Caropop

After Camper Van Beethoven performed the final show of its recent tour in Washington, D.C.—and perhaps its last show ever—violinist/multi-instrumentalist Jonathan Segel returned to Stockholm, Sweden, where he has lived for the past 13 years. Segel is well traveled as a musician and otherwise, having been born in Marseille, France, grown up in Davis, Calif., and played with Sparklehorse as well as the Øresund Space Collective and on solo projects. He was a key element, if not the sparkplug, in the classic Camper Van Beethoven lineup until, he says, frontman David Lowery dismissed him before the band recorded Key Lime Pie and then broke up altogether. Segel recalls how he found his place in a band that would shift from ska to klezmer music to crunching rock within a few measures. He describes the band's rise, his departure, how he and Lowery patched things up and whether the far-flung bandmates might record or perform together again.