I came across a copy of a French music magazine, “Rock & Folk” with TLSP on the cover. Here’s the scans and interview (via Google Translate). Enjoy! ☺️
THE LAST SHADOW PUPPETS
THE POP LIGHT CAN COME FROM TWO SCRUBBY BRITISH KIDS. AN ARCTIC MONKEY, ALEX TURNER AND HIS BUDDY, MILES KANE UNVEIL THIS INCREDIBLE PROJECT. BY PHILIPPE MANOEUVRE, PHOTOS BY CHLOE DES LYSSES.
A pop, pop, pop world? Why not? But here we return again and again, to the same abracadabra concept of the pop masterpiece. Everyone knows pop masterpieces, everyone has their own favourite. Tell me your pop masterpiece and I'll tell you who you are. Because since the beginnings of the Beatles - and even Elvis had already indicated the direction with "Heartbreak Hotel" - modern pop has never stopped going back and forth between raw discharges of ultra-violent electricity and research into atmospheres, and especially melodies.
For the May 68 special edition, we meet Philippe Paringaux, retired from Paris but not from rock. Working from his Brittany home on numerous musical translations, personal writings, and other works, Paringaux never stops listening and re-listening to rock, like the rest of us. His vision is clear: "From 1962 to 1972," he explains, "we experienced the age of melody. Then it dried up, and since then, we've experienced something else." The era of the riff? The great shaker world? Something else.
Extraordinarily, the examples of the great masters remain. We could have filled a column with them, with sleeves and notes to back them up. But a simple statement of the facts will suffice for the reader: "Pet Sounds", “Rubber Soul”, “…Melody Nelson”, the White Album and "Abbey Road”, “Ziggy Stardust”, Roxy Music, Marc Bolan, Scott Walker, Todd Rundgren, Big Star Dwight, Twilley Band, Robert Wyatt's "Rock Bottom," Love, Gene Clark, The Byrds, and CSN&Y. Not to mention Phil Spector's Wall of Sound. There it is, very hastily summarized, the pop of rock 'n' roll. Sometimes it's good to sort and organize your ideas. Especially when you're writing about the Arctic Monkeys.
A band that appears in these columns on the express recommendation of Hedi Slimane. When the first album comes out, it's immediately madness in Great Britain: on the day of the record's release, 300,000 buyers. And it should be noted, there's no local smear campaign, no old fogey explaining that it was better before, that they should have rehearsed more. No, the very British Monkeys fever attracts colossal worldwide attention, the forums go wild, and the Arctic Monkeys become the darlings of festivals overnight, offering their frenetic, tense, and hard-hitting rock to totally captivated crowds. It's beautiful, a rock 'n' roll country.
London, very special correspondent
Precisely, on this Monday in February, Great Britain is warming up under a timid spring sunshine. From St Pancras, we take a cab to a faux-designer, truly posh hotel. We're munching on a lukewarm burger when our guests for the day, Miles Kane and Alex Turner, arrive. With their shrew-like looks and bowl cuts, they look like two runaway schoolboys who've come to flirt in the hotel bar. In fact, our two pop stars have left their respective bands to record a kind of improbable kind of UFO, a twelve-track album that's like a collision of an entire, ultra-enjoyable catalog of pop effects plucked from a fertile past. Are there any songs, or have our two buddies simply piled on the effects to feign the real thing? Impossible to say before a hundred listens. But judging by the reception on radio and some TV stations, there's a risk of a small tsunami surrounding this record, something nothing in the Arctic Monkeys' two albums could have predicted.
Putting down their sodas, Alex in a pea coat and Miles in a jacket introduce themselves and follow the press officer into a simple conference room. The decor is reminiscent of a police office. A table, three chairs, and a pencil lying there. Everyone opts for coffees at the generous suggestion of the hostess. Here we go...
Rock&Folk: OK, here we go... And the questions are plentiful... Where did this record come from? How did the idea come about? Who's behind it? Your respective bands, what do they think of it?
Miles Kane: That's a lot of questions!
Alex Turner: There's a lot of people at the door!
Miles Kane: Please choose your questions (general laughter).
R&F: OK... it's your turn!
Miles Kane: Once upon a time...
Alex Turner: Ah, you're starting from there?
Miles Kane: From the beginning of our romance, yes.
Alex Turner: Years ago... Miles was playing in his band, the Rascals, and I was playing in my band, the Arctic Monkeys. We did our first tour together. And then something happened, we became friends. Miles and his band toured with us again, a friendship was born, and we said to ourselves... Anyway, we made this project that...
Miles Kane: One day...
Alex Turner: So, one day, we would make an album together.
R&F: So what's the name of the band?
Miles Kane: This is the first interview we're giving. It's pretty important for us to tell you, because we haven't told any journalists yet, you'll be the first to know, it's going to be called...
Alex Turner: It's called The Last Shadow Puppets.
R&F: Wow!
Alex Turner: I like first times.
R&F: Are you the same age?
Alex Turner and Miles Kane: Yeah, yeah, sure, okay, the same, that's it, yeah.
Alex Turner: Miles is from Liverpool. I lived two hours away...
Miles Kane: After two years, our friendship has become amazing. Hasn’t it, Alex?
Alex Turner: Totally!
Miles Kane: And we made the record, but not just any record, because we decided to create—very dramatically on our part!—an epic masterpiece-
R&F: Totally pop nonetheless...
Alex Turner: Yes, pop, so what?
R&F: Listening to this record might be quite a shock for the Arctic Monkeys fan...
Alex Turner: Very true.
Miles Kane: Sorry, we listened to the album "Scott Walker Sings Jacques Brel" and I wouldn't say it changed our lives, no, but it had a huge impact on us.
Alex Turner: Exactly.
Miles Kane: Scott Walker and Bowie, always Bowie of course.
Humor, dignity, and madeleines
R&F: To continue very quickly, we noted influences on this record from Lee Hazlewood, Phil Spector, Ennio Morricone, Love, The Byrds, Burt Bacharach, Scott Walker, Suede, Gainsbourg...
Miles Kane: Don't forget the Beatles and especially David Axelrod, for the strings. For example, "My Mistakes Were Made For You" is a tribute. We even found Axelrod's drum sound, identical strings, everything.
R&F: For our photographer, "it sounds like film music"...
Alex Turner: That’s it. We wanted to make a cinematic album.
R&F: Miles, your favourite film?
Miles Kane: The "Pink Panther" series. (chuckles).
R&F: From the first song, the rhythm races, it's like a spaghetti western...
Alex Turner: Absolutely. We wanted to make this record, I wanted to get these songs out of my head, OK? We met a guy named James Ford who had worked with the Monkeys and Miles too. We set aside two weeks in the summer and, immediately after the Benicassim festival, in the middle of August, Miles, James, and I left for the Black Box studio not far from Angers, in the smiling French countryside.
Miles Kane: Two weeks in France! We had never drunk so much red wine, devoured so many cakes. Do you know madeleine?
R&F: Madeleines? What do you mean, madeleines (follows a long rant about Proust and the Search for Lost Time)?
Alex Turner: Well, I'm addicted to madeleines.
R&F: Listening to the record, we wondered what strange drug had presided over the creation of this album?
Alex Turner: Madeleines.
Miles Kane: Come on, Phil, it's the new trendy high, admit it!
R&F: We find it hard to believe that mushrooms didn't play a role in your lush creation...
Alex Turner (laughs): No, no mushrooms entered the composition of this record, no... On the other hand, the idyllic atmosphere of sunsets, dawns over the countryside, all that, yes...
Miles Kane: Stop it, we didn't leave the studio for two weeks!
Which mentor?
R&F: Tell us about James Ford. Is he the mentor behind the whole project?
Miles Kane: Mentor? Alex and I write the songs, after all.
Alex Turner: James plays the drums, he does all the drums. He plays a lot of bass, keyboards, but in a way this record was made by three of us, the two of us and him. James plays the drums not too loudly while all modern drummers pound heavily like furious people. He digs the rhythm, discreet and chic, it's important...
R&F: At the same time, pop project or not, the sound remains rough, not polished. In short, an overall indie rock sound...
Alex Turner: Totally. Because if we set out to make a pop masterpiece with strings, which was totally our intention from the start, there's the risk of being corny.
R&F: Not corny, ever...
Miles Kane: There you go! Not corny or vulgar.
Alex Turner: Enter Owen Paley, formerly of Arcade Fire, who was fed up with concerts and came back to settle in Canada. This guy is our age, he hasn't done much before, so he wanted to express himself through us, but above all, he knows where not to go with the strings.
What pop music lacks
R&F: Another obvious question would be: Are you going to tour with this project?
Alex Turner: ...and the good answer would be: Why not, we hope...
R&F: There you go...
Alex Turner: There you go.
R&F: What this record says is: Apart from the brutal success of the Arctic Monkeys, we need pop, we need melodies to hold on to, right?
Alex Turner: Some fans will follow, that's clear...
Miles Kane: In pop, we have nothing! This stuff that's on TV is hot air.
R&F: Well, well, explain that to us. What is pop missing at the moment?
Miles Kane: It lacks class. The production is unreal, soulless.
Alex Turner: It lacks singable harmonies, it lacks melodies. It lacks everything, if you look at it closely.
Miles Kane: There's no sophistication anymore. At the same time, mind you, we didn't come to save the world either (laughs). We simply wanted to make a magnificent record, a pop record... And we didn't want to wait until we were fifty to buy violins.
Alex Turner: Nobody does that anymore. The rockers in English bands, if you talk to them about orchestration, it's immediately offensive.
R&F: What could you add?
Alex Turner: Nothing, just details. We can reveal that the first song on the record, the one that gives the album its title, was written last... Are you interested?
R&F: Are there any studio outtakes? Any unreleased tracks?
Alex Turner: Oh yeah, for the future box set in twenty years (laughs).
Miles Kane: Starting in January, we recorded some unreleased material for the B-sides. During the Christmas period, a new title stood out, "Separate And Ever Deadly." We added it to the album, keeping the number of tracks to twelve.
Alex Turner: We recorded in August, then we both went back on tour with our bands for two months. At Christmas, we listened back, recorded the B-sides, and Owen arrived in London for the strings. After three days, the mixing began, and that's it.
R&F: Were you surprised by the impact these strings had?
Alex Turner: Owen brought the record to life. It was amazing, suddenly our little demos, our sketches, were coming to life. We'd only been writing these songs since 2006, but we had no idea they would come out like this. The arrival of the strings boosted everything.
Clean, clean, clean
R&F: And the internet?
Alex Turner: What, the internet?
Miles Kane: I've never downloaded a single song in my life. Downloading is something I've never done. I collect my records, I'm a vinyl person without snobbery, CDs out of obligation, that's it...
R&F: The internet has certainly accelerated people's knowledge of music. On forums, everyone is always one click away from discovering loads of masterpieces. But what are your favorite Beatles albums?
Alex Turner: "Rubber Soul."
Miles Kane: "Revolver." The harmonies...
R&F: Serge Gainsbourg?
Alex Turner: That's James. He's a huge fan of "...Melody Nelson." I really like watching Gainsbourg's TV appearances. Every time he invents something, he does something amazing or hilarious. What a character!
R&F: How do you both compose? On guitar or piano?
Alex Turner: On guitar. Acoustic, eye to eye.
Miles Kane: We walk like caged lions, we twirl, we strum, we write, we throw the book of lyrics at each other. We start from nothing, we build these little songs and I write, I submit stuff to him, and he's like, "Yeah, that's it!" And if he rips his shirt off with joy at the end, it's good.
R&F: How do you divide up the vocals?
Alex Turner: Hell of a lot. Sometimes it's him, sometimes it's me, sometimes we harmonize.
Miles Kane: Alex loves to harmonize, and when we started singing together, it was a miracle. Our voices blended beautifully. As with songwriting, it's really a twin project.
R&F: Alex Turner, unlike your colleagues Amy Winehouse and Pete Doherty, you're never in the tabloids...
Alex Turner: That's just the way it is, I rarely go out. Most of the time, in fact, I stay at home composing. I'd describe myself as quite a boring guy, you know, I stay in my basement slaving away at my melodies. Not enough to stop the presses.
R&F: Explain your title, "The Age of Understatement"...
Alex Turner: Well, precisely because this album was created in a period when no one was trying anything anymore. Why not? That's a good reason.
R&F: How could we define good pop?
Alex Turner: If we knew, we'd make it. Pop can't be too subtle...
Miles Kane: That said, you shouldn't force anything either. It's somewhere in between.
R&F: Scott Walker is your absolute master, and yet he doesn't sell many records...
Alex Turner: That's the point. I know a lot of people won't like this record or understand it. Releasing this project on the market now is madness, almost utopian. I don't care about the result because we'll move on very quickly.
And the end
R&F: The rest?
Miles Kane: We're going to make videos, the first one is being filmed in Russia, the second for the upcoming single, and there will eventually be concerts...
Alex Turner: We might play the Olympia in Paris. This album calls for a beautiful venue like that. If people like the record, we'd like to play it in very beautiful venues. That would be fabulous. That's our dream at the moment.
R&F: You're not worried either...
Alex Turner: Very excited. That's what we wanted to achieve, and we did it. What could be better?
R&F: Do you recommend listening with headphones?
Miles Kane: ...And with dark glasses.
Not superstitious
An incredibly dynamic photo shoot follows, on the fly, in the hotel corridors, the meeting room, and then out in the street. Everything goes well, very quickly. The press officer rushes to phone this excellent news to her office. The photographer really directs the two rockers, who decide that "since she knows what she wants, we'll cooperate." Alex Turner barely refuses to pose in front of a green mural ("I'm not superstitious, but..."). Suddenly, the two boys look to the side, deaf to the photographer's calls, fascinated, hypnotized. A young Dutch woman, a top model, passes by in the street. An impromptu session ensues between the two pop stars and the Dutch beauty. We return to the hotel. Still under the spell of the divine and unexpected encounter, Alex Turner remains dreamy. Our hearts beat a little faster. What if this was pop, for real? ★
