The album was released this past Tuesday.
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Guest List: Art Brut
Guest List by Eddie ArgosWelcome to the latest edition of Pitchfork's Guest List. Each week, we ask one of our favorite artists to fill us in on what they've been up to lately: which tracks they can't stop spinning, what books they can't put down, and what new bands they've caught on tour. This week it's Art Brut frontman Eddie Argos, who tells us which video game is best for singing about, admits his ignorance about heroin-themed lyrics, and explains why his band will try to be more like Ghostface Killah from now on.
>> Favorite Songs of the Past Year
The Hold Steady: "Massive Night"
I've become obsessed with the band the Hold Steady. Have you heard of the band Lifter Puller before? I think they sound exactly the same. Which is really good stuff. It's like a secret extra stash of Hold Steady albums by a different band. I like "Massive Night". I've been on tour and it has the feeling of being on tour. [Singing]: "We had some massive highs oooo/ We had some crushing lows/ We had some lusty little crushes/ We had those all-ages hardcore matinée shows." Brilliant lyric. I've listened to that a lot this year. I've listened to the whole Hold Steady album on repeat.
>> Favorite Older Songs
I've listened to lots of Mountain Goats, that's quite old isn't it? I've become obsessed with the Mountain Goats too. The Sunset Tree is one of my favorite albums of all time, I think. Really up to date. But, yeah, I'm into that.
>> Favorite New Band
The Indelicates
There's a band in England called the Indelicates that I really like. I was just in their video recently. They just put a single out, but they're lyrics are amazing. When we were writing our album, Julia, who goes out with the singer gave me one of his poems about writer's block and how he can't write about his stuff. And his poem was so good! I was like, "How did he do that?!" It made it even worse. It was really good. How had he written that poem? I've become a bit obsessed. I love the Indelicates, they're one of my favorites. Julia used to be in a band called the Pipettes, but she left to be in the Indelicates, which is more like a Luke Haines/the Auteurs kind of thing.
>> Favorite Song of All Time
The Yummy Fur: "Catholic"
It changes every day doesn't it? I can't decide that. It's probably by Jonathan Richman [laughs], no that isn't realistic. I don't know, I can't do that. There's many of his good songs. I'll tell you what: all, everything by Jonathan Richman. [laughs] I can't say that, I'll choose a different artist I think. I think probably Yummy Fur's stuff. Something off the Canadian flag album by the Yummy Fur. I think their song "Catholic" off their album Male Shadow At 3 O'Clock [Singing]: "Those Roman Catholics, dang they're fantastic!". I just like the fact that, half the album actually, they knock Catholicism. It's very funny. Oh, I love it. There's a Canadian flag, too. I'm very naïve to the Yummy Fur. I liked The Yummy Fur for years. I found out recently that they took heroin, which I didn't know. I thought lines like "All these discarded Kit Kat's at my feet" were just about chocolate, but it's actually the tin foil which is, like, heroin. Songs about half a dozen needles went completely over my head until about 6 months ago when I found out they all took heroin. But they stopped now, so it's okay. But I shouldn't be talking about that actually, perhaps they'll be expatriated-- I take all of that back [laughs]. I was very naïve and didn't know the heroin references from the Yummy Fur.
>> Best Recent Show
Robocop Kraus
There was a band we played with last year called the Robocop Kraus, they're a German band. It's funny, they've been around for years, you see on their posters it says things like "Robocop Kraus sound like The Rakes and Franz Ferdinand" and then you think about it and you're like, "the Robocop Kraus have been around about 10 years!" [laughs] If anything The Rakes and Franz Ferdinand sound like Robocop Kraus. But they're the best live band I've ever seen. We toured with them for a bit in America, they came and toured. And it was just fun, it was madness. It ended every night: everyone was just dancing. I've stolen so many tricks from them. Watching Thomas, he's their singer, do all these tricks and I was like, "The minute he leaves this tour, I'm doing that" [laughs]. Every single thing he's done. I spoke to him about it and apparently he stole all of his tricks from David Byrne, so it's ok. It's just a cycle of people stealing from each other. I couldn't do it without telling him, "Thomas, you know when you leave this tour, I'm doing everything you've been doing onstage". I wanted to tell him and he said it's OK. "What's that?" "Oh it's this Talking Heads stunt, I've got it all from that. Lots of tricks are from David Byrne." But Robocop Kraus are amazing. They did this thing at the end of their set where Thomas goes up to the drum kit and picks up the snare drum and then he walks into the audience with the snare drum while the drummer follows him and they're drumming as they walk around the room, it's amazing. I just remembered now, he told me, he stole that from Les Savvy Fav [laughs]. All of these tricks, they're just stolen from other bands.
>> Last Great Film I Saw
Spider-Man 3
I liked it. It was all right. I read all these bad reviews about Spider-Man 3, you know? It got a bit of a kick didn't it? I mean, I love Spider-Man. I've loved Spider-Man since I was about 7. So, yeah, I was very excited. I wasn't let down. Bruce Campbell's very good in it. I thought it was just the right amount of campy. Towards the end, I think, there's a bit when both of them are really sad, when Kirsten Dunst is sad with Mary-Jane, but I was laughing a bit too much. That was a bit too campy. I cry at films really easily. Like, when's the last time I cried? I cried at Rocky Balboa. Do you know the film Click? I saw the film Click. I can only watch quite simple films sometimes. "The Adam Sandler film Click, I'll watch that. That's easy to watch, I won't get confused or anything". I get a bit confused sometimes. Well, I sobbed all the way through it! I started crying like ten minutes in. It's a very sad film. I think if I watched it normally on the ground in a fun room or something, I wouldn't have been so sad. I cry at films really easily. I should've been crying at the end of Spider-Man 3, but I was laughing a little bit, which was probably wrong. But I still thought it was brilliant enough. So that's the last thing... it was much better than Superman Returns. That was terrible.
>> Last Great Book I Read
Michael Marshall Smith: The Intruders
It's by Michael Marshall Smith [Now he goes by just Michael Marshall], he's an English author, he wrote a science fiction book called Only Forward, and me and my brother were obsessed with it when we were younger. He's got a bunch of other books, Spares, and his book that came out last week I just finished reading it. I think it's good, it's called The Intruders. I don't normally read those sorts of books, like action-adventure books. I liked it actually, it's quite fun. I'm still deciding whether it was really good or not. I'm very indecisive.
>> Favorite Piece of Musical Equipment
Casio VL-1
I've got to say it's a Casio keyboard called the VL-1. It's almost like a synthesizer, it's very tiny. It's on loads of songs, it's a very early synthesizer, and it's got a calculator for some reason. Why would you want a calculator in your keyboard? I can't figure out what that's for. Are you going to take in some math lessons? [laughs] I can't understand what the point of that is. But it's a synthesizer, and it looks all tiny. I love it.
>>Favorite Record Shop
Big Brother Records, Parkstone, England
I think everyone's favorite record shop, probably, is the one they grew up with, isn't it? I grew up in Parkstone in Dorset, there's a second-hand record shop called Big Brother. Vinyl are £2.50 and CDs are £5. I never had much money [laughs] so I bought all these second-hand records on vinyl. Tapes are like £1.50. And they've got a bargain bin-- they're still there, actually, Big Brother in Parkstone-- and they had a bargain bin where you could get, like, 10 CDs for a pound or something. Most of my early record collection came from there. Most of my records now are from the bargain bin. I can't tell whether I made my music taste like that when I began, or if it was like that anyway. It's very confusing. But the man at the shop used to be really helpful, you know, when you'd buy something he'd be like, "Oh, you'd like this too." And he'd often be right. I think he used to also-- because I always spent a lot of money in there-- all of my money, because I never had very much [laughs] when I was younger. He used to put on records that he knew that I'd like when I came in and I'd say, "What's this?" and buy it from him. I think he did that on purpose. All of that is quite nice. I like second-hand record ships too. Selling your vinyl for half the price of your CDs is very good business. It's good. It's my favorite record shop.
>> Best Purchase of the Past Year
I bought a nice pair of trousers. I bought all my trousers in America-- I like Wrangler Staypress trousers that you can't really get here. I find it very hard to find nice trousers. Oh, no! I know the best thing I bought! It was when I was in America, and there's a television program called "Due South", they've got a Mountie in it, in Chicago. It's my favorite ever television program, I think it's brilliant. I was obsessed with it when I was younger. I think that's why I like it really. Over here the box set is about £100; it's very popular here. But I don't think it's very popular in America 'cos I managed to buy the box set on DVD, the whole of Series 3 for like $12. It's brilliant. [laughs] When we were in America on tour I chipped my tooth so I couldn't drink for about a week and a half because I was on very powerful painkillers, so I just played a show, and then I'd go back to the hotel or whatever and watch "Due South" and it would get me going [laughs]. It was good when I couldn't drink. The painkillers in America are so much stronger, I had this chipped tooth and I was like, "They've got these powerful painkillers," and I was like "Fuck!" Our soundman said I was singing like Frank Sinatra from all these powerful painkillers [laughs]. Saying everything like twice as slow: [sings slowly] "Uhh, Change your name/ it's a cliché." I was a bit sleepy from all these powerful painkillers. So I was a bit like Frank Sinatra then I'd go back and watch "Due South." Just for a couple of weeks; it was good.
>> Best Thing I Did This Year
We played a show with Ghostface Killah which was pretty cool. It was a very unusual situation; we shared dressing rooms. It was very strange. I got introduced to him by the guy that was running the thing, and it was like, "Hello this is Ghostface Killah, this is Mr. Argos, pleased to meet you." [laughs] I quite like that sort of music. We played first, obviously, and we came off and I got drunk and then everybody sort of left. It was just the three of us and I was watching Ghostface Killah and I sort of had an epiphany: "We should be more like this!!" [laughs] I think I wrote that on my hand to remind everyone in the morning. From now on Art Brut is going to be more like Ghostface Killah [laughs]. It was mad. Sharing a very small dressing room with Ghostface Killah and enjoying his set so much I wanted to be more like him.
>> Favorite Venue
The Central, Parkstone, England
It's a place by where I grew up, actually, it's a place called The Central in Parkstone, where I grew up. I was in the Art Goblins and we used to play there when no one else would let us play. There were very kind when I was about 17 or so. Ian was in a heavy metal band that used to play there and we used to support him. I would like old small, pub music venues, you know, where you can go there every night and it's like a pound in and stuff. I love watching brand new bands that have just started, where the bass player is singing the wrong… either he doesn't have a microphone or like… everyone's singing and they're not looking after him and they can't play their instruments yet. That's my favorite sort of gig, I think, a band's first gig; brilliant to watch. They're so enthusiastic, I think I saw so many bands like that when I was growing up-- or I was in so many bands like that when I was growing up [laughs]. That's probably my favorite music venue. It was my first, like, when I was 15… maybe you don't have this in America, but I was drinking at 15, and that's where they served me. So thank you for that [laughs]-- for the path of destruction that they sent me on.
>> Favorite TV Show
"House"
It's not over here yet, but I have an American girlfriend now and she's been downloading "30 Rock" and we've been watching it here. Tina Fey is brilliant. It's very funny, I've been watching that a lot. Oh, and "House" is my favorite TV program. I'm obsessed with "House". I want to make sure to download it for me from America. It's on on Thursdays here on Channel 5. And I don't want to jump ahead, you know, I want to watch it one at a time, when it comes out. I don't want to waste it all. I'll watch it all at one go and I'll be finished. It can't be finished! I'm enjoying it too much. I bought the box set of "House", Series 2, about a month ago and I watched it all the way through about three times. It's brilliant. And Hugh Laurie is fantastic. But "House" is the best TV program ever made [laughs]. We were actually on tour with Maxïmo Park, and I had a chance to stay in Newcastle or come back early in the day, and I came back earlier. I flew back just to watch "House" [laughs]. The flight is very cheap; it was like £50 or something. It was brilliant. "I'm going to fly home to my house! So I can watch 'House!'" It's brilliant. And I said "Due South" was the best thing I bought this year, but it's probably the "House" box set.
>> Favorite Video Game:
I'm not very good at video games. I got very angry recently when I walked into the record shop, like a Virgin Megastore or something, and the first thing you saw was computer games, not records. I was very angry. It's like, records first, video games second. Jasper plays a lot-- Halo, on the XBox, I think that was the last game I played. It's not my favorite, but I can't play a game; I'd rather sing about it: [singing to the tune of the Doors' "Hello, I Love You"] "Halo, I love you, you're my favorite game," or [to the tune of the Beatles' "Hello Goodbye"] "I saw go out, you say Halo, Halo, Halo!" I'd actually sing that quite often, like he wouldn't go out; he'd stay and play Halo. So for Jasper I'll say Halo's my favorite game, because of all the songs we wrote about it. [sings] "Halo, Halo/ You say go out, I say Halo" [laughs]. That's why I like it: I like Halo because we used to write funny songs about it.
>> Favorite Radio Show
I like Mark Riley on 6Music. He's very good, yeah. You can get 6Music on the internet, can't you? It's not quite as good as it used to be before, like a long time ago. They had a radio show like in the 90s with him and Mark Radcliffe, it was called Mark and Lard, and they always-- it was how I got into Belle and Sebastian, that was actually when the radio played things like Belle and Sebastian and David Devon. They had an impression on me years ago. I would also listen to him because of that. And his voice stuck so well, I've been such fan of his for years. It's a very good show. Yeah, I listen to it when I'm home and stuff. I feel bad for having a favorite radio show because all the other radio shows are going to turn me off [laughs].
>> My Ringtone
I just got a new cellphone and I don't know how to change it. So it's like hip hop beats or something. Whatever the phone comes with, I'm stuck with it. I got my phone yesterday. My old phone-- that Mikey our drummer gave me-- is whatever noise the phones make in "24". [sings] "De-de-de-do." That noise, it's like that, which is funny because everyone has that in London. I like "24", I'd like to hear that, like I'm saving the world. I've used that in my phone, the Jonathan Richman song called "I'm Straight". It begins like [sings] "I've tried this number three times already today"…and he's calling somebody up. I think I'll probably do that later [laughs]. That's a good one. "What's up? Phoning somebody up." And there's a message and it's Jonathan Richman's voice coming on again. That's good. "I'm Straight". That will be my ringtone later.
