Photo of Marnie Stern by Valerie Paschall

Marnie Stern is no stranger to D.C. On her previous tour stops here, she’s taken her dog, Fig, out for photo ops at the local monuments, bantered brazenly about the touring band’s masturbation habits, and stumbled through working out her pedals after missing sound checks. But mostly, she’s dazzled us as she plays her guitar fretboard like a keyboard, treating her crowd to dizzying riffs. If her performance in Austin was any indication, tonight’s show at the Black Cat could be the best show Stern has put on in D.C. so far. It could be in spite of, or because of the lack of complexity of the songs on her newest album, Chronicles of Marnia. We talked to Stern during her drive through the Pacific Northwest about the influence of her 10-year-old nephew on the tour van banter and the plans (or lack thereof) that they have for bassist Nathan Latona’s birthday.

Does your dog, Fig, go on all the tours with you?

A lot of them, she does. We’re just picking up our friend and we’re figuring out how to get her in the van because there’s no extra seat, so we’re figuring out how we can all sit together right now.

I remember there was a tour in the past where you and Fig took photo ops around all the D.C. monuments. Does she do this in every city?

Well yeah, sort of. So, yeah, we bring her to every city and when we go places we take pictures with her and it’s funny when there are monuments and stuff.

I’ve seen you a couple of times and I just remember there having been a conversation at one of the D.C. shows that you had learned about the male masturbation habits while you were on tour.

Yeah. I haven’t learned anything good on this tour from the guys. I learned on another tour also that a man doesn’t have to hold his penis to pee. I didn’t know that. Did you know that? Weird, huh? Hold on one sec. [unintelligible background conversation] We have a nurse in the car so I asked her to check a little spot on the dog.

That sounds extremely convenient to have a nurse in the car with you.

It’s really great except that everyone starts to ask her questions like that and she gets annoyed.

Have you run into issues on tour where you needed health care?

I haven’t had insurance for like, seven years. No. At one time I had to go to a clinic because I got sick but I just paid the fee for antibiotics. But, honestly, the nurse that’s with us now gave me some antibiotics the last tour so I got away without having to go to the doctor. So, that was good. But, no, we’ve all been okay. Knock on wood. The thing I spend the most money on is the dog at the doctor—the vet. Thousands a year. I have to go three times a year for all her shit. There are a lot of shots and then they charge on top of it. It just ends up being pricey but here’s the thing. She says that she doesn’t bring her dog but I have a vet in my building. So in the morning when I’m getting coffee, it’s too easy not to go in. If it was a schlep to the vet, I don’t think my dog would have ever been to the vet. But since we bring her on tour so much I try. You never know.

I’m sure you’re tired of being asked whether the kissing booth is coming back…

It’s not coming back. It wasn’t very lucrative.

Are these things that you do more or less to have fun on tour?

Yes! Yes, to have fun. Absolutely. To have fun. We’ve named this tour the “Who Gives a Hoot?” Tour. Really, we just want to have fun because we don’t give a hoot.

That’s a great name for a tour. Did other tours have excellent names as well?

Yes, but I don’t remember. ODB tour, Oh Death’s a Bitch. I feel like we did, but I don’t remember any of them now. Oh yeah, we want our next one to be called Overdraft, Schmoverdraft. We don’t have any money!

It’s funny, I know that it’s hard for independent bands, but I assume the ones that tour regularly must have some money coming in. Is that not at all true?

No. That’s not at all true. I’m sure some do, but we’re not one of them. I sell clothes on eBay to subsidize my income…[Bassist] Nathan [Latona] wants me to tell you that it’ll be his birthday when he’s in D.C. and he’ll take a Ben’s Chili Bowl, whatever that is.

I do know what that is. Is there anything we should do for Nathan on his birthday in D.C.?

No. He’s not really into fun. He said he’ll probably just drink a sugar free Red Bull and watch Lifetime, television for women.

It sounds like you’ve already had some good times on this tour.

Totally, it’s been very fun. What we’ve been saying a lot lately is what my ten-year-old nephew picked up in school. At the end of each sentence we’ll say, for example, I’ll say, “I feel cramped in the back seat. #dealwithit” Because that’s what my nephew says. He’s doing all of these things that I’m not even getting. Have you heard of LAWL? Instead of LOL it’s L-A-W-L. Like, if you send a picture of a dog that’s cute, lawl is “Aw” with LOL. Then he does these emoticons with kitten ears but I don’t know what that means. At his school, he said he wrote in an email, “YOLO.” Not You Only Live Once. His is something about loving oreos. They changed it at his school. You Only Love Oreos. Anyway, we’re learning a lot about that stuff from him but it’s crazy how a ten-year-old knows how to do all this stuff. He prints out my eBay from the computer, it’s nuts. But we digress.

We’re touring right now with a band, SISU. They’re a California band. But we toured with this band Roomrunner. They were really nice. Now this band SISU and they’re really nice, too. Everybody’s usually nice. We usually get along. I can barely think of any times where we met people who are snots. I mean, it happens, but, not often.