New York’s atmospheric gloom rockers have just released their fourth album, an eponymously titled record that’s full of their trademark expertly controlled sustain and release, tense guitar lines and singer Paul Banks’ icily erotic way with melody
Wet Hot American Summer is a tour bus flick fave.
Daniel Kessler (guitar): ‘We had this road trip from Chicago to Charleston – 18 hours in a bus on our day off – but on that day off we re-watched Wet Hot American Summer. We took turns watching it on the laptop and having individual giggles. It’s over-the-top silly, but there are lines from that movie that we still pull now.’
Banks is a fan of body art.
Paul Banks: ‘I have a quote from my favourite author, Henry Miller, on my ribs. In one of his books, he was writing about an earlier troubled time in his life, and he says at that time he was: “Not wholly wrong, but deeply erring.” After I made some life changes it really resonated: I’ve hurt other people and those things are permanent. You can make amends and redeem yourself, but that happened. I’m not going to say I’m a terrible human being, but I’m going to acknowledge that I made mistakes.’
In Banks’s spare time he surfs, drums and paints.
PB: ‘I don’t have it in my goals to enter a surfing competition or go to a drum-off, but I like the idea – if I have X amount of abilities, then how can I best exploit them? The best way to exploit your abilities is persistence, so I look forward to painting until I think I’m good at it; and playing drums is so much fun. I’m happy I found it in time to be able to enjoy it for a while.’
On previous album Our Love to Admire, Banks was exploring a lyrical bent that was ‘more arrogant and chauvinistic’. His reason? To attract actresses.
PB: ‘I’m not actually as arrogant as some of the narrators of the songs on the third record. I think I was trying to attract the ladies by copying that attitude. I tried to make actresses feel insecure so they’d call me, and that didn’t work. You know they say if you’re an a*****e, they like that – that was the stance I was going for.’
Turns out that plan didn’t quite work out.
PB: ‘I didn’t get a call from any actresses. I was like, “Why doesn’t Lindsay Lohan call me?” I thought: They’re already insecure, so maybe if I act like I’m not into them they’ll call. It just didn’t happen.’
For this album there’s a new lyrical attitude. One that’s more vulnerable, more mature.
PB: ‘Now I’m over it in so many ways in my life. Not in a defeated way, but in a more spiritual way, I think it was a more mellow temperament to assume. I don’t mind showing myself to be the loser, which is what the narrator on a lot of these songs is doing, because I’m Zen.’
Even so, music is still all about the ladies.
PB: ‘Everything is about trying to get ladies, for me at least.’
