In love with the music of love

Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter Imaad Wasif performs tonight at 8 p.m. with his band, Two Part Beast, at Spanish Moon ($8 cover).

He took time from touring to tell 225 about his inspirations, his fears and his music.

Sample the band’s music on their MySpace page here.

When Imaad Wasif isn’t busy filling out the textures of Brooklyn alternative rock band Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ songs as a member of its beefed-up touring band, he spends his time overcoming his fear of sudden death, writing fragments of songs and living a straight-edge lifestyle.

Or so his biography from his P.R. team would lead you to believe.

Wasif is the paranoid singer/songwriter and blazing guitar soloist who released Strange Hexes with the help of his backing band, Two Part Beast. His influences range from Barthes’ A Lover’s Discourse (detailed accounts from a lover’s point of view by a French philosopher and literary critic) to Eastern Indian classical music.

The new album goes from whirling arpeggios to striking solos in a matter of seconds. The true theme underneath the literary and musical name drops of the biography is love.

“One of my main interests in life is understanding love,” Wasif said. “It’s the only thing that makes me truly feel out of my mind and alive. It’s an addiction. Those are the songs I write – my wanting to explore that emotion.”

Strange Hexes’ ethereal to explosive push-pull of a relationship blends right in the ears. Using non-standard guitar tunings, he flexes his guitar muscles, creating a unique sound. That sound can be traced to his background in East Indian classical music.

“The idea of a drone is a sound I’ve heard forever and I wanted to refine that in some of my first bands,” Wasif said. “Now, it factors into tunings and influences picking style. I connect with my instrument and use different tunings for each song.”

“Oceanic” is a primary example of the tuning, or detuning, he uses. While in Japan, he wrote the song and it was a “fluid experience. I had an automatic sensation about how it was supposed to sound.”

Though the song was written in a couple of days, most of his songs are written over time. Like Barthes before him, he carries around ideas.

“I work on songs everyday, carrying around fragments. When I’m at home, I play all the time. I wake up and structure my day around it. I feel lost when I don’t have that ongoing connection to those ideas that are floating around and I have to shape them.”

On the phone, Wasif seems anxious, ready to pop whether it be with romantic-era literary suggestions or pure emotion. Constantly thinking and humming his next words.

Maybe it’s his deathly fear which he’s had to overcome using “different methods” and “doesn’t know why it happens,” but “doesn’t want to leave the studio because something might happen and I might not finish.”

Now, Wasif is slowly overcoming the ticks.

“The course is set. I feel more conscious and aware of the present state. In the past, I had the tendency to lose connection to the immediate moment. I’m becoming more aware of when I need to pull back and not totally kill myself to finish an idea.”

Check out Imaad Wasif of Yeah Yeah Yeahs at 8 p.m. today at Spanish Moon. Cover is $8.