So is there a noticeably different reception to the record and the live show on different sides of the pond, then?
THORPE: Again it comes down to expression. British expression is sort of stiff upper lip; you don’t want to cruise too far outside the shallow waters ‘cause you might be seen as weird, you know? We made a career out of being weirdos, so we’ve always kind of ventured out into those waters, but you get the sense that here people are just a bit more vocal, both metaphorically and in speech.
FLEMING: [To] an American audience it takes the British audience maybe five minutes to get there to the same spot, the way America always turns up. And that’s not to denounce the British audience, it’s been amazing to us and it’s definitely our people as it were, but it’s just a completely different way of projecting.
THORPE: I’m kind of hesitant to talk in huge sweeping statements here because when we talk about America we’re talking about a thousand Americas, as is plainly apparent, and when we’re talking about Britain we're talking about many microscopic Britains that can really differ from town to town. Towns from coast to coast are a sort of ancient formation of towns; you can go eight miles and have a completely different accent, completely different food, and have a completely different way of being. We sense that ourselves, we play shows in the south of England and in the north of England it’s different, then you go to Scotland and it’s completely different again.
FLEMING: It does vary from town to town, and in Scotland, Glasgow is very different than Edinburgh, for example, and they’re like 30 miles apart.
One really unique place you've been is Texas, when you went to record Boy King with producer John Congleton (St. Vincent, The Walkmen, Modest Mouse, Spoon). Is it true he keeps a Grammy in his toilet?
FLEMING: He does, yeah. Knowing him I don’t think it’s an obtuse move, I think thats just where he has the space. He just works so hard all the time that he doesn’t really have the time to reflect on past glories. Obviously I think he’s done rather well as a result, he made a great record, so why not? But yeah, it’s true.
THORPE: Yeah, I’d always beware of the gold disk in the work space. You don’t need that visual prompt.
FLEMING: Yeah, it’s fine to be proud of it, but you don’t need it where you work.
I hear a bit of St. Vincent in “Alpha Female”’s guitar. Is that his influence?
THORPE: Sure, I think by osmosis, for sure. She is a guitar hero in the classic sense, she’s sort of audacious and quite gifted in a quite visionary way, so absolutely. Actually we’re quite taken by the fact that we were using the guitar as a macho object but were inheriting so much from this woman playing; theres a natural shape to that especially with songs like “Alpha Female,” these sort of sickening slick lines. We’re talking about tools and machines here, that’s what we inherited. When you boil guitars down it comes down to electronics, and we kind of shared some of the same circuit boards, I guess.
Between “Tough Guy” and “Alpha Female” there are two incredibly exciting guitar solos that are highlights of the record, and they take on a sort of dueling quality back to back. Was that an intentional juxtaposition?
FLEMING: There is something in that, yeah. “Alpha Female” is maybe a bit more genuine, whereas “Tough Guy” is a bit more embittered. Like we were talking about it’s about taking that pain and shoving it deep, deep down and not showing any of it, and I think that’s sort of what “Tough Guy” is doing, whereas “Alpha Female” is a bit more positive. But yeah, certainly there’s always a play on gender going on in the record, and I hope people notice that the display of machismo is supposed to look like a performance, and not a very convincing one at that. And so the foreground of the guitars is very deliberate; let’s use them to play with that trope, let’s demonstrate that A) we can do that and B) that we know what we're doing with it.
“Get My Bang” is about American consumerism, not sex per se, but as a single on an album as sexual as Boy King many are going to miss that. Is the interchangeability of these themes a statement in itself?
THORPE: It wasn’t so much American consumerism so much as just consumerism in general, in terms of we have Black Friday now in Britain. We inherited it off of you, but we took it gladly. It’s more about the sense of gratification and the unashamed lengths you will go to to seek that gratification, and in a suppressed society where, for good reason, you can’t kind of be cavemen and -women, it expresses itself in other pores. I just remember watching the Black Friday footage head in hands; people beating each other up for a flat screen TV, this is what western civilization has come to this end for? I just felt you are either not having enough sex or you’re not doing enough exercise, something has got to give here! [Laughs] That is not a healthy way, and I guess humans are bad at finding healthy ways of kind of getting out these carnal sensations ‘cause we’ve kind of been told the lot of them are sinful or unforgivable, and I guess that song is about stripping yourself of that inhibition and saying, “Fuck it, this is how I get off!” And that’s a song about self-interest, which is healthy and good for people to follow those self interests sometimes. For god’s sake, you need to release, you know?
Creating a record does seem marginally better than beating the shit out of someone in a Walmart.
FLEMING: [Laughs] Hopefully!
THORPE: I feel very privileged that we get a safe space where we can sort of act these things out. I mean, the stage is a fucking boxing ring; you come off and you do have s a kind of transcendental sensation. You feel bigger and mightier than you actually are, and therein lies a lot of the historical problems that musicians face with how am I supposed to quantify being, feeling like that guy, and shrinking to normal size again. There’s always a kind of navigation.
