ATN: It was an awesome album. Just that this album is bigger, it's more pop and ...

Love: We've always been pop, we just couldn't get there. We didn't know how. I was just listening for the first time -- I don't really listen to us a lot -- but I listened to that Christof record and it had "Twenty Years in the Dakota" on it. And that song could have been -- had I known what I know now -- genius. You know what I mean? As it is, I think it's hysterically funny and has good hooks in it, but it's not a hooky hit pop song. But it could have been had I known how to place things. I needed to learn. I didn't know how to learn. He needed to go and play every single Beatles song till he knew them backwards, so he understood that structure and why "Strawberry Fields" only has two chords, but then the melody changes like that. It's really Grunge 101, Punk 101, you learn this thing, you know what I mean? And Sonic Youth 101, we learned this one thing, that's what we learned. I don't have musical training. So we had to push ourselves really hard to get to the place where we could go, put in that Hollies part, put in that Saints part. Whatever.

Erlandson: The last record, a lot of people said things about Courtney screaming. That was melodic screaming. And that's why it worked. It still had that pop thing. And this record is more pop singing, without the screaming. But it's still us, it's still her singing....

Love: It's also revenge for me getting kicked out of bands for liking R.E.M. years ago.

Erlandson: But I think the direction of this record was very conscious too. We made the record we wanted to make and we went in the direction we wanted to go.

Love: It was hard.

Erlandson: It's not like a drastic departure from the last record. I think it's like an evolution.

Love: We always planned it.

Erlandson: Yeah, and that makes sense. If it's an evolution, it makes sense. If it's a departure and all of a sudden we're a techno band or whatever, that's when I think people go 'Whoa.' All we did was become bigger, better at what we do.

Love: Organically.

Erlandson: Organically. And just opened up. We just spread our whatever. [laughs]

Love: Somebody at the company said "What are you gonna wear?" "I don't know." "You wanna take a marketing meeting about that? We'll sit down and talk about it." What! I don't know what I'm gonna wear. I'm gonna wear what I feel like, I guess.

ATN: What about the guitar sound. Obviously a lot went into that. Is that one of the things that you've been working on for these years?

Love: Listen to him -- for years -- for three albums now. He's amazing. Sometimes he gets usurped by my shit, which is a tragedy to the American rock culture.

Erlandson: A lot of this album is me trying to squeeze in every second when there's not some singing, trying to do something. But there's not a lot of room on these songs. They're very vocally oriented and that's what we wanted. So as a guitar player, I'm playing very simple stuff. It's all about the sound.

ATN: But when you listen to it, it just hits you so ...

Auf Der Maur: It's also the production thing.

Love: The sonic stuff that he did is amazing.

Erlandson: That's the details. That's all the details. Our last record was made in five weeks. This record's made in a year. I had time to actually sit down and go 'OK' ...

Love: And be as anal as you wanted to be.

Erlandson: And it worked.

Love: And then I'm the anal editor. I'd come by. I think Melissa's the anal editor too. We come by when the males are going off and trying to find a solar tuner and stuff and tell them to stop and let it breathe. Which is good. It's a good balance.