Richard:
Where are you and how are you?
Courtney:
We're in London. We're a little tired. And I
think Britpop is dead. It's a bit boring. We went
to Pulp the other night and I've never seen so
many bored people. 20,000 bored people!
Richard:
They need Hole to get back there, don't they?
Courtney:
They're so desperate, I can't wait.
Richard:
How are you guys feeling? Are you feeling at this
point relieved, excited or nervous on the eve of
the release of the album?
Eric:
All of the above.
Courtney:
Yeah. Having had to listen to the record so many
times I'm sick of it. So I have no perception of
it any more. I know it's good, that's all. But
playing it live and offering it to the souls of
the world will be exciting.
Richard:
When will you be playing it live?
Courtney:
Not for a while. Not until January.
Richard:
So it's going to be a while before you get to
Australia?
Courtney:
Well, we're going to do one of those big 110-day
slogs. I'm sure we'll make our way down there.
Richard:
Courtney you just said you're feeling a bit sick
of it. Literally how many times have you heard
these songs?
Courtney:
Well, let's see. I had something to do with
writing every one of them...so from the moment of
inception until now, I don't know? Maybe 1,000?
There's each permutation as well like "Sugar
Coma". That started the day Melissa played
it just to us at Reading and then it moved on to
this sort of unplugged thing. And then it turned
into this weird song about Evan (Dando), then it
turned into this other sort of other song, and
then it turned into "Boys On The
Radio". So that took four years. It had a
chorus, then it had a bridge; then we took away
the bridge, then we put another bridge in. And so
on and so forth.
Richard:
Is that a typical example of the other songs?
Courtney:
No. Like "Northern Star" was written in
45 minutes, words and music. So I mean it's
crazy.
Richard:
Do you reckon it all hangs together, given that
there were so many different approaches and that
it was spread over that period of time?
Eric:
I think that helped it.
Melissa:
It gave it a lot of balance.
Courtney:
And discipline. Because everything's so
restrained and meticulously gone over...and I
don't just mean meticulous in terms of it being
slick, I mean meticulous in terms of it having
the restraint to know when to let a flaw be a
flaw or when to let a vulnerability be a
vulnerability...I think that it really helped it
having that much time to breathe. Bands get
pushed to make records so quickly that they don't
have time to make giant leaps. And then there's
this lack of ambition from people to make
ambitious, magnificent, classic rock records,
because it does take some time to really do it
right.
Richard:
I was going to ask you to compare it to Live
Through This. To my ears, it's got a bit more
polish and a bit more sheen. I don't mean it's a
more commercial record, but do you see it that
way too?
Courtney:
I see it as a hugely more commercial record! And
it has a lot more sheen. So that's how I see it.
Richard:
Good, I didn't want to offend you with those
words.
Courtney:
No, see, that's the whole problem and I think I
address this lyrically on the record as well.
There's a huge problem with people in my
generation who have this conflict over what is
selling out. And the problem is that people
between the ages of 23 to 33, and certainly
amongst my peers in songwriting, tend to not be
ambitious because then they're somehow selling
out and to me it's sort of ridiculous because
we're now coming to the end of the millennium and
there aren't that many classic records by people
in my age group. It's ridiculous. We had signed
on to the corporate sponsorship years ago, and
you know what you're doing when you sign on for
corporate sponsorship. You're trying to be heard
and you're trying to be heard without
compromising and that's a really hard thing to
pull off. How do you do it? You look for
examples. Pulp Fiction's a good example of
something where somebody didn't compromise his
vision and it was also really successful and
appealing. Do you know what I mean?
Richard:
Yes, totally.
Courtney:
So it doesn't offend me if you call something
commercial. That's part of the intention. I mean
that in the most Beatles-worshipping,
Hollies-worshipping, you know Abba-worshipping
way. And also in the most Polly
Harvey-worshipping, Girls Against
Boys-worshipping...come on Melissa don't let me
leave one out....(laughter). Yadda yadda yadda...
Richard:
What will your response be if the criticism is
made of this album that you've sold out? What
will you say to that criticism?
Courtney:
Honey, they said I sold out the day I was born!
What's new? That's a new one? Oh, I didn't know.
Sorry! I thought I sold out when I did the cover
of Flipside.
Eric:
(laughs)
Richard:
Fair enough. You've answered that criticism. Just
getting back to that point of what is cool and
what isn't...
Courtney:
If it's not one thing it's another thing! Knock
it off!!!!
Richard:
Oh all right, but it is ---
Courtney:
Leave me alone
Richard:
OK.
Courtney:
You're never going to knock it off, it's not in
your nature. (But) I guess this is the way, this
is my karma. It's my destiny. I've learned to
accept it anyway.
Richard:
What was the most pressure for you to deal with
in making this album?
Courtney:
Pressure from ourselves internally. That's the
way it's always been. When we first started our
band, other bands would practice three nights a
week and we'd practice seven. You know the
Beastie Boys took five years to make a record too
and it's a fine Mantronix/old '70s referenced
Beasties record...y'know it's great. But I'm
fully aware that we have to work five times
harder than them. And so the pressure just comes
from inside of our heads. And my brain in
particular. Having to go through real changes and
processes in the composition. Not the recording
but the composition. The composition was really
hard for me 'cause I had to grow and I had to be
forced to grow.
Melissa:
And we worked with a producer, Michael Beinhorn,
who doesn't take half-assed as any acceptable
answer. He pushes you until you're blue in the
face and you've done the best work you could ever
do.
Courtney:
And then he makes you do it again.
Richard:
Did you come to hate him?
Courtney:
No way. He has a reputation that people say
they'll never work with him again, but what I
realised....and I got this maybe from leading a
more disciplined lifestyle and going and doing my
film stuff which is a very disciplined
experience...I came to the conclusion that rock
people that say that must be just pussies
because, yeah Michael's not the kind of guy you
want to go home and drink a beer with, but he was
capable. The reason I...we... chose him was he'd
made really, really, really good records but he'd
never made a great record yet, and I didn't want
somebody like Butch (Vig) or Brian Eno or Daniel
Lanois. Somebody who'd already made a great
record. I wanted somebody who'd made really good
records but who was ready to make a great record
just like we'd made really good records and we
were ready to make a great one. So I didn't need
him to be my buddy, I needed him to kick my ass.
Richard:
That's a tough call for a producer, especially
with your reputation Courtney.
Eric:
(laughs)
Courtney:
Exactly. You've got to be a real man or a woman
about it. But yes, I'm pretty passive. That's the
big dirty secret about me.
Richard:
OK Melissa and Eric, please come in at this
point.
Courtney:
Yeah, say something about my passivity.
Melissa:
(coyly) Oh ha ha...Ummmm...Yes. We all worked so
hard.
Courtney:
I think it's a Madonna thing with me. I have this
trainer in New York. I was working out really
hard, and he says, 'Are you a Leo?'. And I'm
like, 'No! Why are you saying that? 'Cause I work
out really hard!?'. I'm like not even a Leo. I'm
a double Cancer, I'm really sensitive!!!! I think
it's because I work really hard and I'm kind of
loud that people think I'm really...I don't know.
Eric:
I always tell people she's a pussycat but no one
believes me.
Courtney:
Ask the people I've gone out with. Except for the
people that go on tabloid shows. They're just
bitter.
Richard:
They're just bitter?
Courtney:
Well I guess so, why else would you go on a
tabloid show?
Richard:
Well it seems to be the norm in America.
Courtney:
Yeah. $500. "You're going to get on
TV!". That must be what it is! All Americans
want to be on TV, maybe that must be it. There's
not that many of them that do that but there are
a few.
Richard:
Would you describe this album Courtney as
strongly autobiographical?
Courtney:
Having watched 'Cabaret' last night and watched
'Cabaret' a couple of times during the making of
the record, I would describe it as a narrative in
many places and very personal in others. But I
can't predict how or what people are going to
project onto the lyrical content. But I think
that people would be very, very surprised if they
knew the real intent behind some of the lyrics
they're going to hear. They're going to think is
that one thing that they know about, or another
thing. You know any songwriter worth their salt
writes autobiographically, but I also wrote from
other people's perspectives as well.
Richard:
You know that certain assumptions are going to be
made about what these songs are about. Are you
ready for all of those?
Courtney:
Well yes, I had to be during the making of it
too. But this is not Sleeps With Angels (Neil
Young's '94 album). This is not a song or a
record about one incident in my big huge life.
I've had a lot of things in my life and being the
lyric writer gives me a lot of responsibility.
And the amount of celebrity that I have gives us
a platform that I think is a really great thing.
So we needed to be as ambitious as we were when
we were making this record. Especially if you
compare this to Live Through This, I showed a lot
of restraint as a lyricist, because a lot of
stuff that happens to me is really none of your
business. You know Bob Dylan once said 'I don't
tell you 100% of my business because what I
choose to tell you is better than anybody else'.
And I'm not going to be Judy Garland and die in
front of a thousand clowns. And you know I think
that that's a pretty brilliant philosophy.
Richard:
How cathartic was this album for you in terms of
writing the lyrics and getting...not your side of
the story out...but your emotions and your
feelings out onto a record? You must have put
some of your own personal side on this album?
Courtney:
I don't mean to get defensive with you, but my
side of the story! I mean my side of what story?
There's more than one story in my internal,
spiritual, emotional, sexual, physiological, and
mental life as a lyricist than you know the event
of...you know this or that. And if I'm going to
keep any sanity at all, the things that are mine
that I experience, not the public, that I
experience, the people that I love presently, the
people that I love...duh...who aren't here etc.,
that's none of...I can't make that people's
business any more. Live Through This was written
whenever that was made. I could very easily open
my diary for the world to see but I have no
interest in doing that. I wanted to write
brilliant songs that would say something and I'm
excited to have the power and the capacity to do
that.
Richard:
All right. Let's talk about one of many recurring
themes throughout the album. The word 'beautiful'
seems to come up a fair bit in the lyrics. Can
you tell me why?
Courtney:
I'm not quite sure why, but for the song
"Reasons To Be Beautiful" I had been in
a hotel room making a great 20-reason list of
reasons to be ugly. Everything from having people
leave you alone, to living a nice solitary
misanthropic life. I guess I'm singing about
inspiration and why should I bother. And I don't
mean outer physical, I mean inner excellence. My
inner beauty, my inner magnificence if you will.
Why should I bother? What is there to guide me or
teach me and to make myself excellent. I mean why
should I bother? And I guess I was really
nihilistic in that I was really looking for a
reason and I couldn't really find it. At that
point that we wrote the song. In other songs, I
just like the word. I like saying the word B E A
U T I F U L. Large and sexy. It's a good word.
Richard:
It's a real Elizabeth Taylor type word, isn't it?
Courtney:
It's very Virginia Wolf! That's astute of you.
Ten points.
Richard:
I must apologise, I only saw Larry Flint for the
first time today on video, and I must actually
congratulate you on your performance. I knew you
did a good performance from what everyone had
said in the past.
Courtney:
We have to believe everything we read of course
because everything we read is always true.
Richard:
Of course, it's the 20th century.
Courtney:
OK, go on.
Richard:
But I wanted to know whether that whole Hollywood
experience and you getting more into acting was
making you analyse what people regard as being
beautiful these days?
Courtney:
Oh yeah, absolutely. It's very weird and
educational in that way. OK I'll tell you
something. In rock, if I say to you 'You were
popular in high school', that's a high insult.
That means that you're a class traitor, a poser.
What are you doing here, right? If you sit across
from George Clooney, which I've done, and you say
'You were popular in high school?'. He looks at
you and says 'Yeah, that's why I came to
Hollywood'. God, that's like two whole different
things.
Richard:
That's so true.
Courtney:
It's totally true. I'm gonna to do a movie in
September with Jim Carey and Danny de Vito. It's
like the Andy Kaufman movie. It's called 'Man on
the Moon'. And I had my first dinner with Jim
Carey, and this is a guy who did live stand-up
comedy. He's a freak, he's an adrenalin addict.
When he gets into the whole theatre of the
subversion he's like a bit of a rock star. Like
when he starts screaming, which he did because it
was my birthday, he screamed happy birthday to
me. And listen, I said to him, 'Were you popular
in high school?' and he goes 'Oh yeah'. I just
about died. What is wrong with these people!?
Like if you're going to do a movie with me you
have to pretend you were a loser in high school
or else we're never going to get along.
Richard:
I'm just actually picturing you at a dinner table
with Jim Carey and wondering whether anyone else
got into the conversation at all.
Courtney:
Yeah, he talks a lot! He talks more than me. But
I'll tell you how I balanced it out. I had dinner
with Jim Carey out in Brentwood - that's the
plush neighbourhood in Los Angeles - and I felt
kind of desolate when I was done with my big
Hollywood dinner. So me and my friends went to
the Bauhaus reunion! So it felt nice and
balanced. My punk side balanced my Hollywood
side. So as long as I do things like that I stay
balanced.
Richard:
That's funny 'cause I was reading about that
Bauhaus reunion and you were one person who came
to mind because I knew you were into Bauhaus at
one point.
Courtney:
Well yeah. You just have to listen to out first
record ha? (burst of laughter). People still come
up to me...what's the song that's totally almost
note for note?
Eric:
Oh, "Mrs Jones".
Courtney:
No, the Bauhaus song...
Eric:
"Dark Entries".
Courtney:
"Dark Entries". Someone came up to me
just about a month ago and goes, 'Hey!' and I
turned around and they go, 'Great cover of
"Dark Entries"' and just walked away. I
thought that was really good. He was really cute,
too. I was like 'where's that smart ass going?'.
Richard:
Back on the beauty side of things, what are you
trying to say in the track "Celebrity
Skin"?
Courtney:
Well that's sort of the Cabaret track. If you
watch Cabaret and you watch Joel Gray in that
first song (sings) "Welcome la dah di
dah" it's really tongue in cheek. It's a bit
of a short burlesque song. Like in a
"Diamond Dogs" kind of way it gets you
into the record. It's not a rock opera, please!
But it has elements of that pretension and bloat,
but I think it's a very conscious allowance of
pretension and bloat from the '70s and then we
pull it back and that song definitely has a
little of that.
Melissa:
Will it be a hit on your Triple J?
Courtney:
Yeah. Are you going to play it?
Richard:
I think it's a dead certainty. A couple of us at
the station heard it the other day for the first
time and we were just completely blown away.
Courtney:
That's good.
Richard:
The first thing that hit me when I heard your
vocals, and I'm not really all that technically
minded, but I just went 'God, there's so much
compression on this'.
Courtney:
THERE IS NOT!!!!! (Slight Pause)Is there? I don't
know. Some of it was supposed to have this Albini
quality. Eric, is there really a lot of
compression on it?
Eric:
It's on everything though.
Courtney:
Fuck you, don't say that on the radio! You're
such a dick!
Eric:
There's not a lot. I mean there's....
Courtney:
IT'S STANDARD!!! WHAT DO YOU WANT??? Do you want
P.J.Harvey 4 track demos!!??
Richard:
No!! That wasn't a criticism!!! You're taking
this as a criticism. I was like 'Oh my God this
is like an AM radio hit from the '70s!'.
Courtney:
Yeah OK.
Eric:
That's the way it was mixed. There were different
ways of mixing.
Courtney:
"Awful" was supposed to have that
compressiony type of vibe too.
Melissa:
You have to remember, it's all been processed
through the chemical brains of Eric and Michael
Beinhorn a million times. It's like ridiculous.
Courtney:
Yeah, if we didn't stop them with our feminine
sense of the earth they'd still be trying to
build up a solar tuner to the fucking sun or
something! But you know what? "Northern
Star" has the guide vocal. And "Heaven
Tonight" is just guide vocals too. And first
take, first time, like lyrics weren't even on the
page. Boom!
Eric:
And "Dying" and "Northern
Star" both have the guide guitar.
Richard:
And you were saying "Northern Star" was
written in about 45 minutes.
Courtney:
Yes, it was magical.
Richard:
It is a magical song. It's a very powerful song
too.
Courtney:
We were finishing the record, and we had 12 songs
too which didn't make it. One is Melissa's which
is really really good, and I think Michael wasn't
going for it with that one and I think we'll whip
it out again later. And then there was that
Billy/Eric male wank off thing, but I just hated
it so much. If I ever hear it...I know it's going
to come out on bootlegs and I'm going to die. So
I don't even want to talk about it. So anyway I
felt it was really unbalanced. We had this big
California record...y'know Hotel California on
fire, Rumours from hell...and I just felt like
there wasn't any Seattle on it. There wasn't any
Norse, from the north. Me and Melissa are
certainly from the north. As much as I've lived
on the west coast most of my life, with the
exception of THE TIME I LIVED IN NEW ZEALAND!,
I've also lived in the north, and I really wanted
a song that evoked something cold. And Eric has a
way...he won't tell you that he's written a riff
he'll just start playing guitar acting really
nonchalant so you have to keep your ears open all
the time so that you go 'Oh that's really good'.
It's completely passive aggressive but it seems
to work out all right. And I heard that riff and
I said 'What is that?'. And we just wrote it. And
we showed it to Michael and then I thought 'Wow
this is really balanced now!'. But the next day I
thought it was too depressing, I needed one more
thing that was happy. So the next day we came
back to the studio and I said 'I'm not leaving
until I have a song I can play my daughter
tonight.' Eric wrote at that point the music for
"Heaven Tonight". This beautiful,
Fleetwood Macesque lovely little pop song that I
could take home and play for my daughter. So then
the record was balanced.
Richard:
And what did Frances Bean make of "Heaven
Tonight"? Did she like it?
Courtney:
A-ha. Because it has the word "happy"
and it has the word "girl" in it.
Richard:
Does she like music a lot?
Courtney:
Well, she likes the Spice Girls. She doesn't like
us so much. She kind of does. I caught her saying
to her friend 'My mum's the biggest rock star',
and I said 'Frances you can't say that, people
will think you're pompous'.
Richard:
I bet it doesn't stop her.
Courtney:
No it doesn't. She is a Leo. She's not a Cancer,
she is a Leo.
Richard:
We should cover the Billy Corgan side of things
as well. What was his involvement in the making
of this record?
Courtney:
He was immense help to me as a singer, but to put
things into some perspective...This record took
about 24 months to make. Actually more like 18.
Like two pregnancies back to back. But he came
out to LA for about twelve days when he was doing
his Batman stuff, and he spent about ten of them
with me and Eric, and two of them with me, Eric
and Melissa. And I found myself in a rut about
two-thirds into the writing of the record. And
maybe a little further along than that even. I
just wasn't really breaking through into the
phrasing, and I needed this kind of understanding
of music that I didn't have. Of a Frank Sinatra,
of Don Henley, of ELO, of like stupid pop. And I
couldn't do it. I didn't know how. I, unlike
Billy Corgan, didn't spend 12 years learning
guitar, and I unlike Eric Erlandson didn't spend
12 years learning guitar in my room and then not
sing. So I couldn't really get it from Eric or
Melissa because they're sort of family and it was
a different thing I was looking for. But he said
'I can really really help you with this', and
then I said 'yeah, and when you do, everyone's
going to say you wrote everything'. And he made
the pitch that 'if you're going to go most of the
way up the mountain you should probably try to
get all the way there, and I'm the only person'.
And it's true, he is the only person that really
can kick my ass and get me off my ass and get me
to be quiet. I think sitting in a room with him
turning these songs over to him, having him help
me with arranging the vocals and arranging stuff
was a really hard process for me because I had to
be so submissive to him. And I don't know if
you've ever interviewed him...
Richard:
Yes I interviewed him when he was in Australia
about two months ago.
Courtney:
He's a big boss. I'll tell you something, that
guy is the biggest boss in the world. He's the
General! And he was like a maths teacher that
wasn't giving me the answers. So I really learned
a lot from the experience and it was really
really positive. And you know me and Billy have
such a weird, rich mythical history together that
I think it was really important that he helped do
this with me too.
Richard:
And was it easy enough to put the history aside
and get down to work?
Courtney:
No, we used the history.
Richard:
So that was a help?
Courtney:
Yes, that's the reason he can boss me around
maybe, I don't know. But there's a spiritual
nature to the history, you know. It's no one's
business, but it's there.
Richard:
So when he came out and said all that
Svengali-type stuff recently, that was him just
being a prat wasn't it?
Courtney:
No, he was just drunk on some lager! He was
talking to a British journalist and he was in a
bad mood and the next day he was in a good mood
and then he was talking about what a goddess I
am. I'm just keeping consistent. And y'know, he's
right! There's not a Svengali thing about
it...y'know, fuck him!...but there's definitely a
deep love that I don't know whether you could
call a day to day kind of love but there's a deep
history between us. And he can boss me around in
a way nobody else can. So he really helped me.
And he's brilliant. He's absolutely brilliant.
Richard:
OK terrific. And that's where we'll leave it
because I think we're out of time. But I
appreciate the time...Courtney, Eric and Melissa,
thanks for that.
Courtney:
Also, the last thing I'll just say... There's 12
songs on the record and he had some composition
on five. So it is not the majority.
Richard:
No I know. I read this stuff off the Internet and
then I actually got the rundown of the tracks and
the songwriting credits and it is a very minor
part of this album.
Courtney:
I wouldn't say minor, I would say it's important
but because of the fact that I'm in the
possession of two breasts and some ovaries,
people tend to think that we as women don't write
our own material or something. And I knew getting
into it that that might come up in this weird
fucked-up, non-matriarchal society that we are
presently living in that I'm going to change by
the year 2004. So it will all be different then.
And it'll be an Amazon planet and this stuff
won't happen any more.
Richard:
I hope that vision is true Courtney, I certainly
do.
Courtney:
(Laughs) I bet you do.
Richard:
Oh come on, I do.
Eric:
Hey, come on let's stick together here.
Courtney:
I have the rules for my utopia all written down.
Should I send them to you?
Richard:
Please, I'd love to read them, I'd love to see
them.
Courtney:
You'll still have a job, you'll just have to do
different things.
Richard:
Oh I don't mind that, that sounds fine.
Courtney:
You'd have to serve us.
Richard:
Oh. All right Eric, I'll stick with you. Great
album Eric, you really did great work on that.
ALL:
(Laughter) Bye.
