Like I promised last week here's the second part of Brian's and Steve Hewitt's interview with Discover from September 1998. Enjoy the read!
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| Photo credit: David Bailey |
𝗕𝗥𝗜𝗔𝗡 𝗬𝗢𝗨 𝗦𝗔𝗜𝗗 𝗧𝗛𝗔𝗧 𝗬𝗢𝗨 𝗪𝗔𝗡𝗧 𝗔 𝗥𝗘𝗔𝗖𝗧𝗜𝗢𝗡 𝗕𝗘𝗧𝗪𝗘𝗘𝗡 𝗗𝗜𝗦𝗠𝗔𝗬 𝗔𝗡𝗗 𝗗𝗘𝗟𝗜𝗚𝗛𝗧 𝗙𝗥𝗢𝗠 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗟𝗜𝗦𝗧𝗘𝗡𝗘𝗥 𝗢𝗙 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗡𝗘𝗪 𝗔𝗟𝗕𝗨𝗠. 𝗪𝗛𝗔𝗧 𝗘𝗫𝗔𝗖𝗧𝗟𝗬 𝗗𝗢 𝗬𝗢𝗨 𝗠𝗘𝗔𝗡 𝗕𝗬 𝗧𝗛𝗔𝗧?
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “We wanted the album to leave a clear and definite reaction, not a wishy-washy feeling. I want people to really love us or really hate us, I don't want anything in between. It's important to me that my music creates an effect on the audience, no matter what the nature, but nothing makes me sadder than to find out that there are people who are completely indifferent to our music. I want reactions! And extreme reactions. Only then do I know that I'm doing the right thing.”
𝗧𝗛𝗔𝗧 𝗠𝗘𝗔𝗡𝗦 𝗬𝗢𝗨 𝗪𝗔𝗡𝗧 𝗧𝗢 𝗣𝗥𝗢𝗩𝗢𝗞𝗘, 𝗧𝗢𝗢?
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “Not really. I don't want to provoke on purpose. I just want to represent myself. If I as a person provoke others because of who I am, that's fine too. But I don't want to create artificial provocations. My aggression often provokes people because I can't hold it back. When I'm angry, I have to show it. I feel the same way with other emotions. I want to be free to really express myself, to be able to express myself all the time, everywhere. I don't like acting as a musician. Our music reflects our innermost, and when someone attacks our music, they are attacking our heart and soul. Our music is so closely connected to our lives, it's a part of our soul.”
📢 𝙎𝙩𝙚𝙫𝙚: “We are often asked if our album is a kind of snapshot of our life, but it is only partly. Because the songwriting for "Without you I'm nothing" stretched over four years, during which we didn't always feel the same, of course. "Scared of girls" is a song that Brian had already written when I was not even in the band.”
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “It's definitely not a snapshot of any particular period of time, but shows the evolution of Placebo since the inception to the most recent song, "Pure morning," which we just wrote in April.”
𝗧𝗛𝗘𝗡 𝗪𝗛𝗬 𝗪𝗔𝗦𝗡'𝗧 “𝗦𝗖𝗔𝗥𝗘𝗗 𝗢𝗙 𝗚𝗜𝗥𝗟𝗦” 𝗢𝗡 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗙𝗜𝗥𝗦𝗧 𝗥𝗘𝗖𝗢𝗥𝗗?
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “Because we never recorded it, it didn't even show up on our live playlists. At some point I remembered that song and we started trying different versions. That's when Steve joined us again and when we tried the song, it clicked and we knew it would fit this time. Still, the song then took us a lot of time. It's the oldest Placebo song and also one that took the longest to finish. We changed it a lot to make it fit the modern sound we wanted for the album. We also had to change "Brick Shithouse" again. The song came over us at a soundcheck in Leipzig, we then reworked it again after the tour.”
📢 𝙎𝙩𝙚𝙫𝙚: “During this soundcheck we also came up with the song structures for "Burger Queen" and "Evil Dildo". It was the most productive soundcheck we've ever done... the gig totally sucked though.”
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “Even songs that we've been playing live for years change over time. We're constantly reworking them because we don't want to play the same thing for years. You just heard our new version of "Teenage..." yourself. It doesn't have much to do with the original version of the first album. We felt that the song needed to go much deeper, that our emotions weren't expressed enough yet. So we incorporated the piano and now we like it much better.”
📢 𝙎𝙩𝙚𝙫𝙚: “The inspiration for this acoustic set with piano came to us during some radio sessions we did while on tour. We realized that the song could suddenly express a lot more than it did before.”
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “It also has something to do with the increased self-confidence I just told you about. Because we realized that we can play instruments like piano or acoustic guitar, so we figured why limit ourselves when we can? We can play a lot of instruments, let's use them. That's what makes the songs more complex. Then we tried it out live and it worked, that was really cool.”
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| Photo credit: Adrian Green |
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “No, strangely enough never. We always encouraged ourselves, "come on, we can make the crowd out there crazy, we can" and that really got us fired up. We're crazy about playing in front of a lot of people, whether they're there for us or David Bowie.”
📢 𝙎𝙩𝙚𝙫𝙚: “Our luck was maybe that it worked the first time. We totally nailed it the first time we played in front of David Bowie, and after that we always said to ourselves, "Hey, what we did once, we can do again and again”."
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “When we played Madison Square Garden, the audience showered us with ovations and that gives you a sense of gratitude and you know you can never repay them. We feel a kind of obligation to say thank you for so much good vibes that we always try to do our best. And that only works if we manage to stay ourselves.”
𝗗𝗢 𝗬𝗢𝗨 𝗪𝗔𝗡𝗧 𝗧𝗢 𝗚𝗢 𝗧𝗛𝗘𝗥𝗘? 𝗗𝗢 𝗬𝗢𝗨 𝗪𝗔𝗡𝗧 𝗧𝗢 𝗕𝗘𝗖𝗢𝗠𝗘 𝗔 𝗦𝗧𝗔𝗗𝗜𝗨𝗠 𝗥𝗢𝗖𝗞 𝗕𝗔𝗡𝗗?
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “When we write a song, we don't worry about it. But when we're on a stage, it's nicer to play in front of 100,000 people than in front of 100. It spurs you on more to do your best, and I have a lot more opportunity to completely forget myself and mentally immerse myself in a sea of people I want to trade feelings with. That kind of thing challenges me. But we don't write songs with the ulterior motive of wanting full stadiums. We're not a hit-making machine. "Evil dildo", for example, is such a song that always impresses me heavily live. Of course, you can only play the song at the end of a concert. But this wall of sounds, feedbacks, and histrionics, it always blows me away. It also shows us that we're capable of expressing all extreme kinds of feelings. "Evil dildo" is so fierce, horrible and violent and in contrast to that "Teenage Angst" is an expression of the highest possible tenderness. We are able to fill up a scale with the most diverse emotions, we have no interest in being limited to anything, be it style, emotions or instrumentation.”
𝗪𝗢𝗨𝗟𝗗 𝗬𝗢𝗨 𝗔𝗚𝗥𝗘𝗘 𝗪𝗛𝗘𝗡 𝗜 𝗗𝗘𝗦𝗖𝗥𝗜𝗕𝗘 𝗬𝗢𝗨𝗥 𝗥𝗔𝗡𝗚𝗘 𝗪𝗜𝗧𝗛 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗘𝗫𝗧𝗥𝗘𝗠𝗘𝗦 𝗙𝗥𝗢𝗠 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗩𝗜𝗢𝗟𝗘𝗡𝗖𝗘 𝗔𝗡𝗗 𝗔𝗡𝗚𝗘𝗥 𝗢𝗙 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗗𝗘𝗔𝗗 𝗞𝗘𝗡𝗡𝗘𝗗𝗬𝗦 𝗧𝗢 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗗𝗘𝗣𝗥𝗘𝗦𝗦𝗜𝗢𝗡 𝗢𝗙 𝗣𝗢𝗥𝗧𝗜𝗦𝗛𝗘𝗔𝗗?
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “That's fantastic. Yeah, that hits the spot, that's where we're going. Plus, they're bands I like a lot.”
[Short internal discussion about the comparison]
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “We really like the comparison, that's cool. It seems to me you get our point. I hope you really write that.”
𝗦𝗣𝗘𝗔𝗞𝗜𝗡𝗚 𝗢𝗙 𝗖𝗢𝗠𝗣𝗔𝗥𝗜𝗦𝗢𝗡𝗦: 𝗔𝗙𝗧𝗘𝗥 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗙𝗜𝗥𝗦𝗧 𝗔𝗟𝗕𝗨𝗠 𝗬𝗢𝗨 𝗪𝗘𝗥𝗘 𝗢𝗙𝗧𝗘𝗡 𝗖𝗢𝗠𝗣𝗔𝗥𝗘𝗗 𝗧𝗢 𝗣𝗔𝗩𝗟𝗢𝗩'𝗦 𝗗𝗢𝗚. 𝗖𝗔𝗡 𝗬𝗢𝗨 𝗥𝗘𝗟𝗔𝗧𝗘 𝗧𝗢 𝗧𝗛𝗔𝗧? 𝗗𝗢 𝗬𝗢𝗨 𝗔𝗟𝗦𝗢 𝗣𝗟𝗔𝗬 𝗪𝗜𝗧𝗛 𝗬𝗢𝗨𝗥 𝗔𝗡𝗗𝗥𝗢𝗚𝗬𝗡𝗢𝗨𝗦 𝗔𝗣𝗣𝗘𝗔𝗥𝗔𝗡𝗖𝗘?
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “I am the way I am, if someone plays with my appearance, it's the viewers. I already said that I don't want to provoke anyone consciously, but if someone thinks they have to interpret something into my appearance, then they have to do that. I like reactions, but they should be clear. By the way, we were also compared to many German bands, Can and Blixa Bargeld were mentioned just as often.”
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| Photo credit: LUZ Photo Agency |
[Brian talks about Placebo's music again]
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “We always have to follow up an idea immediately. If we have tried something and it starts to please us, then nothing exists for us. Then we have to go all the way, otherwise a lot would be lost. Then, when the song is somewhat finished, we start to think about its message and whether we can achieve what we want with the music. You know, in the studio we don't have a fixed distribution of roles, we constantly alternate on the instruments. Any one of us could have played anything on the album, that helps us give shape to an idea right away. For example, if I think there needs to be a different drum rhythm, I can demonstrate that right away and don't have to ask Steve to drum something for me until I get it reasonably right. And it's the same the other way around. If Steve has a certain riff in mind, he plays it for me right away. Stefan can do that too. That's how we all get involved in the song and in the end there's a Placebo song, not a Brian or Steve song. And we are true workaholics.”
𝗧𝗛𝗔𝗧 𝗠𝗘𝗔𝗡𝗦 𝗧𝗛𝗔𝗧 𝗘𝗩𝗘𝗡 𝗢𝗨𝗧𝗦𝗜𝗗𝗘 𝗢𝗙 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗕𝗔𝗡𝗗, 𝗬𝗢𝗨 𝗞𝗘𝗘𝗣 𝗜𝗡 𝗖𝗟𝗢𝗦𝗘 𝗖𝗢𝗡𝗧𝗔𝗖𝗧 𝗪𝗜𝗧𝗛 𝗘𝗔𝗖𝗛 𝗢𝗧𝗛𝗘𝗥?
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “Actually we never leave each other (laughter).”
📢 𝙎𝙩𝙚𝙫𝙚: “Look at us, don't we look like we sleep together too?”
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “Placebo is our life, we just can't stop writing songs.
𝗦𝗢, 𝗜𝗦 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗡𝗘𝗫𝗧 𝗔𝗟𝗕𝗨𝗠 𝗞𝗜𝗡𝗗 𝗢𝗙 𝗗𝗢𝗡𝗘 𝗔𝗟𝗥𝗘𝗔𝗗𝗬?
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “We could have put out a double album right now, we have thirty songs written. Some of them will be released on the singles.”
𝗛𝗢𝗪 𝗠𝗨𝗖𝗛 𝗧𝗜𝗠𝗘 𝗗𝗢𝗘𝗦 𝗧𝗛𝗔𝗧 𝗟𝗘𝗔𝗩𝗘 𝗬𝗢𝗨 𝗙𝗢𝗥 𝗬𝗢𝗨𝗥 𝗢𝗪𝗡 𝗟𝗔𝗕𝗘𝗟?
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “None at all. At the moment we don't plan any releases, we just don't have time to take care of other bands. We don't even have time for collaborations, which we are often asked about and some of which we would love to do. We are fans of the Sneaker Pimps and we have been planning to do something together for a long time, but we just don't have the time. Maybe after the tour. But being an A&R guy on the side, that really wouldn't work right now. I sang on a single by a band called Dream City Film Club. But that's it.”
𝗪𝗛𝗘𝗡 𝗬𝗢𝗨'𝗥𝗘 𝗦𝗢 𝗕𝗨𝗦𝗬, 𝗗𝗢𝗡'𝗧 𝗬𝗢𝗨 𝗠𝗜𝗦𝗦 𝗬𝗢𝗨𝗥 𝗣𝗥𝗜𝗩𝗔𝗖𝗬, 𝗬𝗢𝗨𝗥 𝗟𝗜𝗙𝗘 𝗢𝗨𝗧𝗦𝗜𝗗𝗘 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗠𝗨𝗦𝗜𝗖 𝗕𝗨𝗦𝗜𝗡𝗘𝗦𝗦?
📢 𝘽𝙧𝙞𝙖𝙣: “Sometimes, sometimes I miss a little bit of normality in my life. Or being able to get drunk without people writing about it.”
(Discover, September 1998, interviewer: Ralph Buchbender )
Post by Silke
