XX TEENS INTERVIEW: INSIDE GOON ISLAND

Rich: I’m more excited about getting to work on another one now, to be honest. Just because that one’s all done.

Artrocker: The record’s been described as a kind of ‘mix tape’ – do you agree with that?

Anthony: It draws on loads of musical references, hopefully.

Rich: We’ve also got this situation where some of the songs are really old, and some are more recent, so there’s a kind of juxtaposition.

Anthony: The lyrical references as well, are ways in which the album is different throughout. But they always sound like us. I think people always thing the differences are bigger than they are though – they’re not as varied as people think.

Artrocker: A lot’s been made out of how your sound’s evolved – people almost talk about Xerox Teens and XX Teens as different bands. Do you agree that you can draw the line?

Anthony: They’re completely different bands. There may be similar songs but you’ve got quite different versions of them.

Artrocker: Was that stimulated by the line up change or was it more personal evolution?

Rich: It was a lot to do with the recording of the album really. For us there wouldn’t have been much point in recording the songs that we’d been playing for two or three years exactly the same as we’d been playing them. And we’d recorded and released them all the same. So the only point in doing it really was to make new songs of them, to do something more exciting. More new.

Anthony: We worked with Ross Orton too, who was our producer, and he was able to push things in different directions. Ideas that weren’t as strong got dropped, while other ideas got pushed. A song of ours called ‘Round’ –we dropped the Slits influence – and it got pushed in another direction much further.

Artrocker: What direction was that?

Anthony: It got much more to do with the beats. I guess you could say musically it had a hip hop reference. And because he’d produced ‘Galang’ by MIA, he was able to take it in that direction.

Artrocker: Did you end up with a pop record?

Rich: I don’t think so – but it’s probably more poppy than I think it is!

Anthony: I have a very open view of pop. I always see everything as pop, which in turn makes you think of all music as being quite similar. Which it kind of it is! I guess…

Artrocker: Why is it suddenly ok for bands to proclaim themselves as pop again?

Rich: I think it’s more a case that music which – ten years ago – used to be seen as more leftfield, stuff like The Horrors and that – that’s all fashion now. Bands that wouldn’t have been fashionable at all in the… “Britpop Golden Era”…

Anthony: Don’t say that!

Rich: Ok! But yeah, bands that were doing something slightly more interesting wouldn’t have got a look in, but fashion’s moved on…

Anthony: For me, it was being influenced by the whole Andy Warhol idea. You know, where he saw the Velvet Underground as pop. If you can see them as pop then you start seeing Captain Beefheart as pop, or you see Frank Zappa as pop – but then obviously Madness are pop. Jay-Z is pop – and eventually it makes a complete joke of the whole situation. I think when people say ‘pop’ they think of something very twee – maybe it’s a derogatory thing…

Rich: There’s a difference between a pop record and what we’d call a truly avant garde record. A Brian Eno record – that’s not pop, for example.

Anthony: Maybe not ‘Music For Airports’, but I know what you mean. But even with those kinds of records there are moments… maybe it’s a sense of ‘the hook’. You could listen to Classic FM and they’ll be playing Beethoven and it seems like a pop song, because it has a hook!

Artrocker: Was ‘How To Reduce The Chances of Being A Terror Victim’ inspired by tabloid sensationalism?

Rich: Yeah kind of. It came from the Fox News website. They read the phrase out on the news, I think in America, as genuine advice on how to avoid being a terror victim. It was written really well… a perfect piece of hysteria.

Artrocker: What song sticks out for you most on the LP?

Anthony: My favourite is ‘Sun Comes Up’. It got pushed quite far. It was right near the end of the album – the process – and I didn’t have huge expectations of it! And it managed to get taken somewhere. ‘Round’ is a blast for similar reasons.

Artrocker: And what was the most enjoyable one to record?

Rich: Probably ‘My Favourite Hat’. It was me, Rich and Ross working in the studio. And it often became a thing where – Ross is a hard Sheffield man – and for a couple of Southern Ponces we often got beaten up – but for that song he just let himself go, and realised the song was a bit bonkers. It was the song where he let Rich do whatever he liked! It was the most fun, and the easiest to do.

Artrocker: Rich, do you ever wear the sunglasses off stage?

Rich: No, I never do. Ha ha! For fear of being recognised from all those Artrocker posters!

So what next? A year of grind then it’s album number two?

Rich: We feel like we’ve toured this already, so we’d much rather get in the studio and make an album, and possibly work on some other projects.

Artrocker: What kind of projects?

Rich: Maybe make a film, a couple of short films. We’ll have to see where it takes us…

Artrocker: Finally, some of our staff were wondering, when the name change came about, did you ever consider calling the band XXL Jeans?

Rich: We thought of alot of other ones like Kleenex Teens and Durex Teens - any other brand names so we’d get in more trouble! But no, we never thought of XXL jeans…

Artrocker: Probably just as well!