the blog @ dagmarsieglinde.com

Thursday, August 28, 2008, 10:34 PM ( 4065 views ) - Interviews - Posted by Administrator
-This review originally appeared on my Seattle PI Blog, Beat Back.-

Wanderlust, Gavin Rossdale's first solo album, has just hit stores. This is good news for all Bush fans - I really think if you like Bush you will love this cd. And if you don't like Bush perhaps there is no hope for you - but you just might like this cd instead.

Rossdale took some time to talk with me before his show in Seattle. He played a show as part of Samsung Summer Krush and it was a great runup to a planned fall tour. I was struck by how intelligent and modest he is. He's never taken a break from music since Bush began and has ventured into acting as well. He's a very busy man.
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Q: Are you interested in doing more acting at some point?

Gavin Rossdale: I don't know. Everything is so great with the record that you've got to enjoy doing the record and playing and concentrating on the music. It's kind of sod's law that it probably will mean that because I am so busy with music that something will come along that's interesting.

Q: Did you feel like had more control on the solo album?

G.R.: I don't want to say this in the wrong way but, no. When you come from bands, especially if you write the songs in the band. We had a rule in Bush, if you loved something it would win out, you could even convince the other three. Since I'm such an emotional person I could often win out. A bit of a cheeky democracy really. It worked the other way too, if someone really felt something, we'd all go, okay. We'd choose our battles. All that kind of electronic stuff - the band hated all of that. I was always interested in trying to progress it. My biggest mistake throughout my career was trying to move forward. I think if you have something successful you should repeat it, just do the same songs in a different order. It's always been my downfall and maybe if I reflect on it sometimes you don't understand what the nature of your success is. With rock music I was always more interested in being a band on Touch and Go rather than being on a major label, which is ironic. When that went a bit belly up (signing to Atlantic) it was like . . . I'm not signed to Matador.

Q: What's some of your favorite work from Bush?

G.R.: I think every album would have a few songs that I would love to have another go at, that I could improve. Every record has certain moments that I think I are really interesting and I'm really proud of. It just depends. It depends on how you view music and how you view things you make. If you view things you make based upon their success then maybe you'd look at your hit singles and say that's the best thing I ever did. But for me it was what I felt most excited about driving away from the studio and listening to. There's one song, Communicator, which is on Razorblade Suitcase, which the band really never liked so they would never play it live. I always loved it. I was so happy with the riff - I just thought it was really underrated. Science of Things was a record I really liked - there's a song called Land of the Living, off Golden State . . . there are songs everywhere . . . English Fire, which I did on Science of Things. We played it one time in London. It's not really complex but it's a quite demanding song, and I remember our manager saying to me afterwards - we were playing a few nights in London, because we were very successful there, contrary to popular folklore - and he goes, English Fire, maybe don't play that one tomorrow night. Give the audience a break. And I was like, I fucking love that track. I don't choose the singles - I get everything wrong. I played that song for Tom Morello one time and he said if he ran (the) label that would be the single. I was like, yeah! On this record I really felt like every where my voice should go in, it went . . . I felt really connected to the songs and there are certain songs where I've felt like that throughout my career. There are other songs I play where I'm like, why didn't I rework that lyric? It's annoying. . . . I heard that Kerouac said something about first thought, best thought. I'm sure it worked for him. I never used to be into that. I do go through the words quite a bit. There are certain songs throughout my career where I know I could do a better lyric if I'd had a bit of more time with it, but I was into that whole stream of consciousness stuff so I didn't want to betray that redundant idea.

Q: I've always liked your lyrics.

G.R.: Thank you.

Q: You started writing on a bass guitar?

G.R.: Yeah, it was the first instrument that I played. My sister's boyfriend gave me a bass. I didn't have an amp or anything, it was just kind of fun because growing up I thought Sid Vicious was cool. My Way. . . stab your girlfriend . . . die of a heroin overdose, it's cool. Firework life.

Q: Was that some of the first music you listened to?

G.R.: In my house my mum had about four records: Queen, Roberta Flack, Abba, and Carole King - on permanent rotation.

Q: That's an interesting mix.

G.R.: Yeah it was really nice. Roberta Flack - those records had some of the best musicians ever, the smoothest musicians. And Abba - fantastic pop music. Queen, you know, great drama - and Carole King, sort of introspective. So it was a really weird four pieces. I probably know their music pretty good without realizing that I do. If you put it on I could probably start singing it, like an out of body experience. And of course the whole punk thing was really exciting. It was the clearest defining era of antiestablishment, anti-authority, anti-parent . . . that was the perfect music for youth.

Q: How did your father select the name Rossdale?

G.R.: I think it was originally Rosenthal - it was Russian/Jew. My family is Russian/Jewish on my father's side and my mother's side is Scottish. And it's weird because the Scottish really don't like the English - I'm half English and half Scottish. I'm such a mass of contradictions, it's no wonder that I slightly overthink things and I'm slightly paranoid.

Q: Some paranoia is good.

G.R.: It keeps you nimble, keeps you looking over your shoulder. You rarely get self-satisfied, that's for sure. Every time I think anything positive, something in me tells me something else. I don't even know what the word is - self-cynical? For every action there's a reaction.

Q: Do you ever think about studying Judaism?

G.R.: No, I have an entirely different mindset. There are so many books that I want to read and so many films that I want to see . . . there's so much to learn and so much to think about without going into a study of faith. I'd rather read Richard Dawkins. I like Buddhism. I like lifestyle systems more than faith-based systems. I do love the theater of faith. I think places of worship are beautiful, absolutely.

Q: What do you remember about making the video for Glycerine? It's such a beautiful video.

G.R.: It was strange because I didn't know much about doing videos. All I remember about doing that video - which was the same when recording the song - was no drums - it's so weird. So doing the video it was kind of like the band sat in the trailer for most of the day. It was the first taste of the separation between us because they're not strictly on it. There's guitar from Nigel[Pulsford] but that's about it. I love that song. I remember playing it for them for the first time in London actually and I remember them talking over it and I was like, I think this song's got something. For me it was a great song for us. I always remember it as their beer and cigarettes time. As soon as I'd start singing there'd be plumes of smoke from the stacks. Time off. Do Glycerine, play it twice. English people are very cynical. I was in a very funny band - funny for humor.

Q: I read that you like to cook. What do you cook?

G.R.: Probably a combination of English and Italian. I'm all about the ingredients. I seem to have a knack for it. Miles Davis said every musician should be able to cook because it's a combination of things. I don't do that much outside of music and hanging out with people I like and I think eating together is really convivial. Whenever I made records I would always make everyone eat together. You break bread and you drink wine together, it's a very unifying process. From a really young age, when I started living on my own in flats with lots of friends, I'd always have loads of people over for dinner before you go out. It's a really good way of starting the night. It's got kind of a bourgeois idea to it but it's cool when you break bread and drink wine - it takes the bourgeois out of it.

Q: What do you see of yourself in your son, Kingston?

G.R.: Individuality. He doesn't want that much help - he'll tell you when he wants help. You can't interrupt him. If he's in a process or if he's on his way somewhere he doesn't want you to crowd him, which I totally relate to. He likes people, he really enjoys it when people come around. He's very social. He likes girls. One of my favorite things is him coming to the shows. I never thought about being at a show with him. It's just such a shock, even two years in, to have a child and be responsible for him. He came to Del Mar - I played at this sort of racetrack - he'd seen the show in LA and he got really upset when he saw me onstage. He couldn't understand why he couldn't come on the stage. He was running around while I was doing soundcheck and he came on the stage so I could hold him. Then when I played the show he was on the side of the stage, and his foot was going in time to the music. It's shocking, he's got really good rhythm. He was in a group of about 20 people on the side of the stage and every time a song would end (there were like 10,000 people there) he would bow.

Q: That is so cute.

G.R.: No one taught him that. It's been really great playing again. I am so looking forward to coming to Seattle again. Obviously there's clear history for me, the whole connection of rock music from Seattle and when I first played there, I think it was Mo's or something, and it felt (like I was) in the backyard of where the music was at. When I first played there I thought is this going to be really difficult? It was amazing. I remember the show. I remember getting super trashed the night before. I was taken out by the label and for the first time I drank - and I think the last time - 50-year-old whiskey. I couldn't even see straight. I was so done in and I was trying to play this show, and I was trying to be good and was so nervous but I got a really warm welcome. Then I did some recording up there in Seattle at Robert Lang Studios. He's got a regular house - this was when it was being built so Lord knows what it's like now - but he had trucks of dirt at his house and he built down into the mountains. He was like Dr. No.
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Click here to read my review of Rossdale's show and here for photos.



Thursday, August 28, 2008, 09:23 PM ( 1924 views ) - CD Reviews - Posted by Administrator
-This review originally appeared on my Seattle PI Blog, Beat Back.-

Alison Goldfrapp is a goddess. She has done it again and released a super sexy cd with her co-composer Will Gregory. Goldfrapp's is as surreal as it is consoling with dreamy tunes and cool vibes.

Starting off with Clowns - complete with bird sounds and easing into the fairy tale of Little Bird - Seventh Tree recalls their Felt Mountain. This is a good thing. I really love all tracks on this cd - Happiness has an oompah beat and the vocals are breathy and sexy. Eat Yourself is melodic and hauntingly sad; A&E is a key track - a paean from a mental ward and I just think the concept is brilliant. It even has frog croak noises in it. Perhaps the real center of the cd is Cologne Cerrone Houdini. I am not the only one who has long-hoped that Goldfrapp will snag the next James Bond theme. It is a high honor and I think this track in particular of almost anything they have done screams the Broccoli people need to sign this band up. Fast. Her voice will make the difficult title of Quantum of Solace hot.

It's a cleverly put together cd ending with a poppy Caravan Girl and the love song Monster Love. I am always amazed by how Goldfrapp brings strange sounds together and makes them even more different than I can expect.

Check out the video for A&E and photos I took of Goldfrapp at the Showbox.


Saturday, August 11, 2007, 07:56 PM ( 3669 views ) - Musings - Posted by Administrator
Last night I saw a band called Switches. Here's their myspace page:
Switches on Myspace. Now, maybe I am partial to great music and cute British boys. I don't know. But they were great and no one here in the cowtown that can be Seattle knew about them. If you live in Los Angeles though you have two chances to see them next week. Bastards. Pix and interview soon.

It's been a good music week in part because I got this: the new She Wants Revenge song:
Written in Blood
Sounding cruel and moody.




Monday, March 5, 2007, 09:51 PM ( 1667 views ) - Show Reviews & Photos - Posted by Administrator
First thing I am going to say about Jet is that their second cd, Shine On , is brilliant. Second thing is that they are fantastic to see live. The new songs blended in seamlessly with the older ones – this does not always happen with bands.

Lead singer and guitarist Nic Cester is a star who knows how to involve an audience. Cester walked around in the audience twice, and the band seems even musically closer since the last time I saw them when they opened for Oasis . Mark Wilson is a fantastic bassist, Cameron Muncey is what I would describe as a cool, calm and collected guitarist, and drummer Chris Cester is an original.

I have many favorite Jet songs. Cold Hard Bitch still sounds fresh and dirty. Their new song Rip It Up is luscious; Take It Or Leave It is just super, and Look What You’ve Done Look What You’ve Done . . . is so touching.

To see more of my Jet photos, click here


Jet's Nic Cester, Seattle 2006






Monday, March 5, 2007, 09:22 PM ( 900 views )
Angels and Airwaves, formed by singer and guitarist Tom DeLonge , put on an energetic and passionate performance. This was their first visit to Seattle and I will see them anywhere, anytime they return.

DeLonge has a gorgeous stage presence with amazingly unique body positions – truly great to watch. Their songs were generously appealing and DeLonge, in a black militaristic outfit, reached out to everyone in the large arena. I am never one to underestimate the effect of lighting as well, and this set had absolutely stunning lighting.

All songs sounded great, but Do It For Me Now , Valkyrie Missile , and particularly Distraction were especially intense. Distraction is perfection.

Click here for more AVA photos.

Tom DeLonge, Seattle 2006


Sunday, February 4, 2007, 07:25 PM ( 890 views ) - Show Reviews & Photos - Posted by Administrator
Goldfrapp’s following in Seattle is tremendous. The fans not only sold out the show, they came dressed up and ready to dance. Goldfrapp knows how to create and sustain a sexy mood and Alison Goldfrapp appears a bit like an indifferent dominatrix in the best way meant. Watching her up close - hearing as well as seeing, yes I said seeing - that voice come out - it’s all kinds of beauty and colour.

More artists should do as Goldfrapp chose to do that night - be the only band. No openers, no filler, none of that. Just what people came to see and hear. I got the feeling that the audience would have been insulted by any opening act, that they wanted Goldfrapp and they wanted no other. It’s electronic, it’s got a chanteuse, it’s a rock band . . . it’s many things.

Singer/Composer Alison Goldfrapp really was in superb, slender form, dressed in a black zip up cat suit and black heels tied to her small feet. I could say something silly about her tininess belying her large persona . . . but that’s kind of cliche. Though she is a sleek and precious picture for sure. Her voice filled the Showbox smoothly and the band kept up throbbing and loving beats. She did that thing she does of playing her portable theremin between her legs. Strict Machine, Number One and White Horse were favorites of mine and I found some space to dance. Which brings me back to the dancing. Most of the audience was dancing - many like it was a huge disco floor, though yeah some of us tapped our toes. This was a great thing to see and rare to see at any concert.


Sunday, February 4, 2007, 07:06 PM ( 2515 views ) - Interviews - Posted by Administrator

Did you have a musical family?
Both my parents are still singing (in the church choir) My dad’s a pretty proficient piano player and a pretty good guitar player as well.

What are the differences between your albums?
Some things are different but we always try to challenge ourselves and do new things. I hope that each of our records sounds new like something we’ve never done before but also like us.

Who designed the new cover? I love it.
Josh. He designs a lot of t shirts and stuff – he’s a great artist. Watercolours and drawings.

How was touring with Keane? Is that the largest band you’ve toured with?
Now they’re really big, but that tour wasn’t so crazy. We were still playing Berbati’s in Portland – Irving Plaza in NY. It’s not like it was Madison Square Garden. We’ve gone on mini tours opening for bands at that level. In terms of world domination I guess they’re bigger than any band . . .

That was the first tour I had heard about you guys.
It was a great tour to for us to have done because I think a lot of people saw us – it’s a different demographic entirely than we’re used to playing. It was not necessarily all the hipster kids – it was more different kinds of people. It’s cool, I like playing in front of different kinds of people not just straight up rock & roll fans – although I love obviously playing for those people too. They [Keane] have a different audience and it’s working out well for them.


What do you like about playing live music?
I like playing music, period. There’s that (we laugh). You’d be surprised being in a band. You practice a lot. You drive a lot. And you do a lot of peripheral stuff. But playing – the sound check you just saw – usually it’s not nearly that long, then you play the show is not even that long. Sound check is usually about an hour, if you’re lucky and the show is 45 minutes. So in a day of tour we drive like seven hours, we talk on the phone and do business and emails for many other hours and then you play music for an hour and 45 minutes if you’re lucky. By that break down we’re so happy to be playing , which is really what we’re supposed to be doing . . . so I like that and I love being in a room with a crowd and getting a vibe going in a room. Playing and singing, there’s nothing like it – or people wouldn’t starve to death and drive around in vans and go crazy. I do think it’s the hardest thing – it’s one of the hardest things people can do. People think, you’re in a rock band cause you can’t get a real job. But I think this is so much harder than any other real job – and I’ve had some hard jobs.

What other kind of jobs have you had?
I’ve worked in kitchens – really hard. I’ve worked as a teacher, which is maybe the only thing I would put next to this as as hard. I’ve been a landscaper . . . I gravitate towards these things for some reason.

Teaching and this work – I can see how you’d compare it.
It’s like a 24 hour – you have to be all there all the time or you can’t do it. You make no money. Teachers really don’t make any money. The joke is we don’t make any money – rock people- cause obviously some rock people make more money than God. No matter how good a teacher you are you’re not going to make any money. But you get rewards that most people don’t even know about (as a teacher).

What did you teach?
Music. A school in Jersey city – a Catholic school – two Catholic schools actually. The other teachers were Haitian nuns.

Were the kids well-behaved?
No, they were horribly behaved, but they were wonderful.

Music was probably one of their favorite subjects.
They liked me. But it was hard – I mean forty kids in a class in an inner city school.
I don’t believe I’ve ever said anything about that before in an interview – that’s an exclusive. In professions like acting, music and teaching you have to engage people.Except in teaching it’s for them and everything else is for you. Although there’s a gray area there too. Teachers, especially at the college level where they like to hear themselves talk, they like to be adored, they like to inspire awe and girls to have crushes on them and stuff. I am sure you could find a lot of teachers who have weird motivations - I claim to not be one of them.

You studied at Oberlin – is that where you got your music degree?
I don’t have a music degree. I was completely unqualified for my teaching job. For this type of job I feel qualified – for my teaching job, at least on paper anyway, I was completely unqualified. They didn’t have a music teacher at all at the school.

How was working with Haitian nuns?
They’re great - they were crazy. Wanna take about making no money, they really made no money. Nuns make no money.

Were they fun?
They were great.

I guess I wouldn’t go into the nunnery to make money.
I would advise against it.

What happened to the column on French Kicks’ site, What Would French Kicks Do?
It’s gone.

Did you get tired of it?
What Did French Kicks Do? We just got lazy. For a while we were just lazy – we’d be in the car and somebody would be like, we really should do some of those. We should of done a lot more of them, but it’s the kind of thing that’s really fun for a while and then as soon as it starts to feel like a chore we’ll quickly be like, no sorry. In theory anyway there will be some enticing new content on there [the French Kicks’ web site]. It was fun to do that. I think our new idea is to have a gallery – a page where people send their art submissions in the and we critique the art submissions where we do a psychological evaluation based on the art.

I was afraid you were going to critique the art.
We’re going to do that, too. It’s like a critique of the art that gets into a more psychological profile. Whether we actually do it or not I can’t tell you. It’s in the works.

You’ve been touring continually since 2001.
Well not exactly. We’ve had sort of seasons of heavy touring. This is the first tour we’ve done in a really long time – a year.

Do you have a driver?
No, we drive. It’s something to do. It’s different when you’re driving – it’s a little better – you have to pay attention.

You’re not just staring out the window.
You kid yourself into thinking that you’re doing something worthwhile. Although sitting and staring out the window is great, too. I have no problem with that. I don’t mind it at all. It’s just that after a while, living on top of each other . . .

Who’s the first one to start picking a fight?
I pick fights all of the time. No, we’re a bunch of perfect gentlemen. We are, it’s true. A very gentlemanly band. Very nice to eachother.

No shut ups or we’re going to leave you in Fargo?
No. I mean you this about bands, I mean people get into real fights on tours all the time. Real bad fights, but we’ve been pretty good.

You played drums in the band earlier on – why stop?
Just for live purposes, it was a little limiting. We couldn’t play fast songs – we could do maybe one if we were lucky because I would be so out of breath.

They’d find you collapsed –
I used to literally see spots – almost be about to pass out after every show. I don’t have a problem with that necessarily – just I couldn’t do more than one fast song per show. I could only do so much intricate stuff. And also now I play keyboards here and there. It just basically opens up opportunities to do other stuff.

You don’t like to refer to influences – you think it’s misleading?
I just don’t like to mention them. There’s so many . . . the way we’re influenced by them is so different – it’s like little details as opposed to broader things. [He’s the same on films and literature, too] I think everything you see or read will listen to you in some way.

I’m intrigued by the title of the one about-

England? It’s the only one –

Do you get a lot of questions about it?

I’m psychic.

I know.

It’s about a time we were over there at the end of a long tour. We were out for five weeks in the States and then immediately went over there and it was sort of a kick some one when they’re down scenario. We were so exhausted and everything was fucked up. [The song] is obviously a tongue in cheek thing. It’s something that’s fun to complain about – we’re champion complainers.

How did you get involved with Poptones?

We did one record. Alan McGee – there’s this party that he puts on, it’s mostly in London with Radio 4. He was doing it in NY when the whole New York thing was happening, seeing what would stick. What stuck was the Hives.

Do you think that you are now able to get out of being labeled a New York band?

I hope so. I mean, here we are talking about it. But I hope so.

None of them sounded much like each other.

They never did.

You have a new guitar player?

For about two months. He’s great – he’s an old friend, a D.C. guy.

What’s D.C. like?
It’s much more fun as a native than as a visitor. It’s a great to be fifteen or sixteen years old – I think that’s what it’s best for. It’s sort of halfway been a small town and a big town, in a great way for teenagers. There’s a really good music scene, especially when we were in high school. But then you can also sit outside in the park and get drunk, the kind of things you can do in smaller towns. It’s a great place to grow up.

You moved to NY for more opportunities?
I think for the same reasons most people move to NY. There’s more going on.

What kind of music did you play in your teenage years?

It was pretty terrible, high school music band music. We did a lot different stuff.

Do you get to get out see things while on tour?

Every once in a while we have a day off and can go walk around. Usually it’s just drive in for sound check, do the show. In our naiive early days we used to book our own tours and book all these days off everywhere to see the sights – it ends up being sort of depressing. If you don’t - first of all if you don’t have any money –but second of all if you don’t have a home base in a foreign town it just gets depressing to be there really quick. You don’t have anything to do. If you have a friend there, anything, where you can feel a little more at home then it’s fine. We learned very quickly that it’s better not to have too much time off.

Who are some of the bands you’d like to tour with?

It’s always fun to go on tour with the Walkmen, we grew up together. It’s like touring with your old gang from high school. Dios, the Joggers – a Portland band who I think are really great.

Are there any kinds of music you can’t stand?

Like whole types of music? No, I don’t think so. I think you can find good examples of pretty much anything. There’s got to be something redeeming about everything, or it wouldn’t be anything. Somebody had to like it. Somebody in that category had to like it, for a good reason, or it wouldn’t have gotten anywhere. It’s like populist theory.

French Kicks is a handsome band and I see that mentioned in every arcticle. Does that weird you out?

No. If you think about that sort of thing you’re doomed, so I try not to think about it. What we’re doing is try to be good at music. That’s the most important thing to us. That people are listening and like the songs. We work hard at it. I like to be listened to a lot more than looked at. In fact I hate being looked at, I do. I’m not a natural hey look at me kind of guy. But I love to play, I love to be on stage so I can play.
[Though I do point out it’s better to be thought attractive than unattractive] It’s too bad.
I think there’s been times, not so long ago, where [appearance] wasn’t so much a parameter by which people were judged so much. In the 70s I don’t think you had to be so attractive necessarily. Everybody has to be a pop star now, rockers have to be pop stars. Any kind of music has to be a pop record. It’s so boring. It used to be you could look shit but if it [the music] sounded good people would listen to it. People were paid attention to for the right reasons. Even beyond looking like shit because that’s your thing but because you just don’t care. Maybe I’m kidding myself. I like to think that that’s possible again. Not having looks be a criteria for being recorded in the first place.


Do you have to force yourself to write?

I think there have been times where we’ve done that, where we’ve said we’re going to write now. Sometimes good things happen. But mostly – the beginning of song has to be something that just happens very naturally and relaxed way for fun just so you want to entertain yourself. Feel it. It will sound like you felt like it, which is the best thing. It’s a mind game, for us anyway. You take the good things that happen by accident and then you make them into things that are listenable. And you have to be around the instruments so things can happen in the first place. Sometimes that will take a little bit of discipline.
It’s sort of a balancing act.























Sunday, February 4, 2007, 05:46 PM ( 3879 views ) - Show Reviews - Posted by Administrator
With a triple bill of Monsters Are Waiting, Stellastarr*, and Editors I needed to stake my place early right in front of the stage to get pictures. The show was sold out and I didn’t feel like the audience would have let me back up to the front if I had left for one moment, so in total I stood about three and a half hours. Festival-goers can snicker at what appears to be my lack of fortitude. And it was scorching in Chop Suey (don’t get me wrong, it’s a lovely venue), leading to a mammoth thirst on my part. Those are the only down sides from the show. Well there is one other to come up later. Not one of these issues was the fault of the bands, who were all just brilliant.

After listening to Monsters Are Waiting I was curious to see them live. Their music has such a vim and drive to it I wondered if they would duplicate it live. In fact, the four-piece, often called sexy - well they are that - played marvelously together and charmed with tender and sensual vocals from Annalee, slinky bass playing and sparkling guitar playing by Andrew and Jonathan respectively, and drummer Eric’s responsive drumming (They seem to prefer being known by first names only.) Songs like Fascination and Ha Ha were particularly groovy live, and their set closer, the lusty Christine saw the band go quite mental - in the best way possible. I am in awe of bassist Andrew’s ability to play guitar, after he and Jonathan switched places, while nearly stretched out on the floor.

Meanwhile it got hotter and the woman next to me still wore a sweater - a sweater I ask you! When Stellastarr* came on I was really starting to hurt for water but was stubborn and I kept my place even when another photographer burst his way in and out of the crowd with impunity. For some reason crew from backstage periodically came out and mopped up water on the stage floor.

I’ve admired Stellastarr* since I saw them open for the Raveonettes in 2003. There’s something loveable about them and the other two bands of the evening and I just can’t place my finger on what it is. Perhaps it’s singer/guitarist’s Shawn Christensen’s tortured and disturbing presence, or Michael Jurin’s culinary guitar work, or the centered drumming by Arthur Kremer. Or it might be the bass playing, some of the most sophisticated bass playing you will ever hear, coming from the seriously foxy Amanda Tannen. It’s probably all these things. And each time I have seen Christensen I feel like he must fall apart every night. He seemed to break down in earnest. This was good stuff and made me flinch. After they finished the classic My Coco - a guy yelled, ‘Again!’. This got a smile from Tannen, who really seemed to play joyfully.

Editors headlined and even though I had been listening to their cd and really loving it I was a bit concerned about the hype around the band. By that point, after seeing shows by bands who would more than capably headline, I had decided they needed to be something special for me to stay in the front through their entire set. I was not disappointed - only more than a bit thirsty, which was when I realized that a pipe above the stage was leaking, and that was where the mystery water came from. It was slightly distracting let alone quite dangerous around the plugged in equipment. I was tempted several times to jump on stage to get some of the water. Guitarist Chris Urbanowicz’s (joking and very funny) comments such as ‘Don’t panic’ and ‘I’m going on’ were very apt.

At one point singer Tom Smith knocked out the speakers leaping around the stage - I had never seen this happen at Chop Suey before and I enjoyed the danger. Smith, trapped like an animal, seemed to want to climb the walls.

They are a beautiful band and I fell in love them from the start of their set. Songs such as Blood and All Sparks are pure wonders. I was deeply touched by Camera, and Fingers in the Factories was aggressive and salty. Several audience members were already familiar with the songs and that gave me hope that important music has made it. Smith’s resonant vocals recall more of Jim Morrison rather than Paul Banks. Ed Lay’s drumming stunned me. And Russell Leetch’s bass and Urbanowicz’s guitar playing joined in perfect sounds and grace.














Sunday, February 4, 2007, 05:42 PM ( 7280 views ) - Interviews - Posted by Administrator
Britain’s White Rose Movement is one of the top British bands to have visited the States this decade. Two members of the five-piece, guitarist Jasper Milton and singer/guitarist Finn Vine, talked with me before their show in Seattle in early May.
Q: Do you like making videos of your songs? Is it fun?
Finn: In a way it is - in another way it’s always a bit of a risk -
(there’s an interruption as the band learns they will get to their next show date in Chicago)
Finn: Someone brings you a treatment and it’s really hard when you read the treatment and not to look at it and think this looks really corny or, . . . we really enjoyed doing the Alsation video (or I did personally).
Jasper: Yeah it seemed like there was more a structural idea of what was going on.
Q: How did you pick Paul Epworth as your producer?
Finn: He did sound for us at a club night that he was kind of affiliated with - that was three years before he started producing. He did sound for us and the gig went really, like, tits up and everything went wrong and he ended having a fighting match.
Jasper: Not with you.
Finn: No.
Jasper: With the promoter.
Finn: He saw something in it [the show] and said he’d like to make a point of coming up to us afterwards. I thought that was really special.
Jasper: And then we didn’t see him for two years. We tried recording with a couple of producers and it wasn’t working out. We were in the studio with a producer and it was all going horribly wrong and we bumped into him - he was working downstairs with a band called Maximo Park. I hadn’t realized he had become a producer. I gave him a cd of what were doing and we did one track with him which was Love Is A Number and from then on in it just clicked really, just jelled.
Q: It’s a question you probably hate and difficult to answer - describe your sound - it has so many elements of music that I love, like disco and 80s music.
Jasper: It’s got an element of 80s and some of the beats are quite disco but it’s also got some of the bands we love from the 90s like My Bloody Valentine and stuff like that going on in it. I think it’s quite diverse it’s not just sort of influenced by the 80s - I think it’s influenced by the 90s - it’s a 21st century record. It’s a mixture of a lot of different things. But yeah, like you said, it’s really hard to ask a band to describe its sound (Jasper laughs and I agree). Invariably we get 80s references and lazy journalists say we sound like A Flock of Seagulls but I don’t see the reference myself.
Finn: It’s just not true.
Q: Who writes the music and lyrics?
Finn: Me and Jasper write the lyrics and we usually write the beginning sparks of a song as well but more and more we’re doing stuff in a rehearse room situation and working on grooves and it can start from anything like a circular phrase or a riff -
Jasper: Or it can start from a bass line. . . every one’s writing music to a certain extent but me and Finn are the major song writers in the band.
Q: Reports are the entire band besides keyboardist Taxxi grew up together in Norfolk in what has been called a commune. Is this true?
Finn: It wasn’t really a commune. It was just like -
Jasper: it wasn’t really a commune by the time we were living there really. It did start out as a commune. It was a broken idea(l) of a commune. I don’t know, by the time it had hit the 80s a lot of the people who had moved out there in the 60s and 70s had fallen out and fences had gone up -
Finn: It wasn’t idealist in that way. It was just lots of young waifs and strays living there and getting blitzed and playing music and stuff, and doing bits of art and photography.
Jasper: I think as kids you had a free run, that was thing - the kids were kind out of control, which is great for kids - just do what you want -
Finn: there was no discipline.
Q: So you were able to take up music?
Jasper: Yeah, no sound restrictions or anything like that.
Q: What’s the story behind your song Deborah Carne?
Jasper: It was about something I read in the papers in England that happened a while back. It was basically a school kid - her boyfriend had a one night stand with another girl and she decided to get revenge [with her mates] and took her out and set her on fire. It was pretty nasty. Just one of those stories you read and you’re just absolutely fucking horrified, you know, that somehow children . . . barely teenagers could do that to each other. It kind of touched on that whole . . . way people seemed to have become, especially with computer games - separated from the reality of the harm that you can inflict on each other and they’re playing these games where they go around and blast each other and it’s not real. I suppose it’s kind of like -
Finn: the social repercussions of having a Prime Minister who’s up for going to war and is a real war monger and his policies -
Jasper: I guess to a certain extent if he’s at the top of the ladder . . . he’s setting the example at the top . . . and blasting away innocent people, then that kind of thing just goes down. I don’t know, I just found it a horrific scenario. It’s a touchy subject - writing about something that’s obviously personal and painful to that family.
Q: Finn, how did you start singing? It’s a very flexible voice.
Finn: I’ve always sung - not in a professional way or in a vocational way. I just always loved singing, even as a kid.
Jasper: I think there’s a whole bit to his voice that’s not even on this record yet that’s really good as well. Maybe you hear it on the secret track on the album. It’s called Luna Park.
Q: How about Pig Heil Jam?
Jasper: I can’t believe how many people have referred to that as a yelp.
Finn: I associate yelps with puppies. I don’t know how I feel about being called a puppy. Puppies are nice, soft and cuddly. And open to abuse.
Q: How’s America? Is this your first trip here?
Finn: Second. This is more extensive than the first one - we only did like four or five shows the first time we came over. We love it.
Jasper: It’s been great, we love it.
Finn: Especially at the moment because it’s not like we’re going everywhere in the States - it’s not that extensive - it’s quite leisurely, the pace we’re doing it. It’s more like a kind of holiday really. Going to lots of different places.
Jasper: Like a holiday but there’s some really long drives in between. It’s not all like a holiday but -
Finn: for me it is. It’s nice looking out the window and seeing different sights.
Jasper: Yeah it’s a beautiful country. It’s a fucked up beautiful country but . . . From day one we’ve always wanted to get out here. A lot of our heroes in music are from here and it’s great to be here. Coachella was amazing.
Finn: Amazing. Two to three thousand people, and they’re all packed into this tent - people who had turned up to see us and it was really encouraging.
Jasper: And that’s pretty much myspace really because we’ve got nothing out over here at all. People seemed to know our songs in the audience.
Q: What’s the strangest thing on your rider?
Finn: It’s pretty thin over here. We’re lucky if we get a bit of fruit. We usually get some piss water beer and that’s about it.
Jasper: There’s nothing unusual on our rider. We just try to get some vodka and red bull. Especially if you’ve had a long trip you need something to pep you up a bit. Nothing that exciting. We’re on a shoe-string [budget]. We haven’t got a record out here at the moment.
Q: When does the cd come out here?
Jasper: We’re negotiating with [American] labels cause we’re signed to an independent in England. Everything that we do, and all the gigs that we do are purely by word of mouth. [Through myspace] we’ve picked up a lot of American fans. We came out here and did SXSW and the Troubador in L.A., which was full. They told us no one dances at the Troubador, and then they all started dancing.


Sunday, February 4, 2007, 05:37 PM ( 3619 views )
Influences – musical or otherwise?

Kreskin! his e.s.p. powers! And we got the game with the mystery pendulum. I'm really into Sylvester (the mummy of a forty-five year old man found, half naked and half buried, by two cowboys in the wild west Arizona desert 1895) - I got the poster at Ye Olde Curiosity shop last time we played in Seattle. Also Miracle Mike, the chicken that lived a year without a head, he preened around the other birds and ate from an eye dropper. Marlin Perkins did such a great job with the whole Mutual of Omaha thing too. I read that some people like lemurs because they think they are mutant monkeys.

How do you describe your music?
Hopefully something like who I imagine Brian Eno to be on the back of another green world with cowboy boots - sitting under the moon next to someone he finds beautiful and funny, listening to a mix tape of Martin Denny, Neutral Milk Hotel, the Clash, and the song 'harborcoat' is on it just before Jesus and Mary Chain, Nick Cave and then Peggy Lee walks by and then there's this party and people are happy and lauging and comfortable enough to share bizarre ideas, and unicorns.

How did the band come together?
It was purely scientific. 4 parts water, 3 parts smoke and 2 parts mirrors. We are from all over the country (St. Louis, Kansas City, Missouri, California) and now we are all in Portland. We were just lucky to find each other as we careen through space headed for the beginning.

Is there something as a ‘shoegazer’ scene?
A shoegazer almost never gets seen, they are always looking down. Rim shot...and crash cymbol. I like Elvis. My favorite shoegazer band is the High Violets. There is a return to music with ethereal qualities - there are bands that use a lot of classic pedals and sounds but I think everyone adds their own dynamic or twist.

How/when did you start music?
Soon after being raised by lemurs - music started us. I think we were all gigantic music fans all our lives and decided to start becoming a part of the music rather listening exclusively. Once music started us, we were born, small, winged, and transparent.

How are things progressing on the new album?
Marvelously. It's definitely the album I feel being involved with is closest to my life's work thus far. So proud of it and we are only about 63% finished.

Spirit in the Sky – Why do a cover of this song (not saying you shouldn’t have)? It was something that happened in the practice space between songs, as things often do, the distortion sounds had not come to us and then curiosity killed the cat and Matt got ahold of Norman Greenbaum and began conversing about how to get that fuzzed out tone and the next thing you knew it was on our album.

Which ones of you were in the Bella Low?
That was a magical time. When you look back at the footage in the movie DIG! The Bella Low was opening those shows and just getting to be a part of that whole scene as it exploded, we were experimenting with sitar and film and... it's funny, last night at Courtney’s someone called me "bella low jsun!". Clint and Luke (other Bella Low) have an amazing band (The High Violets) now and someone has put up the bella low myspace.

What contemporary music do you like?
The Black Angels, The Get Hustle, Hypatia Lake, Wolf Parade, and just got the Kings of Leon Day Old Beglian Blues, Things on the radio I really like are Gorillaz and Interpol and The Strokes. Lately I know there's been a lot of Dolly Parton going around and I love to listen to Percy Faith plays music from South Pacific.

One of your influences listed on your myspace account is John Waters. What is it about him you like?
The way he allows things to be as twisted and cubist as he sees them. The camp is always good for a ha ha ah-ha.

How do you describe the Oregon music scene?
It's so interesting all the bands that are in Portland now. I think it says something about the live-ability for artists. There are so many amazing local bands that are taking off , e.g. The Village Green, Talkdemonic and there are so many great national/international acts too e.g. Modest Mouse, the shins, Sleater-Kinney, Spoon, Pink Martini, and my favorite, The Dandy Warhols. It's a healthy mix right now.

What has touring been like? Where have you gone & where next? Touring has been full of high jinks and tomfoolery. We've gone through 37 states over the last 2 years from sea to shining sea. We love New York and Los Angeles. It’s also brought merriment to get off the beaten path sometimes too.

How was it opening for Richard Butler?
He was a true gentleman. When he sings Love My Way and Heaven it sent those first gala feelings down my spinal column. It was a dream. It always is.

If an animal embodied your band - not as mascot though - what would it be and why?
It would be child's play to say the duck-billed platypus. I would say the animal we would manifest ourselves as is the Aye-aye of Madagascar, threatened by the people it shares the island with because of its odd appearance. To the Malagasy people, the Aye-aye is magical, and is believed to bring death to the village it appears in. The reason I believe we are most like the Aye Aye is because the Aye-aye owes its "notoriety" much to its odd appearance, especially its long middle digit. This toe and claw is most important to the Aye-aye, as this is how it fishes tasty, fat grubs from rotting logs and branches. Much the same way The Upsidedown forages with a fine toothed comb for tasty musical morsels. And because it's Matt's favorite animal.



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