Interview: Black Lips
- May 15, 2009
Just before they took off for the south coast to play The Great Escape festival I was fortunate enough to catch up with Cole Alexander and Jared Swilley of Black Lips. They talk about 200 Million Thousand, plans for the summer, their bizarre and not all pleasant Glastonbury experience, a bunch of weird, far right, homophobic Christians from Singapore and the possibility of including firearms in their stage act...
Tom Sowerby: Hey guys, it's been three months since 200 Million Thousand came out, how has the response been?
Cole Alexander: For a lot of our old fans it was a kind of return to form, to our roots, which a lot of our old fans really like.
TS: That's cool, and what have you been up to since its release, a lot playing and promoting?
Jared Swilley: Yeah, well we've been on tour for ages. I suppose it all goes back to January 10th when we flew out from our home town, Atlanta, and we really haven't been back much since.
TS: About the album, I read that you preferred the whole '60s approach to recording music, like all playing the songs together at the same time as opposed to each part individually; did you do that for this album?
Jared: All the basic tracks are just us guys in a room together, we go back and overdub vocals and we have extra instruments which we'll do separately but the core of the album is all live.
TS: Excellent, and is it right you made this album straight on to vinyl instead of digitally or CD?
Cole: Yeah we did that with this record
Jared: Yeah, it went digital somewhere in the process, I'm sure, but it's as close as you can get to having a pure medium.
TS: You have an impressive list of influences with bands like the 13th Floor Elevators and the Lollipop Shoppe, how did you first get in to those kind of bands?
Jared: I don't know actually...
Cole: I first heard the Lollipop Shoppe on a Pebbles compilation. We used to be on Bomp records and they put out a lot of the Pebbles stuff.
Jared: I guess you like listen to The Beatles and The Rolling Stones because your parents listen to it and then we kind of wanted something a bit more far out and compilations like Pebbles and Nuggets and Back From The Grave.
TS: Yeah, and a lot of your music sounds very reminiscent of that US 60's psychedelic/garage like the 13th Floor Elevators, The Seeds and The Monks, is that the sound you're going for?
Cole: That's kind of like our roots; that music. We'll venture out, but that's always going to be our thing.
Jared: It kick started us a little bit, it's what we wanted to do.
TS: You guys seem like you're going to be around here a while and I was wondering if you've got any plans for any UK festivals?
Cole: Yeah we're playing The Isle of White festival
Jared: I know we're doing Reading and Leeds later this year, we've got some more too.
Cole: We've got Primavera in Spain too.
Jared: That's the one I'm most looking forward to. Spanish festivals are always fun and the weathers good.
TS: I heard that you guys don't want to do Glastonbury again, is that right?
Jared: Well, it's not that we don't want to do it again, we're not knocking it, it's just we didn't really understand what it was and that we were staying there. We got there and there was just loads of mud everywhere and we had to sleep in the dirt and didn't bring sleeping bags or pillows or anything and it kind of felt semi-apocalyptic at one point, we took psychedelic drugs and it took us two hours to find where we were staying. We were sleeping in this Tepee-
Cole: -it was kind of cool!
Jared: Yeah, and I remember at one point we were all sitting around a fire in the Tepee and that was cool but then I woke up and it looked like what I'd imagine Verdun would have looked like; there were just bodies and mud everywhere and it was, it was a rough morning.
Cole: I woke up in the middle of the night and I went in to someone else's Tepee to see what was going on and they were asleep and their fire was starting to get out of control I had to put it out and it was spreading and this girl wasn't waking up, and it was getting on her sheet. I started stamping the fire out and she was just like "stop trying to fucking wake me up!" if I didn't come they would have burned up fast.
Jared: The toilets... I didn't go to the bathroom while we were there because the toilets were so gross they were just like a giant pit. It was supposed to be a VIP camp but it all looked the same to me, it was kinda medieval.
Cole: I reckon I'd do it again.
Jared: Oh yeah, I'd do it again, but next time we'd be prepared.
New single I'll Be With You, out 18th May.
TS: You guys have a pretty busy summer and I was wondering; when you go to festivals do you get to hang out for the weekend or do you usually have to head straight off?
Jared: We usually have to head off, it's nice when we don't; Primavera we're going a day early and we have a lot of friends going there so that one will be really fun. At Coachella we got to stay the whole weekend and that was fun; we were there for three days and we only had to play once and just went to pools and golf courses the whole time.
TS: Would you say it's the best festival you've ever been too?
Jared: Yeah. Well either that or ATP Vs Pitchfork that one was fun. They were both very good, but I love the ones in Spain because they do touches like putting Swimming Pools back stage for the bands and that's always a nice perk.
TS: Yeah, I can imagine! Though you don't really need a pool here; you have the rain...
Jared: Yeah, the rain could probably fill a swimming pool
TS: I wont talk about the whole India tour too much, because it's already been spoken about a lot, but would you say it's put you off going to all these different countries?
Jared: No, not at all, if anything it encourages us; when someone tells me I can't do something it makes me want to do it more.
Cole: We were just doing our job. Even though we got kicked out, we were just doing a service to the people.
TS: And you guys also did Israel?
Jared: Yeah, that one was a major success and really fun, definitely want to go back there. I think we're going to China and Thailand. We got invited to Singapore as well but I think we'll turn that one down, because they're a bit too conservative for us over there; I don't want to get caned or anything...
Cole: There was an American kid who spray painted on some cars there and he was in big trouble and got caned and arrested. You can get in trouble for spitting there.
Jared: The main women's rights group there was like a pseudo progressive organisation and last week there was a coup by these far right conservative Christians who took it over because they didn't want the next generation to be lesbians. That was actually in the woman's speech, so if they feel that strongly I don't think they'd like us very much.
TS: Have you ever been to these countries, heard some of their local music and had it play a part in your influences?
Jared: Well I think Indian music, just because it was so psychedelic and cool and I was disappointed this time because we just heard bad heavy metal bands and alternative rock bands. That was disappointing because in my mind I had this image of a psychedelic train ride with a bunch of sitars and stuff but it was quite the opposite. But there's a bunch of traditional Brazilian music I like, like Tropicalia music. So yeah sometimes, it makes a difference, but I mainly like American music, and British music.
TS: Is there one band in particular who you really love and hope to emulate?
Cole: 13th Floor Elevators are pretty high up there.
Jared: Yeah, them and like The Beatles, The Ramones and The Germs are real influential to us, they're like an LA punk band who inspired me to want to do bad things. Not really bad things, but mischievous things. Oh and The Rolling Stones.
TS: If you want to live up to the 13th Floor Elevators are you considering getting an Electric Jug player in the band?
Cole: Yeah, we talked about maybe doing that for a song or something. I've heard this song by a new band where they do it.
TS: Oh really, awesome. I take it you're not going to play Heaven again?
Jared: Nope, they accosted our booking agent, a friend of hers, beat me up and, y'know, I survived and stood up for myself but they're a lot bigger than me and roughed me up pretty well. But shit like that happens everywhere; I've had worse in America.
Cole: It's cool they at least captured it on YouTube, it made a good video.
Jared: Yeah, and you know what; those guys are idiots. If they had just let a few guys get on stage it would have been nothing. But that's why I hate grown-ups, because they could have avoided all that, and it kinda worked in our favour but they could have avoided any conflict that night if they'd just acted like human beings and not beat up kids.
TS: Yeah, you guys have a pretty unique and controversial stage act, was there much going on before the whole stage invasion incident?
Jared: Well I like when you get a general air of when things are slightly out of control; just before violence breaks and just beyond when things are civil. It's a fine line and I like being in that area. I like a good time when people are uninhibited and having fun. The best shows I ever went to when I was a kid were the ones when I was scared something was going to happen or I had the freedom to throw something, it just felt like I was doing something loose and I'm always trying to recreate that feeling; like the first time you get high you always want that first high again.
Cole: It's true.
TS: Yeah, I'm guessing you're not going to go Arthur Lee on us and fire a gun into the crowd though, right?
Cole: Butthole Surfers did that too, it's a good one... I'd be open to it, you know.
TS: Awesome! Finally, it's obviously only been a couple of months since you released 200 Million Thousand and you've got a busy summer ahead of you, but are there any plans for a new album?
Jared: Well we got a bit of summer vacation coming up so we're going to go back to our studio and try to get things ready and see what everyone has, hopefully have an album done by the end of the year. But we also want to go take a vacation somewhere a some point.
TS: I'm guessing not Singapore...
Jared: No way, they're all way too uptight...
