Few rock performers made the kind of splash that Bradford Cox has in the past year. The impossibly tall, gaunt frontman for the Atlanta-based indie darlings Deerhunter made a reputation for provocative concerts that carried over onto his often outrageous posts on the outfit’s blog—deerhuntertheband.blogspot.com—which boasts a quotation from Jean Genet (among free MP3 downloads): “To achieve harmony in bad taste is the height of elegance.”

CLASH OF THE TITAN Cox hopes his days of inner conflict are behind him.

PHOTO: HISHAM BHAROOCHA

We met up with Cox recently as he talked about his new solo album, Let the Blind Lead Those Who Can See But Cannot Feel (Kranky), recorded under his longtime alias Atlas Sound.

Time Out Chicago: The record was a nice surprise. It’s all so introspective, shimmery, floaty.
Bradford Cox: That’s a real good description. I work real fast and I have a lot of concepts about music that excite me. And I never have my foot in one genre that I’m obsessing over. I wanted to do something a little bit along the lines of Casino vs. Japan. He’s an electronic artist who I admire a great deal. I had this instinct that drove me toward a softer, more electronic bedroom sound—a laptop sound. But I also had certain urges that always come up, which are guitar, drums—I love acoustic drums, programmed drums, and basically it just became a collage. I’m very satisfied with that because my favorite pop records of the early ’70s were made by Brian Eno.

TOC: After several years as a band, Deerhunter broke big last year. What was it like to suddenly have all that attention?
Bradford Cox: I felt like I was open to more personal attacks that I don’t think I deserved. I made an ass out of myself a lot. I was really depressed, trying all these different antidepressants that made me totally five different people. I barely know myself right now.

TOC: So all the crazy stuff that went on at your shows was just you getting lost in the moment?
Bradford Cox: All lost in the moment. One day I show up to my day job and I’m fired. The next day we’re touring for the next six months.

TOC: But some of those shows really got people talking.
Bradford Cox: That’s because I was operating on a level of mild psychosis at certain points. I drove myself crazy. When I look back at the footage of myself when I was in those dresses covered in blood, I honestly get a little nauseous because it’s not me. It’s somebody else.

TOC: That sounds like a real roller-coaster ride.
Bradford Cox: That’s not the best place to be. I have separated myself from wisdom for too long. And the type of wisdom I’m talking about is the kind possessed by Midwestern women who knit, and talk while they’re knitting, and make casseroles for people when they’re sick, and when there’s a funeral they all get together and sit and knit. I’ve been involved in punk rock and indie rock and alternative rock and promotion and promoters and tour support and touring and day-to-day buyouts and hotel rooms and youth, youth, youth culture—an endless cycle, and man, you know, I want to go live on a farm with a 48-year-old woman who can teach me how to knit. I want to wake up at 6am and milk a pig or something.

TOC: [Laughs]
Bradford Cox: I’m not being funny. These are my interests. I want to record an album in a barn. It’s cold now. Maybe Vermont. In the spring.

TOC: What got you going in music?
Bradford Cox: I was 10 or 11 years old, playing on a home karaoke recording system. Re-recording the tapes over and over again. They sound like Swell Maps when I listen to them now. I played drums like Epic Soundtracks. I had that 1977 Rough Trade sound. It was not my knowledge. I was inspired by Pavement and Stereolab mainly.

TOC: Given the way the Deerhunter record was made, did you think it was going to take off?
Bradford Cox: We just lucked out because Pitchfork responded so well to our album and they’re a cultural barometer. But our success is exaggerated in the minds of our audience. I do this for a living now, but I don’t make as much money as I did in my last job. But I’m happy to be making music. I can sit and think about drums for five hours and, like, really get off on it.

Atlas Sound plays Empty Bottle Saturday 1.