Emilie Simon in Chicago: the complete abridged interview transcript

Photo by: Elizabeth Sentianin , Sculpture by: artzura.com

Here it is. Finally. The (abridged) transcript of last month’s interview with Emilie Simon. Emilie is off touring Europe right now, so here in the States, we probably won’t be hearing anything from her for a while. In the meantime, you will just have to read this and get all excited for the eventual American release of her latest album: The Big Machine. If you live in Europe, you can already buy the album (or, at least you can in France). You can also catch Emilie on tour, which you ought to do, because it is a life-altering experience. You can read the complete (almost) interview here.

The Indie Handbook: First of all, let me say that it is such a pleasure to meet you. Have you ever been to Chicago before?

Emilie Simon: No, this is my first time to even leave the club, so I will discover it with you.

TIH: So you’ve been living in New York for a while, right?

ES: Yeah, it’s been almost two years now.

TIH: What made you pack up and come over here?

ES: At the beginning, I just came for vacation and I enjoyed it, so I decided to stay longer. And I ended up moving here. I think it was just the right timing for me. I was between two albums, so I finished my tour and came here.

TIH: How long do you think you’ll stay.

ES: I have no idea. I didn’t plan it, I don’t plan ahead. I plan what I have to plan, like if I have a tour. I know I am going to be touring pretty much all of 2010. But you never really know what’s going to be happening in your life.

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Lots of new beginnings

Things have been kind of hectic here at the main office. I’ve been out of town in Virginia for several days because Kristin got married this weekend (see left) and Kristin will be out of Virginia for a while because she got married this weekend (see left). Unfortunately, this means I am now the most eligible blogger here at the Indie Handbook; my apologies to you all. So, while it may take a few days to get things back up and running the way they were before, I thought you deserved to hear a little something from us.

The Kabeedies‘ new album, Rumpus, is out today! I would love to tell you what I think about it, but my copy has not arrived yet, though I preordered, so it should be here in a few days. In the meantime, you can read this old entry to find out just how excited I was about it when the announcement was made.

Otherwise, those of you who watch TV may have recently seen the new Amazon Kindle commercial that debuted last Tuesday (you know, the stop motion one with the blonde girl in it). If you are anything like me, you fell instantly in love with the song from the commercial (“Fly Me Away”). It just so happens that the girl in the commercial is also the one singing the song. Her name is Annie Little. She is an actress/model/musician from L.A. and I hope we will be hearing a lot more from her in the future. And, while it is true that, if you stay glued to your TV, you are likely to hear the same 30 second clip from “Fly Me Away” at least a few times a night, you could go to her MySpace to listen to the whole thing along with two other songs from the Fly Me Away.

Now, in case you missed it or you forgot it or you don’t have Amazon Kindle commercials where you live, here is the commercial again. (Hopefully, it is still embedable.) And while you are watching that, I am going to see if I can get in touch with Annie and maybe even get her to answer a few questions for us.

Emilie Simon gets the Big Machine up and running

I followed her for years – not in a creepy stalker way, but the way any true fan tracks the career of an artist he or she admires – spending countless hours in dusty independent and secondhand record shops near university campuses and enlisting the help of friends and family in Europe to track down a catalogue of records that you just can’t get here. It was all very calculated and deliberate. Meeting her, on the other hand, was (almost entirely) an accident.

It was on one of these prospecting expeditions (in search of a release date for her latest album, The Big Machine) that I caught a glimpse of Emilie Simon’s tour schedule. Noticing almost immediately that the next show was scheduled to be in Chicago, I, without thinking, sent off a message to (literally) the only American contact I could find and several hours and half a dozen emails later, we had plans to sit down for a cup of tea after soundcheck.

As I approached Berlin Nightclub and heard the sound of “Opium” emanating from behind the swinging doors, I had no idea what to expect. I am not exactly a veteran of the club scene and I had never even heard most of the songs on the album she was touring, but walked in, trying as best I could to look like I knew what I was doing. What I found: half a dozen people prepping and decorating for the party that night, Elizabeth (my contact), and Emilie on a small stage in the middle of the room surrounded by machines and a keyboard. I stood and listened as she finished her soundcheck, attempting to recover the carefully planned talking points that had fled my memory the moment I came into the presence of my all-time musical idol. How do you cover such an impressive body of work in 20 minutes? You don’t, but the attempt became markedly easier when I discovered that we have a great deal more in common than I ever thought I would with anyone I consider a true genius.

Her first two albums (Emilie Simon and Végétal) and her soundtrack for the French version of March of the Penguins, included some of the most intricate textures I have ever encountered in the course of a four-minute “pop” song. The Big Machine is different, though. You could think of it as the first of her “American” works the way you might “Dvořák’s “New World” symphony. After all, she’s been living in New York for almost two years now.

“At the beginning, I just came for vacation and I enjoyed it, so I decided to stay longer. And I ended up moving here. I think it was just the right timing for me. I was between two albums, so I finished my tour and came here,” she says. And any such dramatic change is bound to make an impression: “I don’t know why, but there is something very intense and creative about New York with all of the artists…but something very noticeable to me when I was in New York was that it was full of a lot of energy…. I don’t want to say that it’s more energy or something, it’s just different and because you are not used to it, it is very noticeable, so it’s really inspiring.” It’s that spirit of change that was such a factor in the new sound heard on The Big Machine.

“I think I had a way of doing things from the first album….I was sort of building the basics. For the album after that, I feel like it was a little bit the same way of working: that I was experimenting and still building and I needed to change – to try something else…because…there is a point where you know that you are totally capable to do that again and again and there is no point in doing that again and again.” And so, the IRCAM alumna and winner of three Victoires de la Musique set out to reinvent herself. “I thought, I am going to stop writing on the computer first and see what instruments I need the most for writing songs and it’s been the keyboard, so…for a long time I was writing without a computer, without programming and everything, just working on the composition itself, the song and its structure.”

As a result, her vocals, once set back within the instrumental texture of her songs, have been moved into the foreground, featuring more prominently than ever before. “The other albums are more…like: I have my studio; I can spend a lot of time programming details and the vocals become a part of the instrumentation and are in balance with the other elements. This one was more about the energy and this kind of urgency of writing…. I was moving every week; I had a keyboard and that’s all…It was more of a raw energy, so the vocals took a lot of space because I needed to express myself and I didn’t have all the sounds.”

But such “urgency of writing” is the nature of an album conceived almost entirely in a live setting. After a short set at the Roxy in L.A. where she played several of the new songs for the first time, Emilie embarked on a five-week residency at The Cutting Room in New York. “At the Cutting Room… I was adding a new song every week. So every week I had to finish the programming of a new song and make it ready to be played.” That live atmosphere was maintained throughout the recording process as Emilie “decided to keep [the] energy of experimenting on stage and find [her] band and record”. And she seems happy with the results, assuring me that “everything was like it was meant to be like this”.

Still, someone so involved in the intricacies of composing, as Emilie is, does not relinquish control easily: “at the beginning, I thought maybe I’m going to find the right producer for this album and ask somebody else to produce it…but I didn’t find this perfect person that I can trust so much more than I can trust myself…. And because I produce all my own albums now, I really know what I like, what I don’t like, and trusting somebody else – it has to be amazing, and I trusted and I worked [on] this album with really amazing people and I opened a lot,..but I still kept being the producer of the album because I know where I want to go…I was more like the captain, but the crew was amazing”.

That amazing crew included Kelly Pratt and Jeremy Gara (both of Arcade Fire) and John Natchez (Beirut) as well as sound engineer Mark Plati (David Bowie, Alain Bashung) and Renaud Létang (Feist, Gonzalez…) who mixed the album. The result is an album that “is very different from the other ones: a lot of energy – a different type of energy – a lot of it because of New York and the kind of energy I’ve felt there. It’s the influence of New York on me”.

As we walked back to the club, part of me wished she had an extra day or two to experience Chicago’s own characteristically unique energy that slips so often and unfairly unnoticed beneath the glamorous cacophony of the coasts, rather than the 22-hour reality of airports, traffic, and Belmont Avenue (and you ever do have the time, I hope you will let me know). No offense to the neighborhood, but the one block stretch between Berlin and Starbucks at Clark and Belmont (much of which was under construction at the time) is not exactly the pinnacle of what my beloved Chicago has to offer. Still, for a few hours on October 15^th and for reasons I cannot even begin to express, there could have been no more perfect place.

dance dance revolution

Hi, dear readers.  I’m really sorry that I have been slacking in my posts lately.  However, I promise that on Saturday I will have something to show for it (not that you really care about our personal lives, but we like to bring them up constantly anyway), and that is…I will no longer be Kristin Garrett!  I’ll be Kristin Williams.  Please get used to this.  I guess I’ll have to change our “About Us” stuff.

Anyway, with Eric being gone for a bit, and me being gone for a longer bit, I want to remind you guys who volunteered to write guest posts that… we want them!  And are pretty excited about them, actually.  So, send em along to the.indie.handbook@gmail.com and we swear we won’t hack them to shreds (or really edit them at all, I don’t think.  I mean, it’ll be Eric doing the posting, but neither of us have much desire to edit.)

Ok, mostly I’m just going to be rambling tonight.  I have been busy with wedding stuff and haven’t been doing too much listening to anything new, and I owe Lost Bear a post, but I want to devote more time than I have had to listening and writing it.  So, here is my rambling.  I’m using my an ipod for the dance music at the reception…not my ipod, because it conveniently BROKE…but I have come to realize in the past couple months that I’m not a huge dance music fan.  I mean, I like it, but usually I opt for something a bit more laid-back, maybe folkish.  And then also, Eric knows how to dance the *real* way, but all I know how to do is move around, and sort of skank from when I went through a ska phase.  So I went through my itunes and the best I could come up with was sort of a bizarre assortment…the Ting Tings, the White Stripes, the Raveonettes, Blondie, Billy Idol, the Rumble Strips, and some Verve Remixes.  Also, I am nervous to admit (why are we always admitting things?) that Beyonce, M.I.A., and Vampire Weekend are on my list, and they are there because I actually like them.

Anyway, so I’m taking suggestions for dance music that doesn’t suck.  I’ve been “doing some research” or whatever, and everyone seems to love MGMT, Bloc Party, Cut Copy, that sort of thing, and I have to say that I don’t hate these bands, but I also don’t really love them.  Not for my wedding.  I do like Black Kids, though.  Anyway, if you have any suggestions for something a bit *happier* and a bit less generic, that’d be cool, and I’m also down with generic if it’s good.  In the meantime, you can watch this video of Kate Nash covering Beyonce.

On a completely different note, you can watch Peter Mulvey being a badass folk singer and amazing lyricist.

 

apologies and old valentine

Hi everyone!  As some of you know, I’m getting married in 10 days, and for that reason, I’m feeling more ridiculous than normal, and kind of like everything is floating around in my head and I can’t get a grasp on it.  I locked my keys in my car yesterday for the first time in my entire life.  My head is not screwed on right, and it will probably only get worse until November 8th.  You’ve been warned.

Yesterday one of my friends said he resisted reading The Indie Handbook for a long time because we sound pretentious.  Ok, he didn’t say we sound pretentious, he was actually really nice about it, but the basic jist was that we sound sort of stuck-up and obsessed w/being indie.  And this is one of my friends.  He knows me.  He likes me (I think).  So I have no idea what you guys think when you read this, and I don’t know how Eric feels about me saying these things, but I would just like to clarify.  If you read our About the Indie Handbook page, you will understand our goals.  But if we come across as biting, condescending, or elitist…I’m really sorry.  When it all comes down to it, I really don’t think I’m better than anyone else.  I don’t like myself very much most of the time.  I think the music I listen to is pretty great, and I want you to listen to it and like it too, partly because you may not have heard it and I think a) you deserve to hear as much good music as possible and b) good music deserves to be heard, and partly because I want to connect with you–I want you to appreciate what I appreciate, and I want to be understood.

We don’t really care about being indie (I mean come on, read Eric’s “The State I Am In” post), whatever that means.  We don’t really care what Paste magazine says is cool (except to be mad when they think STUPID things are cool…haha joooooke…).  I hope you don’t take our sarcasm for elitism, and if you do, there’s not much else I can say about it at this point…so, I apologize.

Moving on, today I wanted to write about Nic Dawson Kelly, but that stuff sort of sidetracked me, but I’d like to get back on topic and talk about music again, if that’s alright.  The other day I was listening to Nic Dawson Kelly’s debut album Old Valentine at work, and one of the students asked me, “are you listening to folk music?”  To avoid more explanation, I said that yes, I was listening to folk music, but in reality, Old Valentine is much less easy to label, more of a folk-blues-rock mix.  I could have sworn that somehow the White Stripes had slipped in at the beginning of “The Musician” (“We’re Going to Be Friends”), but after the first few chords, the whistling and one-of-a-kind voice gave it away as something completely different.  How to describe Nic’s voice?  At first, I wanted to compare him to Coner Oberst, but I feel like Nic has a better grasp on technique and is less grovelly/talky.  It seems kind of lame just to call his voice unique, even though it is different from anything I’ve ever heard and in a good way.  He just really knows how to use it, like a classically trained musician; like I said recently, you find that once an artist knows the rules, it sounds/looks/feels better when they break them.  Nic knows what he’s doing, and he uses his voice in a ton of very cool ways–shaking and narrating and teasing–and, like Will Sheff from Okkervil, you can hear the emotion in it.  This is great because he achieves tenderness, sarcasm, and fun convincingly, with soft chords (“Marilyn”, “Oh Well”) or playful swagger (“The Musician”, “Old Valentine”) backing evocative vocals.  As for the album itself, I’m impressed with how well-crafted it is.  The songwriting is beautiful and the flow is perfect.  I was afraid at first that it would be too country, but it definitely isn’t; there’s a level of soul in every song that is incredibly refreshing and works as a nice balance to the harmonica/acoustic guitar sound.  Frickin’ awesome.  I think Nic Dawson Kelly is a definite up-and-comer, or whatever the crap you call it, and I’m excited to encourage you to buy this album!  On iTunes!  Tonight!  You can even get a first listen on his myspace, just to prove it.  My favorite on the album is “Marilyn,” just fyi.  Precious.  And look at that precious face!

I will touch the harp-strings of my voice to see if it can fashion a little song for me.

(I promise, unlike Friday’s post, this one is about music.)

There is an elegance about the Gaelic language – a certain tactile satisfaction that lingers on the tongue after forming the words – that purveyors of such a vulgar language as English more than likely have difficulty understanding (I should know, I used to be one). So I was understandably offended when I read today that Highland councillor John Rosie called the establishment a Gaelic development officer for Caithness an attempt to “impose” upon the citizenry “an alien language, of no value to them”. Even more ironic is the fact that I first learned of this on the official release date for Uam, the third solo album from Julie Fowlis who, at least in my circle, has done more to spread the beauty of Scots Gaelic abroad than any other person.

If you are familiar with Julie’s other two albums, Mar a Tha Mo Chridhe and Cuilidh, you more or less know what to expect from Uam, though a few things have changed. Most notable is the presence of English, be it only on one track and used with interesting effect (more on that in a moment), it certainly stands out in context. Uam again features several songs native to Julie’s home island of North Uist (in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland) and Barra (to the south), but also includes a Breton song (“Rugadh mi ‘n teis meadhan na mara”) and one Irish-American tune (“Wind and Rain”). Somewhat less important, though still interesting trivia, Chris Thile doesn’t play on any tracks. As whole, Uam is a beautiful album rivaling in cohesiveness Julie’s hugely successful breakout album Cuilidh.

The first two tracks, “M’ fhearann saidhbhir”, a set beginning with a traditional waulking song followed by three tunes (two recent compositions and one traditional Highland tune) and “Bothan Àirigh am Bràigh Raithneach” (a slower piano/vocal number featuring lush three-part harmonies) set the tone for the whole album: an album that (thankfully) never settles on one style or tempo for too long. Still, this album is full of stunning moments, the most immediately captivating (at least for me) being the pairing of two songs recounting the story of “The Jealous Sister” (a story which has been dated as far back as the 16th century). The first song, “Wind and Rain”, of Irish-American origin, is performed here (partially translated into Gaelic) as a duet with Eddi Reader. This comes across as, more or less, typical Celtic festival fare, but the ensuing Hebridean take on the same tale, “Thig am Bàta”, is absolutely arresting. Featuring only Julie’s vocals and Martin O’Neill on bodhrán, it is highly percussive, rhythmically intoxicating, and easily the coolest song I’ve heard in months.

Of course, if there is one thing Julie Fowlis does well (and there are actually at least a dozen), it is to bring an album to a memorable conclusion. Whether it is “Moladh Uibhist”, the haunting ode to Uist that closes out Mar a Tha Mo Chridhe or “Aoidh, Na Dèan Cadal Idir”, the a cappella lullaby at the end of Cuilidh, they are without fail, the most charming, organic moments of their respective albums. The case with Uam is no difficult. Allan MacDonald and Mary Smith join in with striking parallel modal harmonies on “Hò bha mi, hé bha mi”, a night visiting song with the most beautiful, lingering lyrical image of the album: “’Cò tha còmhl’ riut, a Sheònaid? / A bheil thu ‘d ònrachd a’ bruidhinn?’ / ‘S làbhair Seònaid ghrinn uasal / Air uachdar a cridhe / ‘Barail leam gur e bruadar / A ghluais sibh nur dithis’.” (“’Who’s with you, Seònaid? / Or are you talking to yourself?’ / And noble, beautiful Seònaid / spoke from her heart. / ‘I think it was a dream that roused the pair of you’.”).

It deserves to be noted as well what a pleasure it is for me to once again hold an actual CD booklet in my hand as I listen to this record, especially one with real, substantive liner notes. The texts, translations, and detailed song histories are an integral part of this album, of the culture, and of human history. I read somewhere once that people of Scottish decent, no matter how distant, can feel the tug of the Highlands and Islands pulling them gently toward home. Had I never read that, I would still attest to the strength of that call. I’m a little fuzzy on the details, but a great many of my clan had already settled in the Americas by 1745. And even now, 250 years removed, listening to Uam (or Mar a Tha Mo Chridhe or Cuilidh for that matter), it has taken all the pragmatism I can muster not to drop everything and move to North Uist or Perthshire (where the Robertsons come from) and learn the (“alien and [useless]”) language and spend a few years studying this music – my music. (If anyone knows how I can do this, or can introduce me to someone who can help make it happen, and I mean this in all seriousness, please email the.indie.handbook@gmail.com. Let’s talk.)

He took all of my sins and he wrote a pocket novel called “The State I Am In”.

Bear with me for a moment, because I’m not sure where I am going with this, though I promise it relates to music (or at least the way we experience it). If you are a frequent reader of The Indie Handbook, you may have noticed that I have been away for a couple of weeks. It wasn’t really an intentional hiatus, it just sort of happened, and while I love this blog, I am glad I’ve had these two weeks to myself. It has given me a chance to think about a lot of things: about this blog – where we started, how far we’ve come, where we’re going; – the paradoxical, amorphous, ridiculous “indie” universe we (all of us) are constantly creating and defining, even whilst it defines “us” and what the crap this all has to do with me.

And, in all of this, it’s that quest for self-definition – and the subsequent manufactured persona – which has stuck with me (while this is the ideal place for a Kierkegaard reference, I’ll give it a miss; go read The Sickness Unto Death). It’s time we faced the truth: we are a lost generation. Unfortunately, while we are tragically overrun with Hemingways, we haven’t produced an Eliot or Fitzgerald yet (though I suspect there is at least a Hart Crane in our midst, you’ve not yet met her; she lives in Chicago). Even though we claim to prize ambiguity above all other virtues and cherish what we like to call “nuance”, we all require some degree of definition.

And I am not immune to this. When we began this blog, we set out to be ourselves. We were going to ignore the rules and dress code and requisite iPod playlists that define indieness and be honest with you about who we are and what we like – and where the music is concerned, I think we’ve achieved that. But talking to Kristin this week, I came to the realization that I have done a fair bit of inventing over the last eight months. I’ve reinvented myself (or, more accurately, manufactured a second, internet exclusive, Self), and I’m not sure I like him.

Internet Eric is fascinated by celebrities, loves cute girls, and has a particular appreciation for cute celebrities with a celebrity crush list twelve miles long. He does nothing but listen to, think about, and write about music all day. But if you went to a show expecting to meet a trendy, girl chasing, indie music blogger with earphones permanently attached to his head, you’d never find him, because he doesn’t exist. The real me cannot be trendy because they don’t make “indie” clothes for fat people. I like cute girls, but I am drawn to brilliant, creative, irrepressible, strong women with wide-ranging interests who are as fascinated by numbers as they are storytelling. And, frankly, you are more likely to catch me reading Lolita or a fashion/design magazine or “The Waste Land” for the 384^th time, than listening to my iPod (which is actually an Archos 605). It’s true, I am as cynical in real life as I come across online, but not so much about other people as my own inevitable failure as a human being.

I say this because I met a genius last week. She has created two of the most perfect albums I have ever heard. Her work is so intricate – so detailed – that I hesitate to even wish to understand her creative thought process because I’d probably break something. And, above all of this, she is one of the sweetest people I have ever met. In all, we sat for half an hour in a busy Starbucks and talked. As far as I know, no one recognized her, and all the while, in the back of my mind, was this little voice saying if you only knew who this woman is, what she can do, what she’s already done, you might stop and listen to what she has to say. I doubt she was thinking the same thing.

Later that night, she (Emilie Simon), made her Chicago debut at Berlin Nightclub, which (for those unfamiliar with the club) has a reputation as one of the premier gay discos in the city. I had never been to a specifically “gay” anything (well, a hotel, once, in Boston, but that’s a different story), nor have I ever felt so un-judged in any reputed “straight” club or bar that I’ve been to. I saw things that night that I’ve never experienced before. I saw people who were entirely uninhibited, dancing with abandon and wearing clothes I would never be caught dead in.

And I leaned over to my friend Lindsey and whispered, (read: shouted) in her ear, “I envy them.”

“So do I,” she said.

if…t-shirts, paste mag, & school of seven bells

Before I talk about music, I have some other things to talk about.

If we sold The Indie Handbook t-shirts, would you guys buy them? No, this is not a rhetorical question. We really desperately want to make them and sell them to you. We promise they’d be just as charming as we are, but we need some definite opinions before we take any action. Also I need to get married before I spend any more money. (Unrelated? Sorry.)

If you saw Where the Wild Things Are and didn’t like it, you have no business reading this blog anymore. Just kidding. But okay, seriously, I saw it and of course I loved it–I knew I would–and the soundtrack was incredible, including all the “music from the motion picture” stuff that isn’t on the official Karen O & the Kids soundtrack. There is an enormous amount of beautiful music in the movie…but that isn’t why I’m talking about this. I know maybe this isn’t related to indie music, but this was the most beautiful film I’ve seen in some time (then again, I’m not much of a movie buff) and once again, Paste Magazine doesn’t like it and definitely doesn’t love it. Paste angers me. A lot. And it kind of sucks, because I’d love to have Paste on our side–after all, they do like music I like, and they even interviewed Thao recently and I cried a little on the inside because interviews scare me and I would still love to have coffee with Thao. It was a pretty decent interview, too. They also like Welcome Wagon, which is cool. But then they go and make She & Him the best album of 2008 and so often I feel like their reviews miss the point…and it makes me so angry!! And jealous!! They don’t define what’s “cool,” they just write about it. …right? Anyway, The Indie Handbook is all about what we love. No matter if anyone thinks it’s cool. Difference.

If you thought I didn’t like electronic music, you were only sort of right. I don’t like bad electronic music, and I don’t listen to much good electronic music. But I found a cool band that is pretty electronicky and I think you will like them too. Ok, I didn’t find them, they’re nominated for MOJO’s Best Breakthrough Act of 2009. They’re pretty cool.

School of Seven Bells released Alpinisms in July, and when I have money again, I will most certainly purchase it, because I like it way more than I expected to.  They have been called psychedelic and futuristic–they are those things, but when I think of futuristic, I often think of hard, cold lines.  School of Seven Bells achieves futurustic in a lovely, soft sort of way.  The female vocals are reminiscent of Stars, or especially Au Revoir Simone.  I like that the focus seems to be on atmosphere and creating a beautiful line rather than on voice or lyrics or rhythm or whatever people tend to put more energy into.  Everything flows in an even consistency, and they’ve created so many layers that they’ve got the Mates of State “wall of sound” thing out-walled to infinity.  I do love Mates of State.

They’ve only got about six songs from Alpinisms on their myspace page, and who can blame them for not giving it all away?  But I think this is going to be one of those albums that needs to be listened to all at once and in order, like Sigur Ros.  I could be wrong.  I have to say, anyway, that I could listen to “Half Asleep” or “Connjur” on repeat for hours.  They’d be badass to see live, so if you’re in Brooklyn this weekend, you should check them out.

The lights went on and there was Garth from Wayne’s World and Elvis Costello playing Fisher Price percussion

By Dan Holloway

I don’t think I’ve ever been closer to not going to a gig. True, last November I had to wrap my wife up in five layers of blankets and Benilyn to get her to Pendulum, but this night I’d actually started the journey home about 10 times before dragging myself in the front door of the Relentless Garage in North London, and it was only several pints of the sponsor’s strongest keeping my eyes propped open when the place went dark and the theme tune for jaws came on.

I looked up from my drink and there were two guys on stage. One looked a bit like a young Elvis Costello, and the other had a Garth from Wayne’s World thing. They were standing hunched over toy percussion, hitting them with a concentration and precision like they were doing open-heart surgery.

I looked closer. There was a Teddy Bear on the front of the stage, several more dotted around the set, and an inflatable shark sitting at the drum kit. I’d entered the strange, delightful, utterly marvellous, yet really rather sinister world of The Candle Thieves, aka Scott McEwan (Garth) and The Glock (Elvis).

For the next half hour they took us through a set of pure kitsch magic, at once as delightful as a child’s party and as dark as the Montmartre of the fin de siècle (maybe that’s because my wife and I had been to see Le Grand Macabre the weekend before). And everything was done with a sense of wonder and showmanship that had the audience in their thrall. I’ve never seen that kind of connection with an opening act before. From opening a cardboard egg box to extract a shaker to the moment The Glock stood up put his finger to his lips, blew up a balloon and released it over the crowd.

It sounds twee, and, let’s face it, rather awful. And if it had been done with anything less than 100% conviction it probably would have been. But the conviction was there, and the result was a Pythonesque, Willy Wonka, Moulin Rouge of a spectacle. And yet whilst it was very much part of a larger whole, the music never took a back seat to the show. And that, in large part, is thanks to the other side of their persona. The Candle Thieves’ lyrics are like the childcatcher in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. They are a black heart beating in a glitzy body. Their twinkly glockenspiel and keyboard, and folk guitar accompany songs about death and angst and the end of the world.  “You can’t be young forever,” they repeat starkly in their current single Sunshine Song, “but you can be young for the rest of your days.” It is, in fact, the exact same message as that with which the cast of Le Grand Macabre left their audience. You’re small. You’re nothing. But what you are is part of the giant carnival of life.

I fell in love with The Candle Thieves like I can’t remember doing with a band in a long long time. They get inside your head, and drag it into their world. Which is a pretty good place to hang out. I wanted to speak to them so much I tweeted them the moment I got home (http://www.twitter.com/candlethieves) and asked them some questions. Here are their answers in full, because that’s the only real way to bring you into their world.

The Candle Thieves – it’s a perfect name for you. It sounds like something from a film, but where DID you get it?

Glock: Hi! Well I play the odd Wedding gig here and there to keep me from living on the streets. The evening guests often used to have those big church candles on their tables. At the end of the night I’d often grab one or two and put them in my bag. When Scott was over mine once he asked what all the candles were about, to which I replied, ‘I’m a bit of a Candle Thief.’ The reason that anecdote was a bit boring is because it’s totally true and that’s how we got our name.

I saw Noah and the Whale headlining this summer, and people in the audience brough along inflatable whales. You have an inflatable shark. That parallelism yet difference with them came across throughout your set (like they’re your cousins who moved to the burbs and became accountants). Would that be fair?

Glock: Well if they put the work in Accounting can pay very well.

Scott: I’ve still to this day never seen Noah & The Whale but I think what they seem to be doing is cool. I think at any scenario where people can bring a long in an inflatable whale to a gig and it be normal is a really cool thing.

If I were going to write a paragraph (which I probably will) about your influences or, if not influences, then all the associations you conjure up, I wouldn’t know where to start (correction, I wouldn’t know where to finish but I’d certainly say there’s Baz Luhrmann, Willy Wonka, The Streets, Elvis Costello,and for some reason I haven’t figured yet They Might be Giants). Where would you start?

Glock: Influences are always difficult to conjure up. I could say all the bands I liked but they’re not necessarily influences. I think the life you lead, things you see and the people you spend time with influence us the most. Certainly for me any way.

Scott: It’s so refreshing to hear influences from not just the music world, thank you! I think if we can take anyone out of the real world for even 10 minutes we’d be really proud.

I’ll come on to the layers within your work in a minute, but in terms of your actual sound, there’s an overwhelming sense of simplicity. It’s like you’ve consciously cut out the nonsense. You use the word intimate in your blurb, which I got. But I also got a kind of naive wonder (that’s part of what I mean by Willy Wonka – there’s a bit of Vince Noir there, too), both in terms of what you were trying to do and how you wanted us to feel, like you cared about each note. Is that way off-beam?

Glock: Not at all, and thank you for looking at us in that way. We certainly wanted to keep our songwriting simple. I tend to complicate things and Scott’s simplicitly I’m sure has levelled me out. When I joined the band it was to escape a bubble I was trapped in so suddenly it felt like I was allowed to express myself in a different way. If we appear weird or eccentric, in my case it’s probably a product of that. I love our band because it’s not put on, we developed into weirdos organically.

If I had to use one word to sum up your set it would be “showmanship” in the proper PT Barnum sense. I kept thinking of Jim Broadbent in Moulin Rouge. I got the sense you were creating not just music but a whole world for your audience to lose themselves in. How did that aspect of your shows come about?

Glock: Again, thank you! When we started out we were fully aware that we were basically an acoustic duo, and we wanted to make it interesting for ourselves and for the crowds of few watching. We’re also fans of people like Eels & Duke Special who if you ever get to see live, they can really take you outside of yourself. We really aspire to do that too.

And do you think that’s going to make it hard for you to make a go of it as a recorded act?

Glock: Aww I sincerly hope not. Underneath the party poppers and balloons are our songs which are more important to us than anything. The live set it just how we present ourselves.

I love your MySpace. You’ve recreated some of that world from the live show (and I’ve got another association – the first series of Pushing Daisies – while it was still good!). I get the impression part of your future may lie in a world that’s more than just music. Are you trying to create a whole parallel Candle Thieves world, or is that just chance?

Glock: A thousand thank yous! It’s probably a bit of both. I’m not sure why a grown man sitting at a toy piano and blowing up balloons works, but it just feels right.

Scott: We got to do a video for The Sunshine Song with a guy called Richard Cullen from Pixelfing and he helped in creating this world for us to be in within the video, and we loved it so much that eventually the artwork and our myspace became themed on those.

You describe yourselves as a guilty pleasure for deep thinkers. Could you explain?

Glock: Aww who are you kidding? You know me better than I do! If you only look on the surface you might see a couple of boys the wrong side of 20, dressed funny and playing silly sounding songs. Granted that’s what we are but there’s more underneath if you want to dig.

Scott: It’s true, and there’s a side of me that really likes that you might find something deeper, but you have to dig deeper to find it.

There is a streak running through your work that’s almost nihilistic, and that plays wonderfully off the actual sound. It reminded me of some of the parts of Monty Python’s Meaning of Life, or the gaudy absinthe-soaked world of fin de siecle Paris. What are you trying to do with that? What do you want your audience to come away feeling?

Glock: Yeah if we can take people outside themselves for a short while and bring them back a little lighter that’s all I can ever hope for.

Scott: There’s a surrealness to Monty Python which is brilliant, and it’s only brilliant because first and foremost it’s very funny. We could have all the stage props in the world but if our song’s aren’t any good and people don’t have a good time then it would be devoid of meaning for us, we’re still learning in both departments but we’re havinga  lot of fun doing it. We couldn’t appreciate it more someone coming to our gig, or writing nice things or getting a cd. Means the world to us. Oh and I’m definitely going to put on Monty Python when I get home!

The instruments and props. Do you go looking for things to incorporate into your music, or do you see something and think “how can I use that?” And is that really an egg filled with sand that you took out of the egg box?

Glock: He he yeah it’s just a regular egg shaker. The box was bought separately. No we don’t really go looking. Every now and then on the drive home Scott will will say something weird like ‘It’d be cool to use sparklers in the set.’ Or ‘It’d be cool to call a song Sharks & Bears.’

I can’t imagine your set working on a huge stage. I know you do garden parties and private shows. Part of me thinks that would work as TV, but there’s something almost alchemical about the way you interact with the crowd that wouldn’t work on TV. What do you see yourselves doing if you “make it”?

Glock: Well I’m answering some fine questions to someone that cares about what we’re doing so we’ve already ‘made it’. I think we could get bigger and remain pocket-sized. We want to keep developing so it’d be cool to play will a full line-up sometime. Or a string quartet would be amazing. I think we could adapt to changes.

Anything else you’d like people to know?

Glock: Amongst weller known classics, we’re both extreme fans of the 1st season of ‘Game On’ and it’d be a total dream come true to have lunch with any of the cast.

Scott: It’s true! We’re also very grateful for the interview, many thanks Dan.

Thank you for the interview!

Thao + the Get Down Stay Down

So, Thao + the Get Down Stay Down has a new album out, it came out … yesterday?  But it was available a week early on iTunes or some nonsense like that, and anyway, it is called Know Better Learn Faster and I have been listening to it all evening in hopes of telling you something awesome about it.  And, not surprisingly, I feel that like We Brave Bee Stings this is going to be an album that I have to live with for awhile and listen to for awhile, and like a good wine, it will get better as it ages.  I find this to be one of the marks of a great album, up there with finding a new favorite song every week.

The thing that impresses me the most about Thao with the GDSD is their craftsmanship.  After all, I’d say that making music is about perfecting both your art and your craft–these guys are perfecting both.  I guess it’s one of those general truths that to break the rules, you have to know them first.  I’m in love with the introduction to the album–the 30 second opening, “The Clap” (not the STD)–where it sounds like when a group of people who have no concept of key sing “Happy Birthday” and you want to laugh and cry at the same time because it sounds so ridiculous (or I guess you could call it “modal”).  Of course, after about 10 seconds of that, the band breaks into brilliance.  “If this is what you wanted, okay, okay”–well, yeah, thanks, I did want that.  They’ve developed into something very refined, each song being wonderfully orchestrated with enough edge in the sound to be rock’n'roll, and with Thao’s raw, boyish, sexy voice as the perfect complement.  “Burn You Up,” for instance, has enough of an interesting countermelody going on behind the vocals with keys and guitars and drums and other percussive instruments and such that it would work as an instrumental track.  However, what would they be without those vox?  Pretty damn cool music that I would probably still listen to…but not at all the same.  This stuff is just good.  I don’t know what else to say about it.  You should listen to it because it is legit GOOD, and how often do you hear/see/think/know things that are for real legit 10 out of 10 GOOD?  Probably never if you’re me and your ipod thing for the car broke and you have to flip between top-40 radio and oldies.

Highlights of the album:
“The Clap”–gosh it’s such a freaking fantastic intro!  I have nothing more to say about it.
“Cool Yourself”–I like the bridge, it’s pretty badass.
“When We Swam”–I don’t know, the “bring your hips to me” is funky and I like it.
“The Give”–the guitar parallels the voice…Thao w/the GDSD has a cool way of giving the guitar melodid lines.  It’s nice to hear something other than strumming chords.
“Oh. No.”–this is about as tender as I’ve ever heard Thao sound.  I like it alright.
“Fixed It”–what the crap is that intro?  It’s kind of cool.
Another general highlight–sassiness everywhere.

So that’s about it, you should buy the album, and probably you should also watch this funny video.

And this one:

Thao with the Get Down Stay Down in the studio from Kill Rock Stars on Vimeo.