Brian Jonestown Massacre - Interview - Spring 2008
By: Yousif Nur
RFB: Hi Anton. To start, would you mind giving us a few words about the new record, its musical objectives?
Anton: "Well, first of all I want to express myself artistically rather than, sort of, guard my ass commercially, as I've been known to do for the whole length of my career. Then we set out to do a lot of drugs, basically, and make a really crazy record. Because I feel that everybody's just....it's a f**king joke that people go on and on about Amy Winehouse and Pete Doherty, and it's just, crap! Just like... Simon Cowell and everything...and that's fine, because I'm into the business. The business side of it... I want people to be happy, and if they're happy just listening to whatever they want to listen to... I want them to be happy. I want everyone to be drugged up and wear black shirts and brown shirts stepping down the street. I want them to enjoy themselves. I listen to things that other people don't listen to. I listen to Sikh music and I really enjoy it! And I don't expect everybody to become a Sikh and what have you. I just wanted to go for the jugular y'know? Keep turning it up and turning it up. To have no pre-conceived notions about it. We just did it over four days, basically with no ideas whatsoever, like 'what are we gonna play? I dunno, that beat from LCD Soundsystem? F**k it, let's rock it!'"
RFB: Well I love LCD Soundsystem...
Anton: "That's cute. It's really derivative and pre-meditated, but they're good at what they do and that's why they produce all that crap. He really goes 'I'm going to do that', but I was just joking around. I'll just take that and go off in the opposite direction. See how many amps we can blow up or whatever! As for the album I don't think I really approached it differently. The different things were doing it in Iceland instead of my own studio and collaborating with an engineer on that level, I hadn't done that for quite sometime. I was worried that the engineer was a real a**hole to some people, because he really knows what he's talking about. So he's the quickest one just to tell it to you. I had a meeting with him, I was drinking some gin and tonic, it was 7am and I said, 'Look, I don't wanna even talk in the studio, just trust me I know what I'm doing and I trust you' And we just did it. It was great, because we ended up having the best time of our lives, and we kept a sort of security guard person in the studio to make sure that nobody was too high to bump into stuff, and then we just did it. But the emphasis really isn't on the fact that we were high or on drugs, this is more on that you can still hear other things. It sounds like a post-modern apocalypse to me and it has its own flow. There were really beautiful things - when I spill the beans on what I said in Icelandic... It's definitely the heaviest stuff on the planet. Heavier than any death metal or anything I've ever heard myself. I picked a language where less than 300,000 people speak it on the planet. A couple of the songs I made up, one of which when I was nine years old! And I never could muster up the guts to utter it in English because it meant something to me, so much that it was just too personal, and I found that it was easier when I found someone who could speak it in another language, so it was just like... okay."
RFB: I have to say that a lot of the tracks on the album, particularly towards the middle, are quite epic...
Anton: "Well, we need that a little bit. I mean, I'm completely underwhelmed by nearly every single thing that anybody says. I don't wanna diss the NME right now but I got to argue with the man that put Morrissey back on the pages a couple of years ago at least occasionally and I said 'Look he's sold 200,000 seats in a soccer stadium for four days in a row in Mexico City, and he can't get in your paper?! Meanwhile, every single band that you claim are the best thing since sliced bread in the past since you banned him has gone nowhere...' Then he was right back in there!" (laughs)
RFB: It seems to be a sad state of affairs, what's going on with him at the minute...
Anton: "Well you know what? I don't know what his perspectives are. I don't know about his 'Suedehead' or if he's secretly gay, or that 'National Front Disco' bullsh*t. I don't know about any of these things, or what he meant by it, but I certainly know that... My wife is sitting right here, I've been heterosexual all my life, but there have been a lot of men who have called me a fag. I've been on the front line just on principle on a million different issues. I defend people that I do not respect to any degree. Just because I don't want a unified opinion, and that's where I see a lot of this stuff goes, or is headed. Not Morrissey as such, but a culture or a hole that's just crap culture. I mean everybody's ripping everybody off. Everybody I know! I know 80 year old people that are saying 'I can't believe that there's this many grifters at once'. I mean, every stockbroker, every young person out of college is just trying to rip everybody off. That to me is appalling. It's misanthropy on a grand scale."
RFB: You were talking about the disposable culture we're currently in with bands, many struggle with making a competent second album or fall at the first hurdle. I want to know how one keeps the creative juices going?
Anton: "Well we're not sure what it is, it could be performance art, it could be audio sculpture, it could be a lot of different things. Do you understand? It could be therapy, it could be that perspectives change. I just personally really like the artistic aspect of it. It's a wonderful thing to watch somebody that's hurtful or painful as a figure of inspiration flipped around and become this thing where people are like 'Oh, that really meant a lot to me, it got me through a tough time' and what have you. A noble pursuit, much more than flying over in a stealth bomber and blowing the sh*t out of nine year old Iraqis or some crap. All for protecting an oil pipeline. This is much more noble, even though I'm not in this quest for nobility like Paul McCartney, I just think that it's really a very natural thing for me to do. It's using raw material that I have which is this energy, and I think it's very positive. I'm not out jacking people's cellphones on a double-decker bus, I'm not doing any of that sh*t. I'm just making records."
RFB: Do line up changes help keep things fresh album-by-album?
Anton: "But you must understand that there was never a band. Most of those people aren't even on the albums! I'm playing everything on almost every album! I just grabbed a couple of people if I needed to do something with a couple of people. Every record, with all of them, I have always done this. I play every instrument. I'm doing the drums, I'm doing everything. I just put people's names on there."
RFB: Not too dissimilar to The Fall then - John Peel once described them as being 'Always different, always the same'...
Anton: (sounding very agitated) "Yeah, well Mark E Smith and I are different. I think that Mark E Smith is a very talented one-trick pony. I think he's really had some things to say and for whatever reason he does it. He's no Joy Division - their two records eclipse The Fall's albums. Easily I believe. Primal Scream easily does too, and when Bobby Gillespie says these profound northern sentiments of ideas, it easily hands-down wins over Mark E Smith. I just think that there's a reason why he gets the shit beaten out of him periodically, even by his wife. I'm not putting The Fall down or anything, he's great. I like some of their stuff a lot. I'm just saying that... I'm into dynamics man! (laughs) I like to move around and explore the space, take a look at what's around us.
RFB: Judging by your musical output it's hard to argue.
Anton: Well seriously, we're just trying to do massive amounts of accelerated hallucinogens on amphetamine and see how f**king berserk we can get in the studio and that's what we came up with. And it literally took 4 days to do the record. The sessions and songs are just as you hear them in around thirty minutes, but the thing is I did 19 videos. There's a whole other EP you haven't heard yet. The EP just rolls over the record, all the videos are just completely f**ked! They're all Tate Gallery level performance avant-garde pieces. Most of them are shot in one take. There are some of them on YouTube. Just type in 'Automatic Faggot for the People' and it's going to cream you! It's just one shot of me getting a tattoo on my lip!" (Clip HERE)
RFB: Oh my god.
Anton: "Yeah, but it's great. I mean it's f**king really great. When you see the video for 'Who F**king Pissed In My Well', you're just gonna go 'Oh well, this is something else, this isn't exactly Arctic Monkeys'. I mean, this isn't those guys, this isn't The Coral, this is the real deal - art. People are going to figure it out because they're going to put two and two together. I'm not even going to tell people what we're singing about. Like 'Golden Frost', when you watch that video... I'm not gonna tell people what we're saying in Icelandic and good luck figuring it out because it's the hardest language to learn and there are only 300,000 people you can ask that can help you. But I guess that there's a website...
RFB: The 'machine' or 'game' you talked about earlier is changing and has done dramatically in the last five or so years, wouldn't you say?
Anton: "We've been talking about it for quite a while. But all I know is that I've had 90 million downloads from my website, so I have no problems selling out bigger rooms in say, Dublin than as opposed to, say, Bob Dylan in one second. And you can blame Columbia Records for the fact that he can't get that many people because they're not going to pay enough song pluggers to get people that interested and get ripped off by it. Otherwise, you can get the downloads from the website, from any of those MTV sites, all around the world burning discs, people in Dundee are not going to sell even Bob Dylan's records! You've got to be really smart. It's just like, people have computers out there and we'll send our records through the post. It's just perspectives. I knew that this was going to happen though and that's why I don't really care about the song-titles. I don't want them to be talked about long after my death.
RFB: Do you think it's important to leave a legacy behind?
Anton: "I think it's important. Why would I get out of bed if I wasn't going to accomplish something? What is the f**king point of running around like it's a goddamn rat race? 'Hi I live in a big house in London with a nice car and I accomplish nothing. That's my life.' Oh, you live in London, great name plaque, you've got a bug that says London on it. A car sticker that says 'Arsenal' on it or some sh*t and it's like, 'who f**king cares!' At least when you plant a garden you can watch it blossom or pick fruit from the trees. That's a more noble pursuit. I'm not an ignorant savage, I mean... God! I don't even know what people are thinking! I really don't. It needs people like all of us. The thing is it's about us, not me. All I can do is make my life more... I mean, ladies walking around in urban camouflage in the middle of the city are f**kin' hiding in the bushes. It's the biggest idiot f**kin' fashion statement of the highest order. Urban camouflage is walking around dressed in a monkey suit grabbing a ladder with a bucket, walking down the street. That's urban camouflage. Everyone's a f**kin' sh*thead! Period! Their heads are filled with sh*t! They're high on prozac or whatever they're smoking and going over to the gym and just f**king off, paying their bills. F**k it. There's a zillion people like that. Not me. They just need to feel empowered somehow, I just think that people need to see a light from a torch or something. But I don't think that I am the light-bearer!"
RFB: This latest album is released on your own label, correct?
Anton: (long pause) "Yes."
RFB : How vital was it releasing this on your own terms?
Anton: "Well I turned down like a million pounds or something from V2. But the thing is, I can help out my friends and they can't get fired! (laughs) I had my job done and I have always been on my own label. I own the rights now, not somebody else. Because I've realised that these people like are lawyers, it's like, for instance, you've passed your A-Levels, go to uni, then you through the bar and become a barrister then you start a label and then get into music like you're some kind of f**king authority on somebody. It's bullsh*t and it's everybody on every f**king label. I don't know if you've ever been in these places, but there's like two people who make decisions, then there's a bunch of interns and then there's four rooms of lawyers! And that's every f**king label!"
RFB: Well, them and the accountants...
Anton: "And these are the people making the decisions about what you need to listen to. And no-one seems to care because the music they play in the pubs is the same f**king music that's played on the BBC Business News reports. It's like 'Are you getting your hair done in a personal disco?' It's just the same generic f**king (mimicks beat)tch-tch-tch. It's funny how every single show in the UK is like (mimicks similar beat) chk-chk-chk-chk and it makes sense when you're blasted on E driving down the f**kin' motorway hitting the brakes through a f**kin' speed camera saying (cockney accent) 'wow man, this is rad, this is f**king brilliant mate!'"
(much laughter shared)
RFB: So what are your plans for the future? Short and long term...
Anton: "I'm going to work on five records. They keep offering stuff to me really, really big shows everywhere I go and I say 'we'll talk about it'. Then I fly back to America and do David Letterman. I mean, that's pretty big. By UK standards, that's bigger than any audience that you can possibly get on TV here. I don't even know what I'm going to do, I'll probably grab a couple of my friends and play something."
RFB: Who has your admiration at present time? Not that we live in, shall we say, sophisticated times, but who do you respect?
Anton: (Long pause) "Well y'know, this is really complex. I really like young kids when they're kicking butt, so Jakobinarina from Iceland, I really like to see seventeen year olds kicking ass and they've got it bad. So that's nice to see. I have other friends in Iceland that are singing that I really like. But y'know, more importantly, if you go to YouTube, looking at Marvin Gaye doing 'What's Goin' On' and 'What's Happenin'' put together when he presented them, if you listen to the message it's more poignant and important than ever. I like John Safran (documentarian and media personality) from Australia. I like a lot of his stuff, he's just hilarious and it's not music, it's just talk. There's just so much stuff. The thing is, I'm not being a sycophant but I don't see my role as being like the oracle at the Adelphi. Blowing smoke up people's ass from a cave telling people what they're supposed to listen to. I mean, I like a lot of Sikh music. I don't even know how to pronounce the names. I love Sikhs and I really love what they're talking about. I really do. So there it is, I'm into all kinds of stuff! Across the board (laughs)."
RFB: I heard you like a lot of Arabic music?
Anton: "Yeah I've got like, tons of it. But not necessarily just Arabic stuff as such. I like Ghazals which are like Islamic spiritual music, I like the Ottoman stuff, the classical old recordings of the Turkish Sultan style music, the end of that era when they had the old guys were playing Ghazals with an Oud (Arabic instrument similar to a lute), some North African stuff as well. It goes all over the map.
RFB: Have you heard of an Egyptian singer called Um Kalthoum? She's widely regarded as Egypt, if not the Middle East's most iconic singer of the 20th Century."
Anton: "No, but I'll check her out."
RFB: Really do. She's got a legacy that's timeless, three decades after her death. Even Bob Dylan cites her as an influence.
Anton: "So she's like the Willie Nelson of Egypt?"
RFB: Not even close in terms of style. There are performances where her songs will stretch literally for an hour long.
Anton: "I've been to concerts where a song would last longer than around an hour long. I know that experience. I've seen a lot of this stuff in very different places. The King of Morrocco has asked me to come and play with some musicians."
RFB: That sounds amazing.
Anton: "I know, but I don't think I'll be able go."
RFB: What do you think of the Democratic candidates in the US election, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton?
Anton: "Well Hilary Clinton has been a CIA agent since 1968, so there you have it. There's more complex problems going on, the thing that I see is that whatever plan that they decide to execute, they're wreaking havoc. Whether that's intentional or a miscalculation, a lot of people are getting hurt. We're not clear on the full extent of it, but there are repercussions of it here in London right now where I'm at, basically I'm at one of the financial capitals of the world, if not the financial capital of the world. Unlike the banking capital like Switzerland or Iceland where it's the financial wizard, this is the house of finance. And it's the capital city - Londinium. People are sh*tting bricks. Banks are caving in, people are putting signs up. You'll see it in New YorkLondon really hard."
RFB: We're living in a time where everybody's paranoid.
Anton: "I'm not paranoid. People are just infested with junk maybe, but then that might be their poor ideology. But we'll see what happens. Anything else you gotta say? I'm just gonna kiss my wife or else I might die... What other questions do you have?"
RFB: Just the one.
Anton: "Wait one second."
RFB: Sure. Go for it.
Anton: "Ok, I'm back."
RFB: Last question - just, final thoughts, really?
Anton: "I don't expect everybody to fully understand the music in this collection. I would like that people keep an open mind and hopefully that they would set out under their own name to express themselves, hopefully in a positive way. I mean, no animals were hurt in the making of that record."
RFB: Nice to know. Wouldn't want PETA at your door now.
Anton: "Yeah exactly. Sorry PETA! (laughs) No seriously, I just want people to enjoy it. It can also be found free on the internet as well so either way I don't care. And all the videos we've got, you can find them all on YouTube but we're going to do a lot of enhanced stuff with them and we were just trying to have fun. We're just trying to encourage people to work hard, but have fun too! And don't blow yourself up on the bus you punks!"
RFB: I just think everyone's a bit po-faced at the minute.
Anton: F**k 'em. That's never ever affected me. I mean it really has zero bearing on me. I just....whatever. People are just weird. I don't know what they're thinking because when you look at the society in Iceland again, the reason they have the highest living standard on Earth is because they're all close-knit and they work together. They don't fight each other factionally. I mean, you can fight each other individually, but you don't kick people when they're down when everybody's in close ranks and working together.
RFB: I've had a similar discussion once with someone that lives in Denmark, that it's the happiest place on Earth in terms of standard of living and that this idealism could only work within a centralised population. It could never work in somewhere like London for instance, because everyone is anything but selfless. If anything, people here are self-serving and faceless.
Anton: "Well, you know. The British Empire has a history of dividing and conquering in each and every other town, period. Britain got the sh*t kicked out of by Icelandic boats with 16 dudes in 'em. I mean, that's a fact! The St. George's cross is the same f**king flag as Denmark. THAT is the United Kingdom, it isn't Scotland and Ireland. And then as for the Commonwealth, anyone who is a subject of the realm understands that. It's all unedible sh*t. These people understand what it's all about. I just want to tell you that, I'm not really nationalistic. I would defend anybody here in a second, just on principle."
RFB: Hmm.
Anton: "I would!"
RFB: I don't dispute that!
Anton: "I have the greatest respect in the world for people here. I don't have any sentiments of a 'F**k you we beat you up in 1776 and 1812' attitude, no no no. I mean it's got its problems, way crazy problems. I mean there's problems everywhere. We need to work together, not through socialism or communism but just by simply working together by being practical and simply by finding a steady equilibrium. By not being a liberal or anything, but just having a balanced opinion. I consider myself conservative even though I am a little more than slightly eccentric. and it'll hit
RFB: One could say that. Well thanks for your time Anton, it's been an invigorating chat.
Anton: God bless you and take care. (Ends call).
Artists in this article: Brian Jonestown Massacre