thinking about things that are not just himself.”
Not speaking to anyone for days on end
I’m assuming this coincided with this time period and needing to be alone.
Yeah, there was a lot of that. This is not a breakup record, but this is the first record that I wrote as a single person. The dynamic with the band can be pretty contentious. We’re best friends, but we get on each other’s nerves and we fight a lot. Especially when we’re in the process of making a record, things can get really tense. So it was kind of a purposeful decision where we all back away from our friendship a little bit when we’re making records because we’re already spending every day together in the jam space, and we just don’t want to socialize and see each other. In the past, I’d turn all those social needs to the other person that I was living with, and this was the first time I didn’t have that.
I really retreated into myself writing this record, and I found solace in just writing. I wrote so much more than I’ve ever written. I wrote every day. Those winters are long and lonely in Canada. I spent most of the summer when we were writing this record up at a cabin in Northern Canada – I have a little cabin in the middle of nowhere. I just spent a lot of time there with the dog, just dialed in, focused. The things that kept me sane and on track were the dog and songwriting constantly. I think if I had been feeling some sort of creative block, I would have had a whole meltdown. But, thankfully, the songs were coming real fast and flowing in a way that they never have before, and I was able to just fill that void of human interaction with just making things every day and feeling good about the fact that I was being productive and proud of the stuff that I was writing.
Do you find that there’s less of a filter when you’re writing and not interacting with a lot of people?
I don’t think so. I think I’ve always been really open and honest in the songs, maybe to a fault. That’s not an area I struggle in. I’ve always been very true to myself in these songs and unfiltered, sometimes to the detriment of relationships. [laughs] I think all it was was, I was very introverted. I was really able to dig deep within me on these songs. I wasn’t distracted. I was just hyper-focused and really in touch with the things I was feeling and what I wanted to get out of this record, way more than any other record we’ve made. That could have been a really negative, horrible experience being alone as much as I was when we’re making this record. But somehow, it just turned into this very positive, wonderful experience that I’m grateful for. I don’t know if I’ll ever be as creatively prolific or as in touch with my creativity as I felt the year that this.
Making comics
I started drawing comics a while ago. I’m a terrible, terrible artist, but I think there’s some charm to it. I’ve always wanted to tell these stories, but I’ve struggled with it. I’m not an author. I’m not a novelist. I’ve struggled with the format to tell these stories. I started reading a bunch of autobiographical comic writers, people who just made art that was really simple but effective and told these funny stories about their lives. And I kinda felt like that’s where I wanted to go. I felt like a lot of those comics that I make and the ones that I read are very closely connected to the way that I song write, which is trying to capture some sort of – I don’t wanna say juvenile, but a lighthearted version of darkness. This Allie Brosh book that I read, it’s about her overcoming major depressive disorder, I think. It’s about her coming out of the darkness, and it’s so fucking funny. She draws it with stick figures, and I just found it so refreshing and heartwarming.
I’ve been drawing comics like that for a few years, but I got pretty deep in it making this record. I just felt like I had all this creativity, and I wanted to channel it in other ways. And those comics, in the same way that some of the songs do it, make me laugh. They’re able to make me laugh when I’m creating them. When you’re holed up alone and trying to make things that aren’t too serious, being able to laugh at what you’re doing is so important, I think. There was a lot of me giggling writing lyrics and songs and drawing comics during this record. I think some of that really shines through. There’s a lot of my bandmates laughing – it’s not on record, but I feel like those are things that you can really hear. Or maybe you can’t hear, but there’s a feeling when you listen to a record – you can tell if the band is having fun or if the band thinks what they’re doing is kind of goofy.
Is it easier for you with comics compared to songs?
Well, I’ll tell you this. I started writing songs being like, “I suck at this, and I’m gonna just write songs because it’s fun.” And it became a job, in a way that I’m so grateful for and so lucky, but that comes with a different type of pressure where I can write a goofy song like ‘Olive Garden’, but I can’t write, like, a stupid bad song. I do write stupid bad songs all the time, but I can’t show those to the world because there’s a different sort of expectation. Whereas when I started drawing comics, I felt really free. I was obviously very bad at drawing, and nobody expected me to be good, and nobody expected anything. I felt so free to create whatever I wanted, without being beholden to anyone or expectations. And there’s just such a freedom in that. There’s a childish wonder in making something that you have no clue how to make and don’t care if it’s shit. That’s not something that as adults we get to experience very often. That’s something that you experience when you’re a child and you’re finger painting and hitting a guitar for the first time or whatever. There’s a magic to that.
Trying to capture that in something that you do professionally is next to impossible. But when I started just doodling dumb comics, I just felt like I could do anything I wanted, and it didn’t matter. I think that was just a feeling that I have always been searching for since I started writing songs. Maybe for a few years it had been lacking, and it was nice to discover that feeling in a different form. I think having that feeling helped me find joy in songwriting, too. In the past, maybe songwriting just felt like pressure, like, “Fuck, I gotta write a record. My bandmates and the label and these people, they’re all depending on the record not sucking.” Finding that feeling in other ways and being able to imprint it on the songs was a pretty important thing for me.
Skateboarding
To me, it is the same as the comic thing. There’s a childlike wonder in discovering this thing. I will say, comics I don’t do professionally, but it has kind of become something where I put out a kid’s book, and I put out comics. It’s something I do for fun, but it’s also a bit of a side hustle. Once I’d been doing that for a couple years, I was looking for something that could never become even remotely a professional thing. It had to just be a hobby for fun. Learning to skateboard at 34 is something that’s like, “Well, I’m never gonna be a professional.” So I could always just know that I would be bad at it. It was too late for me to be good. But I could just embrace being bad at it and the joy of learning. Getting out and moving your body, there’s something about things like that – I think a lot of people find it maybe when they’re running. I hate running. But when I’m skateboarding, I do not have the capacity to think about anything else or let my mind wander or consider the fact that I’m sad. All I can do is focus on, like, not fucking up. [laughs] There’s a consequence: if my mind wanders, I’m gonna get hurt. So I guess, in a way, it’s, like, it’s sort of meditative for me. Kind of like the ultimate distraction.
People do bring up running or cycling, which are also activities that let you think up lyrics or process what you’ve written. It sounds like when you’re skateboarding, that’s not an option.
That’s exactly it. I was so dialed into songwriting, it was so important for me to take those breaks where it was impossible for me to think about the songs because you start to ruminate on things and doubt yourself, and you get stuck on details. As soon as I started feeling stuck and I would go skateboarding, it would just be like, “I can’t think about this. I just can’t. I’m doing this thing.” And then coming back to the songs after that was a completely blank slate. I was no longer frustrated. I could sit down and start the wheels turning from square one in a way that was healthy for me
Teenage Engineering’s OP-1
I bought one right when we finished the last record. After we finish a record, I try to treat myself to a piece of musical gear that will kinda help on the next one. When we finished Morbid Stuff, I bought a Fender Rhodes piano, and it really inspired a lot of what happened on The Unraveling of PUPTheBand. And this time, after that record, I bought the OP-1, which is pretty much this tiny little machine that I actually use a lot in airplanes. It has a keyboard and a drum machine and a sampler. It’s a powerful music computer, and you can make full beats and stuff like that. It’s just a direction in music that I’d never done. To that point, I played guitar and I sang, and I had plunked around on a piano to make a couple songs for the last record, and that was kinda it. This was my first foray into programming drums and playing with synth stuff.
None of that stuff at all appears on this new record. It’s a very organic record. It’s two guitars, bass, drums, vocals. But the OP-1 got me thinking about music in a different way. When I got stuck with the song, I would kind of try and turn it into, like, an electro beat song. I’d be like, what happens if I just take these chords and the melodies and rearrange it and see what happens? And it kinda worked both ways where I’ll get stuck on a song and I would take that song to the OP-1 and make this weirdo hip hop, power pop, whatever-you-wanna-do kinda thing, and it would give me ideas to finish it in the real world. There were times where I was just on airplanes and would make this whole weird song and then be like, “I wonder what this sounds like if I played it on the guitar and added some words.” There were a bunch of songs that actually came out of that. ‘Hunger for Death’ is one song that’s on the OP-1, fully programmed, I think, flying home from Australia or something. The whole instrumental, and I had all the words in my head. Then we tried to arrange it as a band, and it didn’t really work. It kinda sat there, and eventually, the four of us saved it. But that song only exists because it was an OP-1 track. It’s just a different way to look at music for me and expanded a lot of my sense of songwriting.
When you said none of this appears on this record, I was thinking about ‘Hunger for Death’.
To be clear, the sounds on the record are not the OP-1 for that. But I’m pretty sure there were a few other ones that started out as OP-1 tracks. ‘Get Dumber’, there was some OP-1 on that. ‘Best Revenge’ was an OP-1 track as well. Both of those obviously became just ripping band songs. It’s more of an idea machine than a thing to make pop records on.
Mushrooms
I believe mushrooms come up once on ‘Needed to Hear It’, and it’s someone else doing them.
Yeah, I guess I did mention mushrooms that one time. I wasn’t really thinking about it in terms of the lyrics. I used to smoke so much weed growing up, and I realized that I hate smoking weed, so I stopped doing that. I don’t know how much I can say about this, but I have been on medication for mental health stuff for a while. And recently, my psychiatrist suggested that instead of increasing the dosage, I actually try microdosing. So I gave it a shot. I’ve always loved mushrooms recreationally – and again, I wanna stress that I am not condoning this. I understand that I’m a 36-year-old man, and there’s potentially younger teenagers who will read this. I’m not trying to glamorize drugs, alcohol, anything like that – I think it’s so important to say. But, I have enjoyed mushrooms recreationally, a lot.
I did start microdosing for a lot of this record in a way that was more – I mean, it was recommended by a doctor, and it was very controlled. I wasn’t just popping mush caps. I had mushroom pills. And microdoses are very, very small and subtle, but I did find myself feeling — I don’t wanna say happier, but maybe less mentally disturbed than I have been in the past, and appreciating more – certainly, taking the dogs for walks, when I started microdosing I was like, “I can walk forever. I could just be out here and enjoy the snow blasting in my face because I’m just really present.” It just helped me feel more present in my life. I don’t know if that necessarily helped directly with creativity, but it definitely helped just being more aware of my thoughts at times. I hate weed for myself – no personal judgment for anyone, I just don’t smoke it anymore at all – and this is something that was giving me what I always wanted to get out of weed. Again, I really don’t want it to seem like I’m telling kids to go out and try mushrooms because I’m really, really not. It’s not for everybody. It can be dangerous. I use them very carefully, and it’s what my specific brain needed at that moment in my life.
You said you were more aware of your thoughts. Were you also more prone to writing them down?
I think speaking about being more present and aware is just registering those thoughts. A lot of songwriting for me is trying to figure out how I feel – like, I know I feel bad or I know I feel good, but I don’t know why, and I’m trying to get to the bottom of it a lot of the time. Being present and aware was something that really helped me understand my emotions quicker. And because of that, I was able to, I think, articulate them better and more directly than I have in the past. Mushrooms are probably a small part of that, but a lot of it is also solitude, having quiet space, doing therapy, and reading books.
Home renovation videos on YouTube
I don’t think you’ve talked about this too much, but I saw you mentioned it in Dan Ozzi’s Substack five years ago, saying you find those DIY videos pretty comforting. Has it been a constant for that long?
Yeah, I go through phases on that. A lot of people turn off their brains by watching reality TV. I’m a little bit, to my detriment, obsessed with productivity; with the exception of skateboarding, everything on this list is somehow connected to me doing stuff. Creating, taking care of a dog. That obsession with productivity comes out as – if I need to turn my brain off, I wanna turn my brain off and learn something. So I end up watching all these stupid reno videos. It’s like, why do I know this much about, like, weeping tile? Why do I know this much about how to pour a good foundation? I’m never gonna do that in my life. But I have absorbed that knowledge as a way to shut my brain off, especially if I’m ruminating on a song. It’s like one in the morning and I can’t sleep, I’m just going through this verse and trying to figure out what’s wrong with it, and I know I’m not getting anywhere, it’s like, “Time for some home reno videos.”
I do a lot of basic reno stuff myself and build furniture – just really basic stuff, but I do love it. It’s a thing that also turns my brain off, the way that skateboarding does, because I have to be focused on it. Watching these videos, I feel like I’m absorbing some of that knowledge and being productive, but also pushing all the difficult feelings to the side. Being alone with your thoughts for too long can be really challenging and dark. And sometimes to get out of that zone, I just gotta learn about plumbing.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity and length.
PUP’s Who Will Look After the Dogs? is out now via Little Dipper/Rise Records.
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