Liars' new album is all flower power, and yes, it's music for extreme hippies!
From left to right: Aaron, Julian, Angus
So we're back to Liars for the third time! There isn't anything more exciting than waiting for something you never quite know what. Liars can give you just that! Boy, won't they do just about anything for SUPERSWEET? We stick Vaseline and flowers on their faces and ask if the new album was really inspired by Nirvana. And oh Thai folks, look out!
SS: So now you’ve relocated to LA? What’s the reason for this?
Angus Andrew (vocals, guitar): Julian (Gross, drums) and Aaron (Hemphill, guitar and vocals) are both originally from LA. That’s where we met individually as well, so LA has a bit of a residence for us historically. It’s a nice change from the other places that we’ve been living in the past. A lot of our friends live there, great music scene, it got beaches, great food.
Julian: You got snow, desert, Mexican food, Pollution, (smiles) and lots of crimes...
Angus: But it’s a great great city and it’ just another chapter in our progression.
SS: Does that affect the way you make music?
Angus: I think so, especially for Aaron, I think, because it’s kind of like going home and be able to reconnect with some of the memories from the early years in his life.
Aaron: (Laughs)
Angus: It’s also a rock town. I think we all feel like it should be more of a rock town than it is at the moment. It has a history of great rock bands and we’d only like to see that come back I think.
SS: Is that why this album sounds quite rocky?
Angus: Yeah, I think so. I think we were trying to get to that sort of roots you know - straight forward kind of rock directness.
SS: Have you planned to move somewhere else after this?
Angus: (Laughs) Well, you know the plan actually would be to go to Thailand I think, get really super sweet!
Aaron: We met a man while waiting at the airport, he noticed our equipment and we were really exhausted didn’t want to talk to anybody but he noticed the equipment (laughs) and he went on to tell us his history of playing in punk rock bands and how he gave it up and he moved to Thailand and he has a Thai wife and he speaks Thai and how there’s an amazing rock scene out there. And he was like, ‘Man... I just miss playing rock and I wish I could go on tour like you guys!’ And I was like, ‘Man! I wish I could move to Thailand like you!!’ (laughs).
SS: So that you could have Thai wives?
All: (Laughs)
Angus: That would be nice! But it’s different in area that we haven’t played stuff there really, we’ve done a lot of Europe and a lot of America so now it’s time to hit Asia.
SS: Are you serious?
Angus and Julian: Yeah!
Aaron: The future’s set that up for us in Thailand, serious!
Angus: The future for us, if we could dictate it, would be to spend more time there definitely!
SS: So the fourth album Liars, and you guys have a simpler approach on this than usually, but where did the idea spark? Was it something that started off with a certain thing?
Angus: Well, I think we’ve made a lot of records in the past that required a lot of explanations because we used things like concepts and different things like that, and I think for this record we wanted to make it a lot more direct and have the music speak for itself. There is not a concept but we were interested in making songs that sort of reminded us a bit of what it was like to be a teenager and working with that idea of gut reaction to music other than a cerebral one.
Julian: 'Cerebral'? (laughs)
SS: Some of the gigs you played for the last album, you covered Nirvana, was that the starting point?
All: (Laugh) Yeah yeah yeah...
Aaron: Yeah, it was the beginning of just looking at things a little differently.
Julian: And feeling comfortable enough to sort of do that sort of thing.
Aaron: Yeah, have more fun, where we work and create this is sometimes very serious still and has a very tight approach that's laboured upon but we just didn’t want that to come or have anything to do with it and it’s not important to let listeners know about that.
SS: Are you the kind of band that once you’ve finished the album and you quickly move on to the next thing or you slowly evolve?
Angus: It’s definitely the first one you said, especially for us because we tend to work on albums in a way that... You know like we were just concentrating on drums or just concentrating on witches so by the time you’ve gotten to the end of that you really feel like you’ve exhausted that idea so we’re always really excited to move on usually.
SS: So you’re on to the 5th album now?
Angus: Well, that’s what’s a little different about this one is that we did do it a little quicker, we were able to put it out a lot quicker, so everything is still kind of fresh for us. We don’t hate it... (long pause) …yet (laughs).
Aaron: Yeah, that’s really telling too. I think that’s exciting that we focus on feeling and songs.
SS: It’s really nice that you guys make music that doesn’t fit into any categories and you prove that you can make it!
All: (Laughs)
Aaron: We should have just moved over and started making something else (smiles)!
SS: Is there anything else that you do besides this?
Angus: Julian does a lot of artwork for some other bands.
Julian: A lot of graphic designs for the peeps (smiles).
Angus: He did the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ album cover.
SS: Do you still make clothes, Julian?
Julian: Not how I used to, I still get to design [the band's] shirts.
Angus: We’ve done a few other projects, musically though, we did a song for David Shrigley's album which is coming out soon. We also did one for Cartoon Network in America, it’s called...
Aaron: Adult Swim.
Julian: It’s really good. It’s like we’re Robot Chicken (smiles). Aaron plays in another project too.
Aaron: We did a song for Visionaire too, the November Sound Issue which is really exciting. They have a great taste, plus what they make, it’s so well packaged.
SS: It's so expensive though.
Aaron: It’s so expensive, but I mean it’s really... You know the one they did with Rei Kawakubo (Issue 20: 'Comme des Garcons'), each one was different piece of fabric, it’s really well thought-out and to be a part of that is really great.
Angus: There’s something coming out with...
Aaron: There’s a picture disc coming out and it’s a Japanese label called... I forget what it’s called (smiles). it’s a friend of ours, we’ve got a lot of projects, but mainly music.
SS: How do you view They Threw Us All in a Trench and Stuck a Monument on Top now in hindsight? There hasn't been many mentions of your first album, in interviews or your live sets.
Angus: That’s an album that we wrote a long time ago you know. It’s interesting to look at that album in terms of how we were mentally prepared for that. We kind of stepped into it very naively I suppose and it served a catalyst really for forthcoming record, the following record, we really wanted to put more thought into album as a whole, but it does share some affinity with this one in the sense that we didn’t spend a lot of time thinking about it.
Aaron: It’s the only record that I’ve ever done that we knew how to play the songs, as a band, first so it’s just recording the band playing. I think the one thing I think about that album is what a great job (producer/engineer) Steve Revitte did at recording it. We only, at the time it seemed like a lot but we only took us two days to do the actual recording it but Steve worked on it for a month, making it sound really good. I think he did a really amazing job.
SS: Is that something you would say is less Liars than the other three?
Angus: The first record? I don’t think so, I think it’s there for a reason. I think I’d be uncomfortable in a way if [They Were Wrong, So We Drowned] was our first record. I think it’s important that we did that one and I’m glad it’s there.
Aaron: It’s still how we make the songs today, I mean, it was me and Angus with the four-track and we did that album almost like a year and a half or two years before that record was released. Maybe it was the second year that we knew how to record songs and create songs, I think that it's really cool that it was documented. But I don’t listen to it (laughs).
Julian: As an outsider, because I don’t play on that record, I’ve always loved it, I think it’s a really important chapter in Liars' novel, it’s a four chapter book, that’s a very important beginning to, as they said it, an interesting process from then to now.
SS: You’ve always felt quite strongly about politics, being part of (the film) Loose Change was one of the examples. Is that something you’ve managed to include that in the new album or you’re not into things like that?
Angus: To get more involved? I think in the future there’s always that possibility, I think we never close any doors. For the moment though we still feel the same way as we always have. We all feel strongly personally about a lot of these things but feel less inclined to talk about them on the records. In a lot of ways maybe it’s the old argument for 'art as an escapism' rather than something reflecting back on society. I think at the moment it's something that we tend to avoid a bit. For example, that Loose Change thing was something that we all felt fairly strongly about and we were quite happy to lend our voice to and I don't see why there won't be other courses that we'd be willing to lend our voice to, too.
Julian: That’s the kind of soapbox idea of things too. Sometimes yelling at someone’s face isn’t the best way of trying to get your points across. Subtlety is always a little bit better in some ways too. The Drowned... record it’s not a political album, but you can definitely find...
Angus: I think it’s our most political album! (Laughs)
Julian: We reflected what was happening in that time which was witch hunts and witch trials and really unethical ways of doing things.
Aaron: Yeah, it’s you're in hell if you created a judgment system which is no right way but you know everything Angus said is right, so enough said (smiles).
SS: Do you feel like you’ve topped all your previous albums in some way? Is it important to do that?
Angus: I don’t think we look at it like that, I don’t think we’ve ever looked at it that way. It’s about making something that feels right at the time also as in the case of a lot of things that you make. It takes time to appreciate it a bit. I remember when we put out (third album) Drum's Not Dead, we probably didn’t feel as good about it as we do now. Hopefully that will happen with this record.
SS: Do you think your songs have context of time? Will it sound a lot different or make less sense if someone listens to it for the first time 40 years from now?
Angus: In the past we’ve made real attempts to make kind of timeless music, not really like ‘OK, let’s try to make timeless music,’ but we have, I believe. And I believe that our past records you could listen to, in 40 years, and have difficulties mapping them. [Liars] is a little bit more grounded in traditional music themes so I don’t see it standing out as much in time.
Aaron: I don’t know, I always think about this thing where certain types of pop music is always labeled 80s, or certain types of disco or funk is labeled 70s, there are so many different roots and so many different influences where it could have been other things. I think that will change over the years, I think all the new elements that were in the pop music when we were kids which is 80s music... It’s just odd in a way that, over time, rock and roll has not been constantly compared to The Who or Led Zeppelin and eventually they gain more contemporary sources of influence. I would hope that that happens with the music we grew up with and are inspired by because I just think it’s important for people, for discussion purposes, but that seems to correlate with how your music will stand the test of time - how, what it could be compared to.
Photography: SUPERSWEET