Music
Like I said, this interview is going to run in our white album, which will evoke themes of purity, transparency and honesty. Which are themes that could really describe a big chunk of your latest album. There is a fresh naivety, it’s simple, self-spoken. You talk about ‘starting anew, that’s why I’m sticking with you, nobody makes me feel better and magic.’ It’s very honest and transparent. Is that kind of who you are? Do you kind of to say things the way… Yeah yeah. This is how I am. I’m very open. Of course it’s great for the song writing and it’s great for interviews and it’s great for any kind of public personality. When I see people, I can talk with them and it’s just much easier to be just very honest but then at the same time I have a lot of stress…distressfulness. I feel stupid or I feel like people know too much about me. You know I read interviews and I feel like they made mistakes at the wrong things. I have to talk to my family all the time because they think I have a drug problem…The reality is that I’m OK, you know. The reality is just that I’m running a big business here. People work for me, and there’s been a recession in the United States for the past five years while I had to develop a brand new company! And I’m doing well, so… I can’t help but notice that any artist referring to his band or his art as a business is pretty rare! I’ve never met an artist who takes it so seriously and really talks about it like you’re the General Manager for the company “and I have employees and all”. You know, this shit is serious! Ha ha! I don’t know. Maybe it’s the wrong thing to say… Just to give me an idea, I don’t need a specific figure here but you know this second album, it’s getting so much praise. Is this it for you? Are you guys kind of like comfortable for the next five years of your life and can you now buy yourself a studio and invest in gear and buy yourself a house, or…? No! I mean, nobody makes money selling records anymore. But you’re touring. Yeah but this is our first tour for the new album. And sure, if we tour for the next two years, a lot, we can earn enough money. Anyway, without getting into money details, reality is yes, we have a opportunity right now: we could stop recording, play tons of festivals and outdoor…because the licenses are admitted…Coca-Cola…Just today I turned down a option from Tommy Hilfiger!
commercial and we would not play festivals for two years on one album and keep the money apart: we’re going to the studio by next year. If I had to choose a musical genre that was the furthest away from what you guys are doing now, I’d say rap is definitely it. Do you listen to any hip-hop, who’s is your favourite gangsta rapper? Oh I love hip-hop. My favourite rapper right now is Tylor the Creator. I’ve always liked rap. I feel really similar to Biggie or 2Pac’s personalities; they both were raised by a single mother who was very dynamic with a lot of personality. 2Pac’s mother was a political activist, Biggie’s mother was a single mother and they both didn’t finish college and they, at some point, started to write songs and they became very open and honest and tried to write everything and they did it until they died. And Biggie’s real name is actually Christopher Wallace. But, realistically I feel exactly the same as those two guys. I used to be a very big Wu-Tang fan but I think that’s kind of over now. We asked a couple of our readers to send us questions on Twitter and one reader had a particularly funny one. He’s like ‘What does it feel like to be idolised by Pitchfork media but not to be able to be found on Google?’ (laughs)
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Yeah, I mean not really. When I talked about working on it, that was the time when I was writing the songs but I had to put them away. That’s really how all of our work is done: I write them, put them away and the next day of work is just in the studio, there’s nothing in between so yeah, the first job has been done for the reggae album (the songs are written) but really I don’t know when we’ll work on it, I don’t know if this is going to happen. It will be a Girls project, then? I’d like it to be. I’ve received a lot of oppositions from the others involved, specifically on this one! It’d have to be done differently. I think that people have done co-records like that. I’d have to be done in a studio with a Jamaican producer, vocal musicians and all that. All right. Last question: if I’m not mistaken, you like Oasis, the band? Oh yeah! What do you prefer, Beady Eye or High Flying Birds (Liam and Noel’s new projects)? Oh God, I wish I knew, ah. I’d really love to tell you an answer but I haven’t listened to either of them. My intuition is to stick with Noel on this one. Girls’ latest album Father, Son, Holy Ghost is out now on
Why? Because that’s what we do. We would not accept Tommy Hilfiger’s option for a
I read somewhere that you’re working on a reggae album. Is that a project that’s still going on?
True Panthers. myspace.com/girls