The spectacular new Les Savy Fav album was sadly leaked way ahead of its scheduled release date on September 14th. To make up to those good true types who want to support the band and don’t want to download it the NYC indie rock kings have released it digitally on iTunes a month early.
The album is out now. Get it. It’s rad.
What happens when you cross Croydon with a love for punk and rap? Apparently you get lele[SPEAKS]. Not content with making all sorts of crazy videos and dropping tons of music, she also has a hand in some of the best t-shirts around. We caught up with her to discuss upcoming projects, nightmares and just what happens to a Lost fan when their favourite show ends.
Interview: Abjekt
Photography: Dom Marley
I read that you were a big fan of punk music when you were younger, what sort of bands did you listen to most?
I still listen now, my favorite band in the whole world are The Descendents for me they are so ahead of the rest nothing can touch them.
And you played the guitar too? Did you ever make any punk music yourself, or get a band together to do that?
I played the tiniest bit, I was so into writing poetry and songs I never bothered learning more than 6 chords. I’m very impatient so as soon as I found a friend who played better than me I got her to play so I could focus on writing and vocals. That was as close as I got to creating a band.
But talking of bands I am working in more of a band structure at the moment, I’ve started working with a group of musicians on tracks and it’s so different from working with a producer. Everyone is adding to each song it’s so much fun. I’ve been working with Daniel P Carter (an amazing song writer and member of the band A), the banging guitarists Lags and Steph from Gallows and the sick drummer Gareth Grover from Haunts. These tracks are sounding amazing, I can’t wait for people to hear them!
What made you start making more hip hop style music? Did you just gradually switch or was there one album or track that made you think “Damn, I need to be doing this too”?
When I was 17 I started writing raps. To be honest I became a lot more open minded about a lot of things at this age, it was a real turning point. It wasn’t a particular person or song, it was more to do with me struggling to get everything I wanted to say out in one song. When you’re singing there just ain’t room for too many words! So I started rapping, though at the time I saw it more as speaking that’s when I came up with the name lele[SPEAKS]. I’ve been rapping almost 5 years but I’ve been writing songs for longer, I recorded my first song at 10. I know lyrically I’m killing it on my verses but I don’t battle, I respect it a lot, that stuff takes balls and skills but I am not just a rapper I’m a song writer.
A quick look on YouTube shows that you’ve got a number of videos up for tracks that all seem to be a bit on the weird side – you’ve got Uhh Ohh which is like something from The Shining and Volcano which is Barbie in a homemade volcano – are these ideas you think of yourself and film? Or do you have mates who like to chip in?
Weird side? Really? I thought that was completely normal! The brains behind the ideas is my sister Kelly (from The Sick Kids) and me. Sometimes we try to create the visual we get from the music and sometimes it has nothing to do with it we just go with a theme. Uhh Ohh and Horror are pretty strange and scary that’s our favorite kinda imagery. Volcano takes from a lot of things but mainly the stuff with us in the lab coats with the old film effect is based on the old Dharma tapes in Lost. Not Sober and Back to Bed are more random. Over all my videos are about dark comedy, that’s our style in a nutshell.
Do you think that maybe your Barbie in the volcano was a voodoo doll that caused all the ash earlier this year? Are YOU to blame for all those planes that were grounded?!
Yes.
Do you have any new releases planned for this year? Bang us all the details!
I’m working on my album with these guys at the moment, I’m so stoked on how sick it’s sounding. I’m not sure when any of this new stuff will be released but when all the tracks are done, you’ll know about it! I have a mixtape coming soon for free download, it’s a duet mixtape with fellow Croydon rapper Micky Worthless. We are recording it now, so it should be released by later this year via our sites. I’ve been meaning to do some more free tracks, so I’m so happy to be working on this mixtape. It’s going to be hammer time!
You also put out the Sick Kids clothing stuff with your sister which ranges from t-shirts to denim jackets to accessories. What made you want to get started with that kind of thing?
Well Kelly is very talented, she was born for this and like the way she helps me with ideas, I help her. We are a great creative team, we have similar tastes and being sisters well you can’t beat that. We love street fashion and just fell into it naturally, I guess from living in London and being a part of the music scene. For us, this is it, we’re living the dream dude! Even though we still live at home in a council house we are doing what we love.
Do you and your sister do all the designs yourself?
Kelly draws everything by hand, you should see her doodles! She loves painting portraits aswell, she just gave me one of 50 Cent! check them out on our blog!
Are you the people behind the now infamous “Wasteman” t-shirts, which appeared all over the place a couple of years ago (Toddla T loves it innit)? Did you think it was going to go as far and wide as it did?
Hell yes that is a Sick Kids Tee, in fact it’s one of our top sellers still today. We recently saw Kele from Bloc Party wearing it at one of his gigs (check it out here). We knew it was a good t-shirt because people reacted to it so well. I love my Wasteman tee!
I had a quick look over your twitter and saw a couple thing I wanted to pick up on. You said that you wish people didn’t make music videos with them singing to their reflection in the mirror – why does that creep you out? Any personal experience thing? Maybe a nightmare as a kid that it would jump out and strangle out?
No man. My kiddie nightmares those involved bears eating my Dad and ET coming to get me. People singing at themselves in the mirror is one of those embarrassing things nobody should see right?! So it creeps me out and makes me cringe when people put it in their music videos.
Big question now, how are you gonna cope now Lost is done?
I was such a huge fan and now it’s gone I feel so lost. Nothing compares to Lost, everything else that’s on is so easy to predict but with lost there is so much going on, so many characters, I’m always surprised. I spent hours trying to figure stuff out, watching reviews and recap videos online. It’s been so fun and it sounds mega cheesy but I don’t care, I loved this show!
I also see that you’re pissed Dr Dre signed The Game back to his label. How come you’re not a fan of Game?
He was OK when 50 was writing his hooks but after that his sound just changed into whoever he was working with. I’m not a fan.
And finally, I see you mentioned on your blog that you’re a big Mario fan. Who are the best Mario characters and why?
I like Toad the best especially for Mario cart because his really fast, but Mario has got to be the best overall on all games. I must mention that the new Mario Bros for Wii game is insane, it’s so sick!
Make sure you check out everything Lele and Sick Kids related on Twitter, YouTube, their Blog and their Shop.
Australia’s Violent Soho have experienced several things over the past couple of years that many a fledgling rock band can only dream of. They were signed by Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore to his own record label Ecstatic Peace!, they played a private show for Rick Rubin at his house and they got to record an album with the legendary production powerforce that is Gil Norton. Add to that the tours and festivals that they’ve been playing across the world and you’ve got a pretty exciting and turbulent lifestyle which the band could never have predicted, growing up in the bible belt area of Mansfield. We decided to give vocalist/guitarist Luke Boerdam the Crossfire treatment and find out what it’s been like for the band and what makes them tick. Oh, and some of them skate too. Bonus!
Do you know how Thurston Moore got his hands on your music? Was it a totally random thing?
Thurston Moore is like some weird omnipresent music guru. When we first met him I asked him if he knew a band from Brisbane Australia called Budd. Not many people in Brisbane know who that band is and he just turns to me and says “Yeah I know them. I put a double 10″ of theirs out in the 90s. I have a bunch of them under my bed.” So who knows how that guy finds music. We are just grateful he found us.
How did it feel working with Gil Norton? What are your favourite records that he’s been involved with in the past and why? How did he influence your music in the studio?
At first, I was scared shitless. I think we all were. But Gil is such a great guy and he made us feel so comfortable in the studio. But I mean you can’t help but be nervous when you’re playing in front of a dude who recorded the Pixies’ Doo little, Trompe le monde, Bossanova, The Foo Fighters’ The Color and the Shape… I mean, the list goes on.
How did Gil and Thurston react to your music? What do you think it is that drew them to working with you?
I remember we got a phone call and it was Gil Norton saying that he loved our music and said he would love to do our record. After it was all done and mixed he said he was real proud of the record, which meant the world to us. The first time I ever saw Thurston was at a venue in New York. He walked in while we were playing, stood right in front of James and started headbanging.
How much is the record (especially songs like ‘Jesus Stole My Girlfriend’) a reaction to the way you were brought up?
Very much. All the songs revolve, in some way, around the idea of loneliness, the mundane and boredom of suburbia. Mansfield is a bible belt area, we grew up with a lot of pentecostal christian influence. Jesus Stole My Girlfriend isn’t just a story about what happened to me. It also embodies a reaction against going with the normal.
What does your hometown mean to you and how does it feel being away from home for long periods of time whilst on tour / recording etc?
Our hometown is what made us the people we are and gave us the frustration we needed to make the music we do. So our hometown is everything to us. Being away from home for long periods sucks, but it also helps you keep going because in the back of your mind it reminds us why we do this. For the love of the 4122.
What’s your favourite thing about being on the road?
Meeting random people is always fun but my favorite thing is all the crazy junk food and weird bars.
Where is the most amazing place you’ve visited so far?
We camped out at Joshua Tree and went up to the mountains and looked out over the ranges but I think Santa Rosa in LA is the most amazing place. Anywhere where you get given over a half of the best bud ever is pretty amazing.
When you go on tour, do you take your board with you? What cool places have you come across to skate?
Yeah Shut Skateboards in NYC gave James a board so he always takes that with him. Hollywood is a pretty rad place to skate. Heaps of good spots.
Who’s your favourite skater?
James always goes on about Jay Adams and every story I get told makes me love the dude.
Does skateboarding influence your music in any way?
Sure, I mean everyone has a record that they put on and it makes them want to go for a skate, like the first Face to Face record ‘Don’t Turn Away’. It’s a vibe I guess, growing up those are the records that stay with you forever and we’d love to think that someone out there is skating to our record.
What’s your ultimate goal as a band?
Stay friends, make the best music we can and play as many shows as possible.
What do you think is your biggest achievement to date?
We lived in a small 4 bedroom, 1 bathroom apartment with 10 people (more at times) for 10 months and are all still great friends so I think surviving that is our greatest achievement.
How has the UK treated you on your visits here so far? Have you got any plans to return soon?
Awesome. We love the UK. Great beer, great people, great music. We hope to be there as soon as we can hopefully before the year is out.
What does the near future hold for Violent Soho?
We are going back home to Australia to do a small tour then we get to play in Chicago at Lollapolooza and then go on tour with Mondo Generator which we are pumped for always been a big fan of Nick Oliveri.
Current UK MC D Double E has become quite a sensation since emerging from the London grime scene and establishing himself as an absolutely bananas MC with the Swerve-produced Street Fighter Riddim.
The track in question has cemented itself in the regular playlist at the office (read: just Abjekt’s computer but we love it) so we were overjoyed to see this banger finally get a video. It’s somehow even more fun than the actual track, so get on it… Hadouken!
Kanye West made a surprise visit to Rolling Stone to talk about himself, spit some impromptu spoken word, talk about himself, get a little sweaty, talk about himself, take off his jacket, talk about himself, refuse to take off his sunglasses and erm… talk about himself like only he could. And oh boy, does he.
Ratatat are continuing their trend of insanely odd music videos for tracks off this year’s incredible LP4.
Drugs is an instant Ratatat banger, slick and sleazy guitar slides, euphoric keys and vast landscapes of beats, and the video for it is just as immediately unnerving as the video for Party With Children. Arguably it’s just a bunch of people standing and smiling at a camera. But it’s not that simple at all. See for yourself…
The staff here at Crossfire have once again dived ears first into the deep waves of the web and surfed back to our shore with fresh mp3s to shove in your jukebox. So fill that glass up with ice, kick back and have a good weekend with some free music on us.
This week innerpartysystem bring the prolific beats with not just one but two remixes in our selection, Huoratron gets stuck in too in a poundingly noisy fashion. If this all gets too much then Norwegian electronic crafters Royksopp offer up a chilled jam that should ease that come down while Zola Jesus gently warm you back to real life with their hauntingly wonderful ‘Sea Talk‘.
Grab ’em while the Crossfire Soundcloud is heavy… when it rains it pours.
AWOLNATION – Burn It Down (Inner Party System Remix) by Crossfire Music
Huoratron – gBay by Crossfire Music
Violent Soho – Jesus Stole My Girlfriend (Dillinger Escape Plan Remix) by Crossfire Music
Deerhunter – Revival by Crossfire Music
Zola Jesus – Sea Talk by Crossfire Music
Marnie Stern – For Ash by Crossfire Music
Black Mountain – Hair Song by Crossfire Music
Röyksopp – Hus Nr. 9 by Crossfire Music
Katy and Snoop – California Gurls (Inner Party System Remix) by Crossfire Music
Interview: Sleekly Lion
Having made a name for themselves penning singles for the likes of Banquet and Big Scary Monsters, last year Tubelord finally got down to releasing their debut album Our American Friends. Eight months down the line and a series of line-up changes, the band are back with a new bassist and an added percussionist, preparing for the release of a brand new EP.
The intriguingly titled Tezcatlipōca represents a new era for the band, and is said to mark the beginning of a different sounding Tubelord. We caught up with Joseph Prendergast to get the low down on their new sound, preconceptions of time travel and their progress on a second full length record.
Tubelord are back! What’s all this I’m hearing about a new sound?
A few months back at a house party everyone was clinging to the walls, dripping with the effects of what had been stuffed up their noses. In the exchange of sobriety for a general loss of common sense, one of the tenants gave me a keyboard which I took home and wrote some ‘new’ songs with. A couple days later I found a capo under my bed in the shed and added the guitar parts in…new sound is born.
You’ve also been through some line-up changes, what were the reasons behind this?
I dunno man, maybe it’s best not to discuss the reasons and ins and outs on what could be read by anyone you know? Some of the reasoning involves the James Elliot-Field remix of a certain Colour song, that really quick blue hedgehog and sparkly red cardigans.
How do you feel about your debut album “Our First American Friends”, now that the dust has settled and you’ve had time to reflect?
What with all the line-up alterations the amount of time between recording and being released, it’s quite difficult to talk about you know? The recording was complete in the first week of January ’09, the release being set for October 12th, by this time all the songs had altered quite a fair amount, what with the addition of a different bass with an entirely different sound to Sean’s. Maybe I’m side-tracking slightly erm… I feel that we could have built upon the little bits of fun that lacked a musical reference point..bum slaps, secret conversation recordings, book pages flipping, a can of Stella Artois being cranked open and sipped on…all those bits…
The new EP is called Tezcatlipōca, could you tell us a bit about the title and the main themes behind the record?
The main themes involve building upon our preconceptions of time travel and how we understand this concept with a disregard to space as a physical thing, you know? I’ve drawn up a comic depicting the story you can hear through the lyrics to make it a little bit clearer, but it’s set in the Bear Gami universe for sure…more on that next year.
Tubelord has always had unique packaging and artwork ideas – have you got anything special lined up for Tezcatlipōca?
Ahhh I’m pleased you’ve picked up on the packaging…A lot of time is spent trying to ensure any tangible evidence of Tubelord is as unique as the individuals cognitive sense alongside the music. However…I’d rather not type about the Tezcatlipoca packaging right now…I have no idea what may or may not be physical by August 16th. This fella has definitely helped though…
Were there any bands, books or films that you were into during the writing process that might have inspired the content of the new EP?
Sure…The initial idea derived from the Apollo I tragedy, where in a test to determine whether the craft Saturn IB could operate nominally on internal power, the three astronauts Edward White, Virgil Grissom and Roger Chaffee perished in a fire. Taking on board the image of three bodies and their context of space, it got me thinking about using this idea of the subconscious adjective and questioning who exactly puts us through acts and tests to extract the sense behind our contextual use of words? You know…how you’ll say giraffe to one person and they may think of the animal, whilst another might think of a friend due to the nickname ‘giraffe’…err… the invisible matter that is space and how we are capable of travelling through these unseen entities in memories. At the time I was reading a lot about mesoamerica, their use of colour is incredibly inspiring. Other than that…..Evil Dead IV.
Are there any bands you want to big up to Crossfire readers?
So so so many…Koppen, Charles Hamilton, Olympians, Duke Ellington, Medications, Shoes and Socks Off, So Many Dynamos, Dead Red Sun, Slingshot Dakota, Aimee B, Django Reinhardt
With a busy touring schedule ahead of you, Can we expect anything new from your live show?
We’ll only be seen wearing black and carefully place a large naught-shaped light in front of our drum kit.
Beyond touring and promoting the new EP, is there a second full length album in the pipeline?
As it stands there are 9 and a half complete songs, not too many to go before we record..The recording is currently being planned for November.
Any last words?
Other than an intense thank you for even being interested in what we’ve got to say, we’ll leave by communicating what has to be said through the form of video…
Tezcatlipōca will be released on August 16th through Hassle Records. The band will also be curating their own EP launch party on August 7th at Notting Hill Art’s Club. The event starts from 4PM and will include live performances from Aimee B, Dead Red Sun and of course Tubelord themselves. See you there…
Lazers Never Die
Mad Decent
www.majorlazer.com
It’s somehow fitting that Diplo and Switch should release an EP now, just as M.I.A.’s highly anticipated third album falls hard on its face. After the huge (and largely tedious) press campaign surrounding the ultimately bloated (and even more tediously titled) ///Y/, Major Lazer have managed to cobble together an EP that is fresh and exhilarating. Although there are only two new songs here, additional remixes from Buraka Som Sistema, K.L.A.M and Radiohead’s Thom Yorke make for a surprisingly cohesive five song package.
It’s in fact M.I.A. who sets Lazers Never Die into motion with ‘Sound Of Siren’, serving as a timely reminder of the chemistry she shares with Diplo. The classic ingredients are all there; a big chorus hook and military drum beat form the song’s structure, while Busy Signal goes in hard over the verses. There’s nothing overly complicated about Diplo and Switch’s production, they simply know what sounds good and execute it perfectly time and time again. ‘Good Enuff’, too, is little more than a simple reggae progression, but vocal contributions from Collie Buddz and Lindi Ortega add instant and memorable melodies.
Switching attention to the remixes, tracks from 2009’s Guns Don’t Kill People – Lazers Do are reworked and given new dimensions. Buraka Som Sistema’s take on ‘Bruk Out’ is extended into a six minute house jam, yet it somehow manages to keep the original’s authentic flavour. While K.L.A.M.’s ‘Can’t Stop Now’ remix is perhaps the only dud of the bunch, the ‘heavyweight’ contribution from Thom Yorke really delivers. Yorke’s spin on ‘Jump Up’ keeps the vocals firmly in the foreground, yet adds layers of tense electronics that put the song into a new context. While it’s typical of Yorke’s past solo adventures, his remix emphasizes the best qualities of the original.
It would be easy for Diplo and Switch to lay back and rest on their past successes, yet Lazers Never Die is another record that both individuals can be proud of. Major Lazer don’t get bogged down in big concepts and ideas, they simply make tracks that BANG.
Sleekly Lion
Words: Stanley
Hey! Do you remember a time when MTV played music videos? I’ll forgive you if you don’t because after adapting my brain to this ridiculous contraption we call the internet I too am shafted if I’m to recall or even comprehend how anything ever got done before it. Today, Crossfire Chronicles takes you on a time machine to a time when people actually paid attention to things so gather round kids because this is a true story.
Once upon a time a channel called MTV existed solely to make music more interesting. Every so often they got this right and songs that were previously unlistenable became awesome because we could see things like Peter Gabriel getting assaulted by a fruit salad before being replaced by two frozen chickens who know how to get down. Yet despite its enormous potential, MTV had one significant problem in that it frequently banned anything remotely interesting because pissy parents were always on the blower complaining instead of raising their kids to appreciate a good music video instead of well… doing this. Eventually this got out of control and MTV decided to stop playing music videos altogether and replace them with more family-friendly television series such as Jersey Shore, 16 And Pregant and Tila Fucking Tequila.
So for your enjoyment we have harnessed the power of the censorship-dodging internet to show you our picks for the five gnarliest music videos we can find. Most of these are massively unsafe for watching during work but if you didn’t figure that out already then maybe MTV banned these for good reason. Enjoy.
NINE INCH NAILS – HAPPINESS IN SLAVERY (1992)
When Trent Raznor started to unscrew the artistic shackles placed on him by TVT Records, the methods in which he started playing with his new found freedom can be compared to the way a cat would play with a mouse, providing the cat was wearing a gimp mask and going at the mouse with razorblades and hammers. The video for ‘Happiness In Slavery’ was unsurprisingly banned basically everywhere on the planet for that very reason. Directed by Jon Reiss, we are presented with performance artist and part-time cystic fibrosis ignorer Bob Flanagan tortured by machines in stark black and white. We’re going in at the deep end here. Boys, hold on to your bollocks.
THE PRODIGY – SMACK MY BITCH UP (1997)
The videoclip that accompanies this excellent song that pissed off a whole host of people before it even had a music video accomplished three incredible things. Firstly, it managed to piss off even more people than the unambiguously titled song did in the first place. Secondly, its controversial status helped the single chart in more or less every country that had banned the video from being shown. Thirdly, it led to M. Night Shyamalan spending his entire career trying (and failing) to recreate that moment when the camera looks in the mirror and everyone watching clocks that the person we’ve just watched smacking bitches up in the video is actually a bitch too. Directed by Jonas Åkerlund, this video had the plot twist nailed.
APHEX TWIN – COME TO DADDY (1997)
Picking what Chris Cunningham video we wanted in here was a painful process. Not only did we have to decide what one of Chris’ consistently gnarly and even more consistently brilliant videos was to go in this article, but we actually had to sit and watch them all and now I’m physically unable to close my eyes. Though I was tempted to go with Windowlicker for its perpetually relevant poke at mainstream musician’s ego-centric methods of presentation, or Rubber Johnny’s celebration of distorted bodies and mindfuck editing, it became swiftly apparent that the obvious choice was the best choice. I mean, is there anything gnarlier or creepier than a bunch of Richard D. James clones running around the set of Clockwork Orange shouting at grannies? Answers on a postcard addressed to someone other than me thanks.
JUSTICE – STRESS (2008)
Romain Gavras’ most recent short film (that doubled as the music video M.I.A’s ‘Born Free’) managed to get banned from Youtube in the US. We’ve all been on Youtube before and we therefore know that this is more or less impossible. For example, this little shit has yet to be banned and I would like to know who at Youtube isn’t reading my letters of complaint. The problem with putting that on this list instead of his at-once alarming, exciting and gnarly video for Justice’s ‘Stress’, is that it had somewhat of a more obvious political point. The video for ‘Stress’ on the other hand basically showed a bunch of kids running riot La Haine style (sans-any-political-agenda-what-so-ever) and fucking shit up. That’s it. It’s great.
HUORATRON – CORPORATE OCCULT (2010)
The video for ‘Corporate Occult’, a song (by some loose definition) by Finland’s electronic brick shithouse Huoratron, is as gnarly as the reportedly haunted forest of facial hair that’s rooted on the man’s face. Directed by Cédric Blaisbois, the video unashamedly borrows techniques from Chris Cunningham, Oren Peli and Alien’s ‘Chestburster’ scene to completely re-imagine the abbreviation ‘NSFW’. The video has been billed as blatant hardcore pornography and the music has been labelled as both intense and brutally painful. It’s most definitely gnarly and unquestionably not fucking safe for work. Or home. Or anywhere else.
Sleep tight…