I’ve done music journalism for more than a decade, and frankly, interviewing band after band can get really boring.
Especially because much of the time, interviewers ask the same questions … and I’m not excluding myself from this affliction. You can’t talk only with bands whose music you’re passionate about, and given this, I think every music journalist develops a core set of questions they return to time and again. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but if you don’t pepper your chats with a few curveballs, you’re not only going to bore yourself in the asking, but also the band in the responding — and the readers in the, you know, reading.
I spent this SXSW, my fifth, doing something completely different from years past (helping run a booth at Flatstock poster convention) and engaged in exactly one interview, with Atlanta-based punkers The Coathangers.
I wanted to make it count, and I’m happy to report it’s one of the more irreverent interviews I’ve conducted in a while.
HN: If you could magically know how to play any other instrument — you didn’t have to practice, you didn’t have to learn theory — you could just pick it up and play it, what would it be?
Guitarist Crook Kid: Accordion or violin.
Bassist Minnie: Harp.
Keyboardist BeBe: Cello.
Drummer Rusty: Kazoo or violin.
HN: If you could have any musician join the band, someone famous or someone you know from home, who would it be?
“I wouldn’t pick anyone because I think we’re perfect the way we are,” said bassist Minnie with a cheery smile, prompting laughter from her bandmates.
“That’s her pageant queen answer,” Crook Kid responded.
In the end, they threw out Taylor Swift, Britney Spears and Beethoven as tongue-in-cheek potential additions.
HN: This one’s kind of related: If you could curate your own show with any bands, dead or alive, who would you pick?
Iggy and the Stooges, Blondie, the Ramones, the White Stripes, the Wipers, Alkaline Trio, Beethoven, Jimi Hendrix, The Real Kids, the Undertones, the Doors, Gang of Four, Led Zeppelin, Britney Spears, Slayer.
“We’ve got a whole festival going!” Rusty said, sounding impressed.
“Yeah, we should actually make this happen,” BeBe said with a laugh.
HN: I actually caught you guys back in 2008 or 2009 — you played a show at Ms. Bea’s in East Austin. How has SXSW changed in the last five years?
“It’s just a bumblefuck,” said drummer Rusty. “That’s just how it is.”
“(There are) more lasers!” Crook Kid said. “And more fog machines.”
The east side of Austin is just as packed as downtown, now, they added — but despite the influx of people, it’s still a good festival.
HN: If you could pick 10 words — pronouns, adjectives, a phrase — 10 words that describe your music, what would they be?
1. Cupcake.
2. Santa Claus.
3. Sporadic.
4. Adderall.
5. Rainbow.
6. Periods.
7. Morning-after pill.
8. Good.
9. No.
10. Yes.
HN: What are questions you hate being asked?
“What’s it like being in an all-girl band?” Crook Kid said emphatically, with the others nodding and vocally assenting. “‘Is it annoying when people always talk about you being girls?’ And I’m like, ‘You just did it! You did it! That thing that you were just talking about, you did it!’”
HN: What questions do you never get asked that you wish people would?
“Do you want free drugs?” joked Rusty. “Do you want some money?”
HN: What topics other than music would you want to be interviewed about?
“Prom dresses,” said Crook Kid.
“Adorable animals!” said Minnie.
HN: OK, this is my last weird question before I get to the final “real” question: Would you rather fight zombies or vampires?
A collective “Ooooh ….”
“I would rather fight zombies and be turned into a vampire,” Rusty said decisively. Zombies don’t stand a chance against their fanged, undead cousins, she pointed out.
HN: Here’s my one “real” question: What’s next for you guys? Are you going on a big tour, recording new material … ?
“We’re home for one day, and then we’re going on a European tour with …And You Will Know Us By) the Trail of Dead,” Minnie said. The band will be recording a new album this summer, slated for release sometime in 2014.
“We don’t want to rush it,” Crook Kid said. “We don’t want to put any pressure on ourselves, so we’re just letting it be whatever it is.”
Later that same day, Hilary Stohs-Krause participated in a debate with a group of poster nerds about whether or not vampires would be infected if they bit zombies … which soon morphed into an argument about whether or not Wolverine could be infected with HIV/AIDS. (In the end, we decided he could be a carrier, but he wouldn’t have any symptoms.) She gets her Nebraska local music fix through HN and as a beer slinger at Duffy's Tavern. For more on Nebraska women making music, tune into the "X-Rated: Women in Music" radio show every Thursday from 1:05 to 3 p.m. CST at 89.3 FM KZUM in Lincoln or streaming live at kzum.org. Find "X-Rated" on Facebook at facebook.com/xmusicnebraska