Due to an accident of the right-place, right-time variety, I find myself on the phone to New York City talking to two thirds of indie darlings the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. OK, I know what you’re thinking. Flavour of the month. The Blah Blah Blahs...Well no, actually. Like Imac-wielding alkies who’ve just realised they can piss Frosty Jack the rock hack masses have experienced a happy accident. They got it right for once.
Sure, the Yeahs are jammy bastards but they also released my favourite EP of last year.
So I ask them "most decent bands are criminally ignored. Why all the fuss about you?"
“You tell us” answers Brian irritably, clearly mistaking me for the establishment.
“Seriously”, I ask, “You’ve got one EP out, The Face give you their front cover and Careless Talk give you four (four!) live reviews in one issue!”. This cracks them up. Brian goes on to say that even compared with their rapid rise to prominence in major U.S cities, the reaction here in Britain has been nothing short of “a phenomenon”.
Brian’s the drummer and does most of the talking. Singer Karen is softly-spoken, polite, even a little shy, which will come as a surprise to anyone who, like me, heard the records and assumed she was a gobshite. They met in Ohio, where Brian had played in several bands and Karen had done “a few solo things”, before relocating to New York and hooking up with guitarist Nick Zinner, who has the enviable ability to sound like two guitarists and a bass player at the same time.
“I heard your first gig was a support slot for The White Stripes”. This sounds a bit cosy to me. My band’s first gig was supporting a raffle in a pub full of pissed surfers.
“How the hell did that happen?”, I ask. Karen explains that a well-connected drinking buddy of theirs sorted it out. They’ve since appointed him their tour manager. Well you would, wouldn’t you?
For the uninitiated, The Yeahs specialise in sassy New Wave pop songs populated by bored lovers, bedsit dreamers and art school wankers. Some of their songs are irresistably danceable. Their new single “Machine” is the best song about sharing a vibrator you’ll hear all year. It sounds a bit like PJ Harvey gone disco-metal.
“Is making people dance important to you?” There’s no hesitation here. “Yeah, definitely”, they answer together, excitedly. “That’s a definite goal”. Karen adds that it can be difficult to get audiences to move sometimes; the curse of the too-cool indie crowd, no doubt. However, NYC art-rock isn’t necessarily famed for its ass-shaking potential. Who are your heroes? “Oh, The Velvet Underground, New York Dolls” So far, so predictable. “Mars, ESG...” That’s more like it! Beneath the noise, the posturing, the play-acting, there’s a hint of something funky at work.
I read somewhere that the band been working with drum machines on the new album. Have The Yeahs gone hip-hop then, like Blondie? Apparently not. The drum machine was used more for “fucked up keyboard sounds” than for beats, but the forthcoming album remains a mash up of styles: raucous brat-punk, wide-eyed romanticism, dirty disco; “the complete range of emotions” Brian assures me. The band see “Machine” as a bridge between the EP and the album, though to see which way that’s taken them we’ll have to wait till the album comes out in April.
Karen O purrs and screams with equal confidence, her distinctive voice as confident with the soul-crushing put down (“As a fuck, son, you suck!”) as it is with a breathless anthem like “Our Time”. She’s equally well known for her outlandish dress sense, her cockiness, her attitude. This must piss off as many people as it delights, surely. “You’re seen as a confrontational performer. Do you ever get any bad abuse from the audience?” I ask. “Not really”, she says, “Most of the abuse is good...just people having a good time”. Brian insists that Karen is “not so much a confrontational performer as an undeniable presence”. Going by the attention her performances have amassed so far, we’d be foolish to disagree.
The next two months see Yeah Yeah Yeahs return to the UK for their first headline tour, and they play Bristol on 1st March, their first date in the city since supporting Jon Spencer’s Blues Explosion last year. For those that missed that last outing (me included) this show provides an unmissable opportunity to see if the band can really live up to indications provided by an excellent EP, an intriguing single and a bucketful of hype. The spoiled bastards better not let us down.
No comments:
Post a Comment