They played 30 UK dates, and within six months were playing to audiences of thousands.
Now, having put the finishing touches to their second album they’re about to cross the Atlantic again, this time touring of non-traditional venues like Islington’s Union Chapel (Oct 3).
They’ll also attend the premiere of their DVD All I Ever Wanted – The Airborne Toxic Event : Live From Walt Disney Concert Hall (out Oct 4), which has been accepted into the prestigious Raindance Festival.
Frontman, guitarist, chief lyricist Mikel Jollett is wide awake, it’s 10 am and he’s still at home in LA thinking about packing.
He said: “I get up at like 7am. I know it’s decidedly not rock and roll of me. The last couple of weeks we’ve been finishing this record we’ve been making for about nine months.”
Don’t ask what it’s going to be called, as they’ve got ideas but they’re not letting on.
Their biggest hit to date Sometime Around Midnight, captured the attention of fans, but Mikel’s moved on from drawing too heavily on his previous break-up and says the songs have other stories to tell.
He said: “It’s definitely not a reread of the first record. It’s probably both louder and quieter. I wrote the last record when I was going through a pretty devastating break-up. It was a pretty bad time. On this record there’s some songs about my folks and one about Afghanistan – the hypocrisy of nation building in the context of war. Then there’s some ballads. It’s definitely a different kind.”
Turns out the new album was supposed to be an electro mash-up effort “but we ended up making a big rock record” Mikel confesses.
Back to their stay in Camden, Mikel said: “We got to know Camden pretty well. We stayed in this super skanky hotel that had like bloodstains on the floor. It was such a grimy place, we were sleeping three to a room because we were so broke. I like the Dublin Castle it reminded me of a lot of bars in LA. We liked the rock and roll falafel place (Marathon Kebabs), at night it becomes like a rockabilly night, people dancing and eating falafel. That was the most happening joint in London, I really liked that place.”
Mikel seems thrown by UK music journalist lines of questioning but believes it comes from the right place.
He said: “Everyone always thinks you’re scheming and trying to come up with something clever either how you dress or the aesthetic or the music, something in order to solve the equation of being like the next
huge thing. We do not think like that at all.”
He launches in to a (pantomime) English accent: “(UK critic) "I notice you’ve got your sound, you’ve got The Strokes with a bit of The Clash and Arcade Fire sort of thing, how did you come up with that equation” and we’re like uh.......we don’t know. Actually the UK Press is actually quite polite, smart and enthusiastic about us and I think people seem to understand...Where a lot of the hyperbole of the Press comes from...it’s written by people who literally don’t want to be let down, they’ve sacrificed so much in their lives to be part of it.”
He’s not likely to be found complaining about touring either.
Mikel said: “I used to be a carpenter and my hands were sore – that was work...The people who come to our shows have jobs and work. We don’t work, we travel around and play music.”
He said: “I get up at like 7am. I know it’s decidedly not rock and roll of me. The last couple of weeks we’ve been finishing this record we’ve been making for about nine months.”
Don’t ask what it’s going to be called, as they’ve got ideas but they’re not letting on.
Their biggest hit to date Sometime Around Midnight, captured the attention of fans, but Mikel’s moved on from drawing too heavily on his previous break-up and says the songs have other stories to tell.
He said: “It’s definitely not a reread of the first record. It’s probably both louder and quieter. I wrote the last record when I was going through a pretty devastating break-up. It was a pretty bad time. On this record there’s some songs about my folks and one about Afghanistan – the hypocrisy of nation building in the context of war. Then there’s some ballads. It’s definitely a different kind.”
Turns out the new album was supposed to be an electro mash-up effort “but we ended up making a big rock record” Mikel confesses.
Back to their stay in Camden, Mikel said: “We got to know Camden pretty well. We stayed in this super skanky hotel that had like bloodstains on the floor. It was such a grimy place, we were sleeping three to a room because we were so broke. I like the Dublin Castle it reminded me of a lot of bars in LA. We liked the rock and roll falafel place (Marathon Kebabs), at night it becomes like a rockabilly night, people dancing and eating falafel. That was the most happening joint in London, I really liked that place.”
Mikel seems thrown by UK music journalist lines of questioning but believes it comes from the right place.
He said: “Everyone always thinks you’re scheming and trying to come up with something clever either how you dress or the aesthetic or the music, something in order to solve the equation of being like the next
huge thing. We do not think like that at all.”
He launches in to a (pantomime) English accent: “(UK critic) "I notice you’ve got your sound, you’ve got The Strokes with a bit of The Clash and Arcade Fire sort of thing, how did you come up with that equation” and we’re like uh.......we don’t know. Actually the UK Press is actually quite polite, smart and enthusiastic about us and I think people seem to understand...Where a lot of the hyperbole of the Press comes from...it’s written by people who literally don’t want to be let down, they’ve sacrificed so much in their lives to be part of it.”
He’s not likely to be found complaining about touring either.
Mikel said: “I used to be a carpenter and my hands were sore – that was work...The people who come to our shows have jobs and work. We don’t work, we travel around and play music.”
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment