12:00 :::::::::::::::: Talibam!
Posted in at is playing Bowery Ballroom in NYC on November 13th.
All dates, and some new CD info, below...
It's called the "ROBERT POLLARD THE ASCENDED MASTERS NORMAL HAPPINESS TOUR" and will feature: Robert Pollard, Tommy Keene, Jon Wurster, Jason Narducy, and Dave Philips
"As an add in bonus CD for Robert Pollard's upcoming Merge Records release, Normal Happiness (10/10/06), this 14 track disc features Robert Pollard and the Ascended Masters live at the U.S. Bank Arena in Cincinnati Ohio from June 24 2006.
The show was part of a two day opening stint for Pearl Jam.
Fans who purchase their copy of Normal Happiness from independant record stores across North America will receieve the bonus disc for free.
is touring the U.
S. this Fall.
Oct 30th - Bowery Ballroom, New York City
The 30th (CMJ-eve) is the same night as .
All tour dates below...
"After six studio albums, three live albums and countless gigs, are to split up. A book-end compilation album and a celebratory farewell tour will mark the end of Aidan Moffat and Malcolm Middleton’s ten year relationship. The Last Romance, released in 2005, will remain their final studio offering.
"
The rest of the press release below...
There’s no animosity, no drama. We simply feel we’ve run our course,” explains Aidan. “The Last Romance seems the most obvious and logical final act of the Arab Strap studio adventure.
Everybody likes a happy ending.”
Titled Ten Years Of Tears (a nod to the critics who frequently pegged Arab Strap as ‘Falkirk miserablists’), the compilation is by no means a traditional ‘Best Of’ collection. Comprising B-sides, demos, remixes, new recordings, live tracks and Peel sessions, it’s a handpicked selection designed to give a full picture of this unique band.
“The idea of the compilation is to capture the essence of the band over our ten year career,” says Malcolm. “Sometimes the albums were a bit stifled because we were worrying too much about making a good album. I think that live versions of songs and b-sides etc show a truer, more relaxed side to the band.
Ten Years Of Tears can serve both as an introduction to Arab Strap and also a fitting finale to those people who have followed us along the way.”
Acquaintances on the Falkirk scene, Aidan and Malcolm became friends in 1995. They soon began making music together, telling twisted tales of messy sexual encounters, shit jobs, titanic drinking sessions and the twisted chemistries of human relationships.
They called themselves Arab Strap after a sex toy Aidan spotted in a porn mag.
Signing to Chemikal Underground, they released their debut single, The First Big Weekend, a tale of Aidan and Malcolm’s adventures on the weekend Scotland were knocked out of Euro ’96, in September of that year. A cult classic, it’s included on this compilation along with a recording from their debut live performance.
Over the years that followed, we were given countless glimpses into the intimately private lives of our two protagonists, whether they were pondering the risk of STDs (Packs Of Three) or wondering if they’d get to shag that friend of the cellist from Belle Sebastian (I Saw You).
“No one really writes honest, hateful love songs,” Aidan once said. “The kids never hear it like they should hear it.
They should know of the farting, the fighting and the fucking. The pain and the pleasure.”
Together, Aidan and Malcolm have created some of the most beautifully observed and brutally painful music of the last ten years.
The album ends, appropriately enough, with the triumphal There Is No Ending. The story continues with Malcolm’s solo career (he’s currently recording his new album with Tony Dougan at The Castle Of Doom in Glasgow) and Aidan’s recordings as his alter ego L. Pierre (new album ‘Dip’ released early 2007) and a spoken-word album and tour in late 2007.
And then there’s this album, which serves as a key to that astonishing back catalogue. Future generations who want to know about the farting, the fighting and the fucking will hopefully know where to look.
BrooklynVegan interviewer Lily Olive and frontman Ed Droste live off the same in Brooklyn, so it wasn't hard for them to meet at a local coffee shop in early August before Ed left on a .
Below you can read what Lily and Ed talked about (plus a little added e-mail follow here-and-there that I conducted with Ed the other day).
BrooklynVegan Lily: So I’ve noticed just from reading about the band and your background that your mother was a music teacher?
Ed: Yeah, since I was a little kid.
BrooklynVegan Lily: So you grew up in a musical household?
Ed: I did…my grandfather was a music professor. He was head of the music department at Harvard for almost 40 years, he just passed away this year actually.
And my mom was a music teacher - totally on a different spectrum of music. He was more like the classical, choir kind of thing and she’s more into stuff like playing the autoharp (she gave me the autoharp) and little maraca’s and things for kids to play, and singing. She finds interesting songs from around the world that are usually for kids and still have a lot of musical bearing to them, but a lot of it is also connected to little kid stuff.
BrooklynVegan Lily: Do you think that either one of them had a particularly strong influence on you growing up?
Ed: I think they both did, more than just their professions. On their off time they were so obsessed with music-different music then I am of course- I grew up with them singing all the time together.
My aunt’s a cellist, so it kind of was everywhere, it was around a lot.
BrooklynVegan Lily: Did you study any particular instruments growing up?
Ed: No, I’m totally uneducated in the world of music, isn’t that horrible?
I’m the most ignorant in the band when it comes to that..
BrooklynVegan Lily: So you didn’t take piano or…?
Ed: I took guitar lessons in high school, but it was a mild study. I’m not a great guitarist, Dan is the real guitarist, I don’t even think of myself as a guitarist. I’m just a power chord rhythm guitarist…
BrooklynVegan Lily: Were you trained vocally at all?
Ed: No. I would be interested to take lessons to extend my voice because I find the more that we tour the easier it’s getting strained and weak, and I’m probably doing a lot of things I shouldn’t be doing like drinking coffee and drinking alcohol and, you know, bad things, but I mean aside from those health things I think there’s vocal exercises that I should learn and ways to strengthen my vocals. I’m also not operatic so it’s not that big of a deal, ya know.
BrooklynVegan Lily: Yeah. So, I read that you played guitar in high school, and then you went to Africa for a while?
Ed: Yeah, I did…after I finished school I took a year off, and did half a year in Italy studying art, and I did the other half of the year in Zimbabwe doing community service and teaching at this school in a rural area.
BrooklynVegan Lily: And you weren’t playing at that time?
Ed: Ohh, well, I played but I couldn’t really bring my guitar traveling, it was too heavy and cumbersome. That’s actually I think one of the big things that put a halt to my music, cause I didn’t pick it up again till the end of college.
BrooklynVegan Lily: Really?
Ed: Yeah, the first couple years of college it didn’t work, I was studying writing - doing creative writing and a lot of essays…so just totally not even thinking about music in that way, and um then I had a bad end to a relationship and turned to it as a cathartic tool..
that’s why the first songs are more intimate. It was never meant to be heard kind of…like I never thought it would be.
BrooklynVegan Lily: Yeah, I’d heard you just kind of did it for yourself,
Ed: Yeah, really, honest to god.
.I recorded it in my apartment.
BrooklynVegan Lily: Now you went to NYU right?
Ed: Yeah, but first I went to this school called Hampshire College for a year in western Massachusetts, and then I transferred to NYU.
BrooklynVegan Lily: Did you study music at all there?
Ed: No, not at all.
BrooklynVegan Lily: So how did you pick it up again?
Ed: I think I went home for Christmas and my mum was like “ will you just take this guitar back to New York with you?” Cause it had just been sitting there and I said ok and brought it back.
.
Ed: Why? (Laughs) Just how random it is?
BrooklynVegan Lily: Well, just to not really play for years and then, you know,
Ed: It is funny to think about, cause I wasn’t planning on it but I mean once things started and I realized I loved doing it and performing I did actively try to make the Europe thing happen so it wasn’t entirely thrown in my lap…but we were never a buzz band really…it wasn’t like the thing like three months later we were selling out the , ya know?
BrooklynVegan Lily: Right, right…so you wrote on your own then you met ?
Ed: Right, totally random, the name had already been chosen…It was just like doing a little home project and I thought oh this is fun, I’m just going toll this stuff Grizzly Bear…I didn’t even know who was… I was starting to perform and getting re-involved in music really brought me into a whole world I hadn’t maybe been paying as much attention as I used to in high school, and it was weird, I just suddenly became a lot more aware and was like “Woaahh!
Where did all these animal bands come from? I guess I really wasn’t so original on this one here.” At least it wasn’t Wolves,
BrooklynVegan Lily: haha, oh man!
Ed: This guy I know started a band called Wolf Scrotum as a joke, you should listen to it, , it’s really funny! Several people because it was a mock of all the wolf bands but there’s some new bear bands coming out now.
BrooklynVegan Lily: Ohh yeah?
Ed: Yeah, I read about it somewhere, someone was doing an article on bear band names, and I was like “what? Ohh well, there it goes.” Whatever, it is what it is.
.our name was actually just a nickname for an old boyfriend of mine.
Me via email: Do you currently have a boyfriend?
Ed via email from Europe: I do indeed. Nearing the three year mark. Touring without him is hard, and we have a dog together, but they take care of each other and our dog can go to his office while I'm gone so there's no animal cruelty going on here.
I will be home in a few days, and just answering this question makes me homesick.
Me via email: It sounds like like he's supportive. Does he ever come along?
Ed via email from Europe: He's very supportive the problem is that he can't get off from work all the time--He came to London for a long weekend in the spring, and he came out to LA once but there are only so many vacation/sick days one can take a year.
Me via email: So we've got your boyfriend and ex-boyfriend covered, and I think that " " is your great aunt. Is " " really your little brother?
Ed via email from Europe: Oh dear no. Little Brother was written by Dan so you'd have to ask him about that.
I've been reading some reviews lately that indicate I did all the song writing which is just false.
This album is entirely collaborative and a total debut for us as a band. Dan wrote a large part of the new material and we all would bring various things to the table and try to work them out--we haven't exactly figured out a way in which we definitively write, each song comes from various places, people and at random times. Perhaps the next album we'll all just sit down together and write but I don't think that's how we work best.
We all need alone time and sometimes that's where the best beginnings come from.
BrooklynVegan Lily: How did the songwriting process differ for you and Chris on the new album?
Ed: Well, we wrote the songs together on the first album and my recording technique was also very untrained so I was doing a lot of really crazy things with vocals which is kinda why they all sound so fucked up and low fi.
.and everyone was like “So, you must be a really big fan of –low fi bands A, B, C, etc”- but actually I really just didn’t know that much about microphones..
and everyone thought it was this real deliberate thing and I was just totally an idiot..getting the levels all wrong, and just like lowering them in other zones and it would be really high pickup on one zone so it would be weird….
I dunno. We went in there and tried to fix as much as we could because before it was even more screwed up sounding, it was crazy. It still has that but.
..
BrooklynVegan Lily: So you did that, put the release out on Kanine, then.
.
Ed: ..
.then we put together a live show- that’s when Chris Taylor and Dan came, then we did that first tour..
BrooklynVegan Lily: So before that you didn’t play a live show?
Ed: I did a live show with me, Chris (Bear), Chris (Taylor) and we did that four times then realized there was something missing. Then we got Dan.
BrooklynVegan Lily: How did you find the other band members?
Ed: Well, I met Chris through a friend, and Chris, Chris and Dan all know each other from college, they went to NYU as well and they had studied music and they had all played together kinda..
BrooklynVegan Lily: How did come about? By the way I don’t think it’s that weird you’re on there.
Ed: Well, it’s kind of a departure, but I love the direction the label is going in, how they’re really diverse.
We had a period where there was one label interested in us, but it fell through which was kind of a bummer. We decided to record the new stuff anyway, and gave it to them, and they were totally into it..
someone from Warp had contacted us earlier, and asked if we had new material, but they weren’t going to sign us based off the first album.
BrooklynVegan Lily: Cool. How did you come up with the new album name “Yellow House?
”
Ed: My Mom’s house is yellow, we recorded there.
Me via email: Is that in Boston?
Ed via email from Europe: Yeah, a town called Watertown largely considered part of Boston, but it's still area code 617--that means something I think!
Me via email: When did you move to Brooklyn?
Ed via email from Europe: I moved here after living up near Columbia University for awhile which was strange because I went to NYU, so it was kind of a dumb place to live. But I had a big apartment and at the time I was so new to NYC I still had that "must live in manhattan" mentality.
So then I believe in 2001 I moved to brooklyn. Been happily there ever since.
BrooklynVegan Lily: How does the Brooklyn music scene treat you?
Has it been supportive so far?
Ed: I like it, there’s friends, but it’s not like everyone gathers around and is like “hey, let’s have a jamboree.” My band mates are friends with several other Brooklyn bands, .
I don’t like that there are so many labels attached to the area, both good and bad. But I do like being around so much great music, it’s really exciting. It motivates me.
BrooklynVegan Lily: Who are you listening to lately?
Ed: I love Hot Chip, I really like Camera Obcsura, the new Ratatat, the new Of Montreal, which is amazing, Diane Cluck, Boards of Canada, The Futureheads, and then all this random stuff that I download from blogs…
BrooklynVegan Lily: Well thanks for taking the time to meet up and chat. Good luck on tour.
Ed: Thanks, hope to see you at The Bowery in September.
Grizzly Bear is headlining (with Dirty Projectors and Stars Like Fleas) before going out on tour with their friends TV on the Radio. All dates .
One of my favorite albums of the year so far is one that I don't even think came out this year - actually I don't know if it technically ever "came out" at all. It's an album I just first listened to a few days ago on 's insistence. It's one I've barely stopped listening to since, and it's one that , , and have been raving about for months.
It's a self-titled album by an unsigned NJ band called , and it's available (as MP3s) for 100%-FREE (you'll also find it on an indie-friendly torrent site near you). The track above comes from it, and so does the one below:
More MP3s . Their second album called Smut comes out soon too, and they have four demos from that one (but listen to the first one first).
No scheduled shows at the moment. stay tuned.
Get ready for his full-length album with all new material early next year.
He just wrapped up recording the as-of-yet untitled album in Maine with Sam Kassirer (pianist for Josh Ritter).
Langhorne just finished up a string of dates with the Violent Femmes, and will be supporting Two Gallants on a fall tour.
09-20 Portland, OR - Doug Fir +
10-20 Los Angeles, CA - Troubadour +
10-21 San Francisco, CA - Bottom of the Hill +
10-22 San Francisco, CA - Bottom of the Hill +
+ with Two Gallants, Trainwreck Riders
Anthony wrote in with this story of Brooklyn, the Raconteurs, and the VMAs.
..
Went to the Raconteurs video taping for "Level," yesterday in an abandoned warehouse in Greenpoint (on West St and Noble St).
Got the call to attend because I entered their VMA ticket giveaway on their website, and since I live in the area I guess they needed audience members. There was a very small audience, maybe 45 people max,which seemed to be made up of mostly v2 workers, but some other fans as well. We were brought into this very much abandoned warehouse and were seated in a circle around the band, sitting on palettes, bundles of cardboard, all around the band.
Wasn't sure what to expect, since when I think music video tapings I think people pretending to play music, since they usually loop over the album cut, however this was not the case. It was a live performance video, they performed "Level" the most, obviously, slowly getting each take better and better. But they would also play other songs in between takes for the audience.
When Jack broke his guitar string and we were waiting for it be fixed, they went into a impromptu version of "Big Wheels Keep on Turnin," also when waiting for the cameras they were playing around and ended up going into a Raconteurs version of "Misirlou" from Pulp Fiction. They also played 5x5, Blue Veins, Intimate Secretary, and they closed the afternoon with an amazing version of Broken Boy Soldiers.
It was an amazing afternoon, and the band was super cool to everyone there, talking to everyone in between takes.
Jack showed us his customized guitar which is made of Copper, and was letting us hold it and comparing the weight to Brendan's wooden guitar. They also talked about the VMAs, and mentioned the bombed joke of Jack Black and Jack White forming a band, which I found interesting. Apparently they talked about it before hand and White's non-response to Black's suggestion of forming the band was supposed to be the punchline, but White commented that, but when he watched it on TV later on, he thought he just looked pissed off and was an asshole, and everyone started asking him why he hated Jack Black, his mom even asked him why he hated Black.
He said he just cant shake the misconception that he doesn't have a sense of humor. White ended everything by walking around to everyone in the crowd and shaking every one's hand and thanked them for coming.
The big guns of the fourth quarter: Jay-Z, Nas, and Ludacris @ the VMAs.
As , Mos Def was arrested for illegally performing his new hurricane-themed song Katrina Clap on a TRUCK without a permit. Watch the provocative, controversial, and seemingly low budget music video for the song .
Nas threw a little jab at 50 Cent at Ludacris' .
While Nas was on stage singing Made You Look with Ludacris, he replaced the "5-0" (slang for law enforcement) with "50", rapping "This ain't Fifty, it's Nas yo." 50 has been throwing little jabs Nas' way for quite a while, and this is Nas' first response since his weak reply track Don't Body Yourself in 2005. Read more .
And in other "My Dad Can Beat Up Your Dad" news, Mr. Friendly 50 Cent called out Diddy on The Bomb (whatever happened to misspelling words to indicate street cred?).
Diddy's alleged subliminal reply is one line on his new album's intro: "I'm richer bitch!" Read more on .
Less skilled, but famous, rappers using ghostwriters is a known phenomenon.
But oh my goodness - when using a ghostwriter, please don't be so apparent. Diddy paid the legendary Pharoah Monch to write a few verses, he's never rapped so recognizably fraudulent. Listen to his new song The Future from his aforementioned upcoming album over at (who won "best Jay-Z lyric reference in a blog title" at the VMAs).
Political rap elder Ice Cube spoke out against today's hip hop landscape stating that most performers are only interested in the flashy lifestyle portrayed in most hip hop videos. The 37-year-old former best rapper in the world (1990-1993) expressed that he wishes more rappers would embrace political issues instead of material gain. Read more on .
Wu Tang Clan member Method Man spoke on his preference for independent labels over major companies. After releasing albums on Def Jam and other majors for over a decade, Method Man has seen his profile change from priority artist to one struggling to get sufficient support. "The indie route is the best route right now, all you need is distribution.
You don't necessarily need the record companies anymore," Mef said. "That's why I root for the underdog. I'd love to see more independents doing shit, for the simple fact that I'm tired of getting raped.
" Method Man's 4:21: The Day After, out on Major Label Def Jam/Universal is in stores now. Read more on .
Lupe Fiasco is performing at the Canal Room in NYC on Saturday, September 16th with Jean Grae, and a DJ set by Mark Ronson.
It's the record release party for the excellent early 'best debut album of 2006' contender Food and Liquor. Tickets .
"Former MANOWAR guitarist Ross The Boss will help 'close down' two legendary New York City venues this fall.
For two special shows fans will get to see an almost-all- reunion (and/or MANITOBA'S WILD KINGDOM) with living legends:
Dean Rispler (MURPHY'S LAW, THUNDERBOSS)
Oct. 06 - New York City, NY @ CBGB (the last show we know about @ CBGB as of this post)
WED OCT 11 Cleveland OH, the Spot at Case Western w/ Oxford Collapse
SUN OCT 15 Denver CO, Ogden Theatre w/ Cursive, the Thermals
TUE OCT 17 Salt Lake City UT, In the Venue w/ Cursive, the Thermals
WED OCT 18 Boise ID, The Venue w/ Cursive, the Thermals
FRI OCT 20 Seattle WA, Neumos w/ Cursive, the Thermals
SAT OCT 21 Portland OR, Roseland Theatre w/ Cursive, the Thermals
MON OCT 23 San Francisco CA, The Fillmore w/ Cursive, the Thermals
MON OCT 30 Mt. Pleasant SC, the Village Tavern w/ Oxford Collapse
TUE OCT 31 Wilmington NC, the Soapbox Laundrolounge w/ Oxford Collapse
WED NOV 1 Washington DC, Black Cat w/ Oxford Collapse
are going on tour this Fall with Ted Leo The Pharmacists, OK Go, and Jenny Lewis The Watson Twins (but not all at the same shows).
There's a . Ted Leo is also playing DC this Thursday, this weekend, and Austin City Limits. Jenny is also playing a bunch of shows before Death Cab get to her.
All dates by everyone, more links, and related news, below...
.
09-07-06 Washington, DC The Tavern at American University ( )
09-13-06 New Orleans, LA House of Blues - The Parish
11-30-06 Hobby Center - Sarofim Hall Houston, TX 77002
12-03-06 The Joint Hard Rock Hotel Las Vegas, NV (Opener TBA, maybe not Jenny)
12-09-06 Key Arena Seattle, CA 98109
Thu 10.05.
06 Cleveland, OH House of Blues
Sun 10.08.06 Buffalo, NY Center for the Arts
Tue 10.
10.06 Philadelphia, PA Theatre of Living Arts
Sat 10.14.
06 Northampton, MA Academy of Music
Fri 10.20.06 Orlando, FL The Club @ Firestone
Sat 10.
21.06 New Orleans, LA House of Blues
Mon 10.30.
06 San Francisco, CA The Fillmore
OK Go are also the UK with Motion City Soundtrack this month.
And here's the video of Ben Gibbard and Colin Meloy singing a Blur song together at the 826NYC benefit in Seattle..
.
This was - - Sunday September 2, 2006.
HR from Bad Brains of three songs before GB took the stage.
I was too far from the stage to snap a picture, so here's :
played before HR.
John Porcelly (Bold, Projext X, Youth of Today) and Toby Morse (H20) each played one song with GB. Porcell did "Straight Edge Revenge" and Toby and Civ did Warzone's "As One.
" HR did "Leaving Babylon," the Beatles' "Day Tripper" and some other song. It was cool and unexpected. The crowd went crazy for him.
[ ]
GB played with Leeway and Murphy's Law. AOL's indie blog has . Here's a video.
...
" is a nomadic interactive coffeehouse, gallery, and performance venue rolled into one. Last winter, the Salon premiered in Park City during the Sundance Film Festival, showcasing work from both up-and-coming performers and more established artists."
9/10 - DJ Cat, House of Diehl, Los Super Elegantes, Open Salon
9/11 - A day of video shorts and live music.
9/12 - A day of field recordings and electroacoustic music.
9/13 - Music curated by Jonny Lives!, Jim Carroll, Jonny Lives!
9/17 - DJ Justine D Blairwear custom fashion , Jonathan Lethem, Electric Method, Goodnight Farewell
"Come early. Free admittance on a first come / first serve basis."
are gracing again.
This time its for the 2006 .
To celebrate the release of the issue, Time Out will throw a free concert in Union Square featuring, not CYHSY who are busy getting ready to headline , but, a nice lineup of more up-and-coming bands.
On Sunday, September 17 from noon to 4pm come celebrate the launch of TONY’s 2006 Student Guide, and enjoy live performances by the Juan Maclean, Margot and the Nuclear So and So’s, the Rosewood Thieves, NYU’s Dibble Edge, members of the cast of Broadway’s The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, Pete Dominick (warm-up comedian for The Colbert Report and host of Sirius Radio’s Comedy By Request) and more.And speaking of the Summerstage show, wasn't sure if they'd get to play before on the second date of , but now they're sure - they get to play to a NYC crowd much larger than the ones they faced most recently at , , , and - and much larger than the one they'll be up against .[ ]
And speaking of that CYHSY-AIH-TT tour, that they'll be selling a tour-only EP featuring all three bands.
"The Nationwide Mercury prize judges sprung a surprise last night by anointing the as winners.
Arctic Monkeys capped a year in which they released the , reinvigorated the music industry and , by winning the annual prize which is designed to reward the best release of the year regardless of genre or sales.
The Sheffield four-piece, whose mixture of classic guitar melodies and acutely observed lyrics garnered critical and commercial acclaim, won the prize for Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not..
..
.
...
Turner, whose witty lyrics have been compared to Pulp's Jarvis Cocker and Mike Skinner of The Streets, said fellow Sheffield artist Richard Hawley should have won. 'Someone call 999, Richard Hawley's been robbed,' he quipped on taking the stage to collect the £20,000 prize..
" [ ]
NYC's East Village venue is celebrating its one year anniversary tomorrow (Sept 6, 2006) with two special shows.
The celebration spills over to Downstairs at Mo’s, Mo Pitkin’s experimental new second stage, with the weekly Mo Knows Songwriters showcase featuring Dawn Landis, Will Hawkins, James Maddock and O.T.
I.S at 7:30 PM and sketch comedy troupe Pupu Platter at 10:00 PM. Tickets to both Downstairs at Mo’s shows are $5.
are on sale.
"Australia's are finally hitting U.S.
shore!! The electronic duo have a slew of tour dates where they will unleash hits from their killer album Beams.
Those in the following cities should surrender to their powers:" [ ]
Sep 5 10:00P Galapagos Williamsburg, Brooklyn w/ (former-Elkland) (Playlouder)
The rest of the dates below...
.
Sep 19 8:00P Brick by Brick San Diego, CA
Sep 20 8:30P Spaceland Los Angeles, CA
Sep 27 8:00P The Plaza Club Vancouver, BC
was at The in Montreal this past weekend (September 2-3, 2006). One of his tasks was to interview Wolf Parade guitarist/vocalist Dan Boeckner.
What he found when he arrived backstage was a beer-soaked Boeckner who had just been attacked by none other than G Love (of Special Sauce). Wolf Parade's Dante DeCaro and Dan's fiancee Alexei Perry were also there. They collectively talk about the fight, Handsome Furs (Alexei and Dan's new Sub Pop-signed side-project), Wolf Parade's new album, Win Regine's old apartment, and more.
...
Dan: I'm sorry. I'm covered in beer.
BrooklynVegan Mike: What happened?
BrooklynVegan Mike: Why?
Dan: Because I threw cheese at them. And then they threw beer on me.
Alexei: Well, three beers.
Dan: Three beers. Yeah.
And some water.
Alexei: and some cheese.
BrooklynVegan Mike: So, I take it you don't like their brand of funk/soul?
Dan: No. Not really. Like seriously, like these are white guys and he threatened me with a "beat down.
" And they are all like "man, he's not worth it." They are, like, holding G.Love back [laughs].
It was maybe the most surreal thing, like the whole time we have been playing in this band, that was literally the most fucking hilarious thing.
Like, seriously, could you imagine someone like G.Love being literally held back from giving you a beat down after he's been sitting in a chair playing harmonica.
BrooklynVegan Mike: You'll always remember this show.
Dan: Yeah. The show where G.
Love almost…..[laughing hard].
BrooklynVegan Mike: So who do you think would win in a fight between your band and his band?
BrooklynVegan Mike: The set initially was beset with some technical problems. I know you just finished a west-coast tour.
Was any of that a problem during the tour?
Dan: No. We got really, really rushed on stage.
Islands ran over a bit and Ben Lee went over a bit so we were kind of like the pariahs [Note: the festival was operating on two alternating main stages]. They came down on us and they were like, "you got to go…..
NOW," and we didn't get our shit properly sound checked.
BrooklynVegan Mike: Well you guys had the biggest crowd of the weekend so far and the crowd was hot. I've noticed, and you would know more than me, that especially at shows like this, the smallest thing goes wrong and it can take the entire set to get them back.
BrooklynVegan Mike: But you had the crowd the whole time. They were very patient.
Dan: Yeah.
It's kind of sad because this whole tour we've achieved a level of professionalism, and this show takes us right back to square one by circumstance. It's kind of a bummer because we are fresh off a tour and wanted to deliver…the goods.
BrooklynVegan Mike: The album has been out for about a year or almost a year.
Dan: It will be a year in a couple of weeks.
BrooklynVegan Mike: Okay. Personally, and I'm sure more so for you guys, with the hype and everything else that preceded it, it seems like so much longer.
I know this is an odd question for such a relatively new release, but do you guys have any future plans at the moment?
Dan: Yeah. We built a studio in Montreal.
It is actually the apartment that Win and Regine from the Arcade Fire lived in. It was our first real practice space. We bought a mini mixing board from the CBC, some tape machines, and stuff like that.
We're gonna start recording the new album plus side projects and other things.
Me and Alexei, we just started another band called the Handsome Furs. We are gonna record our album this week.
We're pretty much starting the day after tomorrow.
BrooklynVegan Mike: You guys are playing the Festival next month, right?
Dan: Yeah.
in a couple of days. Hey, man [Dante DeCaro walks by]. This is Dante DeCaro [guitarist, Wolf Parade].
Dan: Did you see his boys try to hold him back?
Dante: You got saucy with the Sauce, huh?
BrooklynVegan Mike: So what should a Wolf Parade fan expect from The Handsome Furs?
Dan: It's me and Alexei and a beat box, some keyboards and some guitars. It kind of sounds like the first Jesus and Mary Jane record.
BrooklynVegan Mike: I think you already answered my question but I was gonna ask what you thought of so far?
Dan: I think it is gonna be one of the last festivals we do. We're gonna do Austin and a festival in Iceland, and I don't think we are gonna do any more festivals. We've pretty much decided today.
BrooklynVegan Mike: As a band, you decided that festivals aren't for you?
Dan: It's just a chicken run. It doesn't work for us.
We need a good…all of our shit is so old we need like, 45 minutes to sound check and get it tight. We kinda learned that in the last year.
BrooklynVegan Mike: I know you guys decided it today but have you thought of the business impact a decision like that would mean?
Radio festivals and such are a sort of necessary evil, are they not?
Dan: We were discussing that before we did this. Is it really necessary to do these festivals?
If, as a band, you know you are only going to deliver a 75% show at a festival, maybe its better to play a headlining show at smaller venues.
BrooklynVegan Mike: Well, the old model was that every regional radio station had this control. And now that radio, for the most part, is dead or at least dying, you probably don't need to be held up to play these festivals.
Dan: Yeah. It's weird because we have never…there was a point with this band when we could have pushed promotional stuff much harder than we did but we just kind of stopped. I think the way the music industry works now is if you are on an independent label, or whatever you call Merge and Sub Pop [Wolf Parade's label]…a medium level label, with complete creative control and a good booking agent and you can book a good tour and make enough money and live modestly and not have to be a….
not that I have any political bent about it…it's not like we're Fugazi or anything [laughs]. But there are things that make you feel really uncomfortable. There is a definite old guard from the late 80s/early 90s that believes that bands have to work in a certain way.
Dan: I read that blog.
BrooklynVegan Mike: Awesome.
Dan: Actually, I remember we played a show at CMJ and I think there was and it was like, "these guys were totally wasted.
" I have since stopped reading stuff on the internet but I read it and I was like, "Oh man" [laughs.].
BrooklynVegan Mike: We are going to start a column about Canadian indie music and I was curious what your feelings are on the difference, if any, that Canadians treat indie rock versus the States.
Is there a difference?
Dan: I don't think so. I think people perceive a difference.
People perceive this collectivism from Canadian bands but that's really because there's less people here. It also seems like, I know it's a shitty thing to say but, my favorite indie rock bands like Frog Eyes always jump to American labels because they have better distribution and there's more money to be made in the states. It's just a geographical fact.
There was a leg of this tour, the Canadian leg, and it was eleven-hour drives.
BrooklynVegan Mike: Okay. I'll admit that I saw it as this collectivism.
The piece I wrote talks about the and how its like a national college radio station.
Dan: Yeah. Definitely.
BrooklynVegan Mike: And it seems these bands that just started out get airplay on there and then the blogs might pick it up and the ball starts to roll, you know? So, what you are saying is that it is really just smoke and mirrors?
Dan: No, I mean it is in that we are smaller.
There are less people here. The community itself that listens to it is smaller but at the same time I don't know if NPR covers bands like that.
BrooklynVegan Mike: They don't.
Some of the shows have some great musical directors and sometimes you will get great bands like One Mile North or something as a bumper between segments, but they don't have eight hour plus shows dedicated to just great music.
Dan: I think maybe it is just more a socialist mindset. The CBC for the last couple years has been constantly on the verge of being tanked.
We just elected a conservative government and the CBC doesn't generate money in their minds. But in terms of Canadian culture, f you want to get nationalistic, it's really the only thing going. It's not being filtered through any Toronto axis of watered down L.
A or New York. It's just purely Canadian. And sometimes it sucks.
The CBC is not consistently great but when it's good, it's really good. And they pay bands money. They will pay a band that has only done like three shows 1,500 bucks to come in and do a session.
For us, when we did our first Radio 3 session, we had hardly played in western Canada at all and they paid us really good money and it helped us get to our next show. And I like that.
BrooklynVegan Mike: Congratulations on .
Now with things like this festival and the Polaris, do you think 6-7 years time it will be on the level of a Mercury or a Shortlist? Like a built-in shared cultural experience that appears in the U.K and the U.
S.?
Dan: I hope so.
I really hope so. I think right now there is a lot of attention because it is the tail end of the whole Canadian rock thing. But if it's sustainable, it will be very good for a lot of bands.
We didn't really know about it, but they called Jonathan at Sub Pop and told him we were nominated.
BrooklynVegan Mike: 20,000 [dollars, prize money], right?
Dan: Yeah.
Not bad. [If we win], we are gonna pay to get our friend kidnapped and mildly tortured. Not with any serious injury but we really are gonna scare the shit out of him.
And with the rest we will start a free festival in British Columbia, with Black Mountain and Pink Mountaintops and Chad VanGaalen. We want to start up a free music festival.
BrooklynVegan Mike: Not bad.
Kidnap, torture…and a free music festival.
Dan: It will come out karmically equal.
When I found out I had the chance to interview a member of the New York Dolls, I knew immediately that J from was the perfect perfect person to do it, and it ends up he was.
J and Sylvain Sylvain talk about everything from Max's Kansas City to the Morrissey-driven reunion, to Pete Doherty...
..
No, they’re not going to go quietly.
Isn’t that the last thing you’d want from them?
When the came together in 1971 they were just a bunch of city kids – Drummer Billy Murcia and guitarists Johnny Thunders and Sylvain Sylvain were from Queens, bassist Arthur “Killer” Kane from the Bronx, singer David Johansen from Staten Island – who wanted nothing more than to be in a rock and roll band.
People didn’t think they looked and sounded like anything else out there, but the Dolls didn’t really think there was any other way to look or sound.
In a musical era of processed, plastic professionalism, these guys played loud and sloppy, banging themselves against bluesy ‘50s-style rock and ‘60s-era girl group sounds so hard something was bound to break.
What broke was everything. Including the Dolls.
But by the time the group had fallen apart in 1975, people knew you didn’t have to love music from a distance, anymore.
Most of the original Dolls are no longer with us. Murcia died on the group’s first UK tour, drowned in a bathtub during a bizarre booze-and-barbiturate party.
His replacement, Brooklyn-born Jerry Nolan, suffered a fatal stroke in 1992, not even a year after a cancer-and-drug-addled Thunders passed on. Kane lived to see the band’s triumphant 2004 reunion at Morrissey’s Meltdown Festival in London..
. but died of Leukemia shortly afterwards.
Sylvain Sylvain and David Johansen are very much alive, and they want nothing more than to be in a rock and roll band.
I got to talk to Sylvain, and though we spoke longer than we were supposed to, it certainly wasn’t long enough. The New York Dolls have so much history – and are responsible for so much more – that I could barely scratch the surface. For those who want more, I’ll link to a few books and DVDs at the bottom.
Further suggestions are always welcome; please leave them in the comments.
Above all, of course, you should own the records. It doesn’t make sense without the music.
The group’s first, is necessary, and available; their second, , a tougher find. And, hey: It’s 2006, and there’s a new Dolls CD, . Whoulda thunk.
Thanks to BV and the folks at for this opportunity, and to Sylvain Sylvain for his time and good humor.
: New York is losing CBGB’s and Continental in the next month, but The Dolls came up before those clubs were even around. You kind of had to invent places to play.
..
"Syl: Yes, well, we always had to look for venues really, because when we came around there was none, except maybe .
J: And that was a Warhol hangout then, right?
Syl: Yeah, exactly, that was famous for the back room, the downstairs back room where it was the late-60s musical scene, Warholish, all the old superstars, self-made superstars. Which we fit in pretty well because we were self-made stars ourselves.
But yes, we had to look for places, and in fact that’s how we ran into the Mercer Arts Centre.
J: I wanted to get an idea what those places were like..
.
Syl: Well there were really – it was just..
. The reason why the Dolls got together was because of the boredom with the norm of the day, which was like the..
. the stadium rock era. The twenty minute drum solos.
Songs were a big operetta and they were sort of boring, they lost their sex appeal. We came out of that era where, Madison Square Garden, that’s where everyone went to shows. That, and rebelling to that, deciding to ‘Hey, man’ – like the Little Rascals – ‘Let’s put on our own show.
’ It’s a hell of a lot better than this crap, y’know? We found out there was a lot of other people that felt like that. That was your start of clubs and stuff.
We kind of kicked it off, trying to find any place, any venue to go out and perform in.
Syl: Well, it was really part of the Broadway Central Hotel, the entrance was on Broadway, they had this grand ballroom that got converted. They split it up into four or five theaters, if you will, plus a bar, and a video(?
) workshop – these were all brand new back then. They had the central location, this place called the Blue Room, where everyone gathered after shows, or before shows. We got started in the back room, which was called the Oscar Wilde Room, and were in there every Tuesday night.
We started with our show and then found everyone else [there] – drag queens and theater groups that were in town from wherever, since they heard their calling and came to New York, your typical artist or writer or poet that lived in the East Village. We became their band.
J: You guys played two shows every Tuesday night, and had a seventeen-week* residency, there?
(*from The New York Dolls: Too Much Too Soon, Nina Antonia, p.35)
Syl: We didn’t – no, I think that’s a little bit exaggerated. We had Tuesday nights, and I don’t know exactly how long – because the whole place, the whole Broadway Central Hotel .
.. They were renovating something, and they had a few beams that were down and the subway came unusually fast underneath Broadway and collapsed the whole fucking building.
The whole place came down. There was residents there, and they were found holding each other together and stuff. Horrible.
That was the end of that joint. I think that was around ’73.
J: And Max’s turned into a Burger King.
Syl: Max’s had a pretty uptight [building] owner that would get a lot of complaints through its heyday, and...
they sort of lost their lease. It closed down under the first [club] ownership, under and when he died, it basically closed. Tommy Dean opened it up later on.
And then when they lost their lease, the owners just took it over and didn’t want to have anything to do with music in that joint. Which is why I think there was a Burger King there.
J: The New York Dolls – is there anything left of their New York?
Syl: New York is always changing. If it didn’t change, we wouldn’t be in New York. We wouldn’t have a New York.
I don’t welcome – sometimes some changes are, y’know, yeah, we lose great “rock cathedrals,” if that’s what they call them today. Back then it was every goddamn pisshole we could find to play in.
Syl: Yes, exactly – although we waited a while.
We had made a lot of noise before we were the Next Band to Be Signed by everybody. We started to appear on the scene in ‘71 and it wasn’t until ’73 by the time – and that’s a long two years, in the music business – we actually made a record. But that’s really what happened.
J: As far as the rights and money were concerned, didn’t you guys get the short end of the stick?
Syl: We were always – unfortunately there’s something about the New York Dolls, we don’t quite sell records right away. To the industry, [the records] don’t make it.
But that’s because they see success in the first few months after a record comes out. If they don’t ship out x amount of units, as they like to say, then it’s not a hit. But in my case, I might never have received a gold record, a million dollar record or whatever.
But my record’s been selling, and in the bins – all over the world, if I could add that – for 35 years. It’s never came out of print. So I don’t know what other bands can really say that.
J: That’s a pretty amazing accomplishment.
Syl: I think somebody owes me a gold record, they just never gave it to me yet.
J: And the money.
..
Syl: They didn’t give me the money, either.
But I’ve got a lot of [musical] influence I can deposit in the bank.
J: You had a successful clothing business before you were even in the band.
Syl: Yeahyeahyeah, Truth Soul sweaters.
Me and Billy Murcia, our first drummer. We started off, because we were both immigrants. My family came from the Middle East, Cairo, Egypt.
Jewish immigrants thrown out of the Middle East in the 50s and immigrated to New York. And [the Murcias] immigrated from Colombia. I come from a long family line of coutures – before they called them “designers” and stuff.
My last name is Mizrahi...
J: Your cousin’s Isaac Mizrahi...
[Note: Never trust the .]
Syl: No, that’s not true! They always say that, just because we have the same last name.
I always say we’re related by trade and family name. When I first told my parents I wanted to become a musician, my mother basically said, “Come over here,” smacked me in the face, and said, “You’re going to learn how to cut shirts.”
Syl: The fashion sense is what I kind of brought around, I’d started to make the first stretch lamé pants that we had, copies of Marilyn Monroe gold lamé capris from the 50s, but I put the zippers and runs in the back and.
.. Me, Johnny Thunders, Billy Murcia and myself went to the same high school in [Elmhurst] Queens, Newtown High School.
.. and we kind of all teamed up over there.
In the New York Dolls everybody kind of brought whatever you had to the stage. Because really it’s stupid not to. Johnny had a great fashion sense.
David, too. And Arthur, he wore that terrific tutu. Everybody brought something from either thrift shops or your mom’s closet or whatever the hell you thought.
.. because at first [the band was] only supposed to last a couple weeks.
So we brought everything we fucking knew and did it. I swear to God it is like the Little Rascals.
J: Did you guys feel you were stuck in dresses longer than you wanted to be?
Syl: Not so much dresses, we never really did the dress thing. We took everything that influenced us that we dug and, instead of art being hung up in a gallery, but we wore it. We were walking, talking art shows.
Not so much on purpose to shock. That was just one of the fragments that happened with our spraying the public with our radiation, if you will.
J: It was just who you were.
Syl: Exactly. The way I saw it, it was like a skyscraper soup, a big mélange of everything that we saw from the ‘60s, the ‘50s, the blues era, from the jazz era, from the cabaret era, from the war-in-Vietnam era..
. from the boredom and stuff we had from looking at shows. The music industry became more like an industry.
It wasn’t no more like a bunch of kids in a garage or in a basement, fucking bored to hell and deciding, “Hey man, how the hell are we gonna get fucking chicks?” Y’know? “Let’s put on a show.
” And how the hell are we going to tell them that we’re sick and tired of what’s going on?
J: There’s a thirty-year gap between the Dolls’ break-up and reunion. You guys played together in various projects here and there.
.. but where were you for that stretch?
Syl: I was still in the music business, I was still knocking on doors, I was still making my own [music] even if I didn’t have record deals – which I did, I had a couple of RCA albums in the early 80s.
Syl: Right, I had the Criminals in the late 70s..
. and the Teardrops, which featured Rosie Rex, my first – we were married and had a child together who’s still with me, and we did a couple RCA (records) which were much more successful overseas than here. But I still toured in the States.
And when I didn’t have record deals, I would still be the animal that I am. I would still have to write songs. I considered that each time I wrote a song, it was another thread in my curtain.
I accumulated a pretty damn big curtain. When it came down to making this new album I was quite hungry.
J: You did a stint as a cab driver, in there.
..
Syl: Oh yeah, I did everything.
I actually even did surveillance, once. I was hired by this insurance company. I didn’t know anything about criminology or anything.
I was supposed to stand on some corner and take pictures of such and such people because they were cheating on their wives or whatever. It was like crazy. I did everything.
I even went back into the clothing business that I dropped out of years and years ago. I started a cap company, making hats.
J: You’re still doing that, no?
Syl: And I still do that, yes. I went into a leather moment there in the ‘90s, but the caps that I wear on stage now..
. It’s no longer Truth Soul, but it’s still Truth Soul in a way. I use my last name, Sylvain Sylvain Mizrahi, when I do clothing.
Syl: Actually I live in Georgia, because I married a Georgia Peach – a real sweet Georgia Peach if I might add – and I’ve been there with my son since the Olympics in Atlanta in ’96. I’ve met Morrissey because he comes to see my shows when I go on the road, he came to see me a few times in California..
.
J: You guys had had other offers to reunite from other people..
.
Syl: Yeah, well, I put out this record called Sweet Baby Doll in the mid-‘90s with this band that I had, and kind of ran into..
. Arthur again and I would jam with him on stage and stuff. Me and David had some communications through our writing the songs.
On his first album, I wrote “Funky but Chic” [among others]...
We had quite a career ourselves, me and David, just in songwriting.
J: You guys worked on each others’ [post-Dolls] albums.
Syl: Exactly.
We did that all through our careers, actually...
Myself, I had a pretty diplomatic thing there with all the guys. I worked with all of them. I went on the road with Johnny Thunders and we wrote songs in the ‘80s.
J: So you were the diplomat who...
Syl: I always had a deep friendship with all of them.
J: So why in 2004 could you guys all get together, or the three of you..
.
Syl: I think really the only person – and we were supposed to get together a few times..
. Well, everybody except David would get together. And Johnny was a sick boy, too.
And there was a lot of times where – certain periods where...
nobody picked up the phone...
because we were actually successful individually, apart. Unlike other bands. Other bands, maybe their fortunes were not like that.
But in our fortunes, we were equally successful – if not as successful – as we were in the Dolls. If we can get back to them telling us we never sold records, well, we were always working. Especially in David’s case.
He had his , his blues career [ ] – fantastic, by the way. And Johnny Thunders was like the second hardest working man in show business, I like to call him. He worked every mad club in the world.
Twice over, probably.
J: Some people hear , and only think about Tom Petty..
.
Syl: The Heartbreakers were so influential, it’s amazing. Every time I see Walter (Lure, the other Heartbreakers guitarist) I say , “Hey man, you should put back those Heartbreakers again.
”
J: After the reunion, when was it apparent it wasn’t a one-shot deal?
Syl: Well, y’know what happened was, I think..
. It was a one-shot deal for David. It wasn’t so much a one-shot deal for me and Arthur.
We thought, “This is the best thing ever.” We could still be doing our careers on the side, or whatever we want to do, because it doesn’t take all that much time..
. but you could still go out and get gigs at night with everything else and be doing this incredible thing. I think once [David] got up on stage, it took the first couple songs, the first night – we played two nights at Meltdown because the first sold out so fast – I think the magic that the New York Dolls always had not only hit the audience, but also – well, it definitely hit me too, but I think it really made sense to David.
After Meltdown, after all the press, and the love, and the people that came down, it was a beautiful thing. And the phones, to be honest with you, haven’t stopped ringing since that moment. We just kept it going.
What happened was, of course, after that we lost Arthur and it was like right back to zero again.
J: So without Billy and Johnny and Jerry – and now without Arthur – how do you decide it’s still the New York Dolls?
Syl: Well you know what, somebody else was asking me the other day, “If David and yourself died, would you want the new guys to keep it going?
” And I said yes. ‘Cause the New York Dolls is no longer just my band or something I created. It’s now the people’s band, if you will.
It’s their baby. After we lost Arthur, I was e-mailing friends and got one back from Morrissey. He said, “Yes, you should go on and keep it going, because not only would Arthur would want you to tell the world about the New York Dolls, but you need to tell the world about the New York Dolls.
” That’s the way I see it now, and I think that’s a beautiful thing.
J: So where did the rest of the cast come from? When people look up, they see you, and they see David, and say, “Who are these other guys?
”
Syl: Well, at first David put them together. [Guitarist] Steve Conte and [drummer] Brian Delancey – Delaney is actually his real name, but we call him “Fancy Pants Delancey” – but they really – especially in Conte’s case because he had the hardest shoes to fill and he’s done such an incredible job. I can’t see this band without Steve Conte.
What an incredible guitar player, first of all...
but he’s added on. He’s got three songs on this new album.
J: David’s credited with all the lyrics, and you’re credited with the bulk of the music, but there are some.
..
Syl: “Punishing World,” “Gotta Get Away From Tommy,” and “Rainbow Store” – those are all Steve Conte songs.
The one that kicks off the whole album is a Sammi Yaffa song. After we lost Arthur Kane, he was my addition. Sammi Yaffa used to be with , and I can’t imagine another New York Doll as bass player, after having lost Arthur, than Sammi Yaffa.
J: The new songs started...
?
Syl: It started being bored during sound checks. We were sitting there going “Hey, this is so fucking boring.
” Just like the old days.
J: Boredom’s your driving force.
Syl: Exactly.
You just start kicking off a couple chords, and “David, man, pick up the harmonica,” and “What do you think of these lyrics?” Y’know a lot of times it says on the album that David did all the lyrics, but in actuality I did some of the hook lines. “ ,” that’s my line.
J: I love that. There’s something about the Dolls – you don’t expect them to be so smart. The title of your album’s from , you mention and .
.. and then you tell us to dance like a monkey.
It’s like the message is, “Be smart, but get stupid.”
Syl: Well, you see, the stupid parts is me. They’re the ones I threw in there, like in “Running Around,” and “Seventeen” and.
.. “Beautiful Music?
” That’s how I did (that line) when I first did my demo [“Plenty of Music”] for David. He turned it into “superfluous beauty.” Sometimes I come up with the real cool hook line, and he goes to town on the verses.
In the case of “Dance Like a Monkey,” where I live now, there’s a big argument – it’s not so much an argument down in the South – all you need is your parent’s signature and you don’t have to take Science, you can go to Bible class. It’s an uptight scene where religion has taken over the educational system in the country, and I’m highly against that. It somewhat touches the evolution part of it.
..
J: But in a lighthearted way.
..
Syl: We love a lot of intellect in our music.
But it’s also done in a type of way that it’s still music. It has to be – we’re still singing. It can’t be just all Webster’s Dictionary.
J: But there are a lot of laughs, too.
Syl: Oh, yeah. It’s gotta be humorous, man, it’s gotta be humorous.
J: Listening to today’s music, do you get the feeling people take it too seriously?
Syl: Oh God yeah. I told David, I said, “Shit, if we did anything wrong on this record it’s that we made a Rock and Roll record.
” And who the hell makes Rock and Roll records, anyway? My kind of Rock and Roll was funny, it was sexy, it was daring, it was political, yes, when it needed to be. Call me stupid, but I still think one day Rock and Roll will save the world.
Syl: I really listen to a lot of old stuff, a lot of old jazz.
.. I like Pete Doherty’s stuff because he’s really a real writer.
I like real writers. The reason I compared him [to Thunders] was, really, the audience and the industry they want him to kill himself. I mean, they’re gonna kill this kid, and the minute he dies they’ve got someone else they’re interested in.
.. It’s a Rock and Roll slaughterhouse.
They’ve got the next guy waiting in the wings.
J: What does the new Dolls record have to offer rock and roll? Why should people buy a record from a group that’s been gone for 30 years?
Syl: Well, you asked the guy who made the record. To me, she’s my baby. I think it’s a dynamite record and there’s nothing to compare it to, out there.
I don’t know...
It’s been described – which I can’t believe happened, being held up to such royalty in music – it’s been described, “This is the record the Rolling Stones wish they made.” Which I can’t believe. I’m glad somebody else said that, not me.
But if those words were even murmured, I’m just so damned proud of the comparison. [Note: I couldn’t find the review Syl’s talking about online, but the Dolls’ label has ; for balance, .
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