A Date With The Light

Karen O

Interview Alexandra Weiss Photography Sandy Kim Styling Natasha Newman-Thomas

The first time I saw Karen O perform was in San Diego in screaming, she sang—almost whispered—the lyrics to Crush 2004. Fever To Tell, the debut from her band the Yeah Songs, her debut solo album. A lot had changed in the decade Yeah Yeahs, had dropped the year before, and she was onstage, since I’d seen her in San Diego. The had caught in her microphone cable. Writhing on the floor, she released three more and would soon go on hiatus; screamed the lyrics to the record’s biggest hits, “Date with Karen had married, and was soon to be a mother. the Night,” “Y Control” and “Maps,” songs that over the previous year had taken the band from grimy college punk Fast forward five years—fifteen since first seeing the Yeah rockers to indie superstars, with Karen as their bowl cut- Yeah Yeahs in California—and I’ve got Karen on the phone. rocking frontwoman. The Yeah Yeah Yeahs, along with bands Joining us is LA musician Moses Sumney, who performed like The White Stripes and The Strokes, were heralded in with Karen on the Crush Songs tour before releasing the early aughts as the latest saviors of rock ‘n’ roll, hoisting his acclaimed debut record, Aromanticism, in 2017. The leather, louche haircuts, sex and guitars back up the charts, contemporary music industry that lauded the album, a fast- which, for the previous few years, had been overrun with paced world of digital streaming and bankrupt record stores boy bands and virginal pop singers. And there was Karen. where audiences are voracious and music is released at warp Center stage, rolling on the ground, covered in beer. speed, is a far cry from the one that birthed Fever To Tell a decade and a half ago. And yet it’s still hungry for Karen O. The last time I saw Karen O perform was in New York in This March, she will release , the record she wrote 2014. This time, she stood upright on stage in a blue velvet and recorded with Danger Mouse while Moses was working dress, her hair grown out past her shoulders. Instead of on his debut. As the two of them catch up, Karen tells us

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about the record (“soundtrack-y” with a “Phil Spector-y” scared? Or are you sort of indifferent about the changes kind of vibe) and the anxiety that comes with releasing it into in the industry and are focused more on your art and life? the wild. She also reflects on how motherhood has impacted her career. In both cases, she’s figured out a way to embrace KO — I started getting nervous about releasing music into a uncertainty and accept the inevitability of sometimes fucking vacuum back in 2006. Now, we’re in 2019, and everything is up. But as she prepares to introduce new music with a new just warp speed. It’s completely changed since 2006. I entered collaborator into what’s essentially a new industry, she can’t the scene in 2000, and our first record came out in 2003, shake the daunting, nervous feeling—“What’s going to when it seemed like there were only a handful of releases happen to our baby?” that everybody knew about. If there was any buzz about a record, it actually had a huge ripple effect on the niche indie In 2004, that question might have plagued Karen, but today scene, but you could also make a mark on the mainstream she’s wiser. “We just wanted to make something that excites in a tangible way. A record cycle would last for a year and a us,” she says of the album. “Then, when you’re finished, half back then, and that’s the world I got started in. So, it’s hopefully you’ll feel good enough about it and yourself, that been hard wrapping my head around how short the shelf life whatever happens in the world, you can be happy and stand is. But now, when I do release a record, like the one with behind your work.” Danger Mouse, the good thing about it—and the good thing about what you do, as well—is, when we started this record, MOSES SUMNEY — When was the last time we saw each we did everything out of pocket, with no expectations from other? I believe it was at the Suspiria opening. Did you like anybody. We just decided to do what we wanted to do and the film? not worry about singles, or pressure, or anything like that. We just wanted to make something that excites us and makes KAREN O — I did. us happy. Then, when I like it whenever you actually have to someone just totally “Life is not black and white, it’s a put it out into the fucking goes for it, and world, you feel kind [Luca Guadagnino] million different shades, and there’s of like, ‘What’s going really just fucking to happen to our went for it with that so much absurdity. From the most baby? Is she just going one. I really respect to be thrown out of that—mad props horrible shit to the most beautiful, the window with the when people just go bathwater?’ At the all in. it’s just such a mixed bag, and same time, if even just a couple of people really MS — Were there even the worst stuff has something dig it, and it really any movies or music resonates with them, from 2018 that you beautiful in it.” then we can’t regret it, really enjoyed? or wish we had done something else. KO — Honestly, my concept of time is just completely all over the place—I have no idea what came out last MS — Well, luckily, both of you do have such big followings. year. I think it’s because I’m a mature mom—I’m pretty But the shelf life of the music industry now is incredibly sure the grey matter in my brain is pretty much destroyed daunting. from it. But movies I saw that I liked were Roma, The Favourite, and I really liked ColdWar. It’s a Polish film and KO — Yeah, I mean, you used to just have to put out a few I’m half Polish, so it really resonated with me. Music, music videos, maybe play on some TV show, and that was it. though—music is harder. I’m just having trouble with Now, it’s just a whole different thing. Making the record is the the whole industry, and I’m quite old-fashioned when it best part, even though it can be the hardest. It’s everything comes to how I listen, so I have no idea what came out else—the three billion other things you have to do now— when. When I like a song, I just like it—it could be from that gives me anxiety. But, with all that being said, I do truly any year. believe that music is the best, and it’s a big deal that people actually want to listen to my music. MS — You’ve got this new album coming out with Danger Mouse, but it’s been a few years since the last MS — When did you and Danger Mouse meet? And at what Yeah Yeah Yeahs record—even Crush Songs came out in point did you decide to actually make music together? 2014. What does it feel like for you to be releasing music in this current era, where everything moves so quickly? KO — We actually met in 2007. We wanted to make music Do you feel excited about it? Or do you feel nervous and together back then, but it didn’t really pan out. Then we

Top and skirt by MOSCHINO (courtesy of DECADES, INC.) would see each other at gigs here and there, or run into each I think we both recognized very early on is that we share a other in New York City at a bar or something, and finally, in similar heart in the way that we think about music and the 2015, we had dinner and decided, ‘Okay, it’s time for us to love that goes into it. My record is not devoid of love, and just get into the studio and see what happens.’ I think you can hear that in the way it’s made, even if the lyrics are about isolation, and loneliness, and the absence of MS — Releasing the album as Karen O and Danger Mouse, romance—I think there’s something inherently romantic in did you ever think of coming up with an actual band name? just discussing those feelings. So, when I think about Karen’s music or try to draw a through line between, let’s say Crush KO — I know I never wanted to come up with a band Songs and my first album, they’re actually not that different. name—I already have a band. But it also just felt like a true At the core, they’re both just about connection, and in a way, collaboration, and a partnership in every sense. that’s all the same thing to me.

MS — What does Lux Prima mean? KO — Absolutely. Connection is something that Moses and I have been blessed with—being able to emotionally KO — It means ‘First Light.’ connect with people through our music—and there’s a real, for lack of a better word, spirituality in both Moses’ and my MS — I really love the record, it’s really beautiful. When relationship to making music. There’s a spirituality in where I listened to it, I tried to listen really carefully to all of we go, the roads we travel within it, and at the heart of that the lyrics, and I wondered if there’s a connection or an is love. overarching theme to all the songs. Also, what was the songwriting process like? MS — Let’s talk about the song “Woman,” which is one of my favorites on the album. There’s a real wildness and freedom KO — I’d never worked with Brian [Burton (Danger in your voice, especially in the chorus, which feels like a kind Mouse)] before, so we both had to figure out what each of new thing for you. What’s the song about? For me, it feels other’s processes were, and because he’s a producer for the like you’re playing with this duality of being aggressive and most part, he’s very flexible in how he works with an artist. intimidating, but also being friendly and approachable. It’s But the way we did it was by just listening to music until it really tongue-in-cheek. would trip our trigger, and we happened to like a lot of the same stuff: a lot of sprawling, soundtrack-y music from the KO — It is, and I was verifiably pretty pissed at the time I ‘60s and ‘70s, and French or Italian artists. So, we’d listen to wrote that song. something that we both liked and start with a Phil Spector-y kind of vibe and just see where it went from there. Lyric- MS — Really? Why? wise, he told me that the majority of songwriters that he works with just come up with a vocal melody, and they deal KO — It was leading up to the election and I was just feeling with lyrics at the very end. But that’s just so alien to me. I this deep, quiet rage about how things were going backwards come up with words as I go along. for women because of the leader of our country, especially when there has been so much progress. So, there was a real MS — That takes so long. I always write lyrics last. fire brewing under the surface. That’s also why there’s that little tongue-in-cheek element to it, because I feel like with KO — Yeah, and it can be a huge waste of time, just sitting anything that has a bit more charge to it, there has to be there, wracking my brain, while we’re in the studio. But balance. I’ve never taken a real political stance on anything in that’s just the way I do things—I can’t write any other way, my music or my art—I normally come from a really personal especially because I feel like it’s so important to have an place—but I feel like I’m doing a disservice if I take even idea of a theme, or a subject. That really guides me with the something important much too seriously. Life is not black storytelling and what I feel like the songs are about, and that and white, it’s a million different shades, and there’s so much ends up affecting the melody. absurdity. From the most horrible shit to the most beautiful, it’s just such a mixed bag, and even the worst stuff has OFFICE—Thematically, both of you write a lot above love, something beautiful in it. There are always contradictions, just in different ways. For Karen, some of your most famous and I always want to present them in whatever I’m doing. songs have been about your relationships, or crushes; Moses, your last record was called Aromanticism. On the surface, MS — So, when you wrote that song, you didn’t want to just those seem like opposite ends of the spectrum. But do you write the equivalent of, ‘This is my angry song.’ think you both write from a similar place? KO — Right. It’s multi-layered, like we are, and like life is. MS — I feel like our music is about the same thing in a lot I feel like that represents the world more than being super of ways. Maybe that’s because I toured with her, so I was serious about everything, or not taking anything seriously able to feel the heart behind Karen’s songs, but one thing enough. It needs to be somewhere in between.

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“It’s easier to take things for granted if you think you know everything. And life isn’t as mysterious as we think.”

Suit by ACNE STUDIOS 96 97 Photography SANDY KIM — Little Big Man Gallery, Styling NATASHA NEWMAN-THOMAS — ICM Partners, Talent KAREN O, Makeup LOTTIE — LOWE & CO, Hair DYLAN CHAVLES – Art Department MS — Going off of that, how do you feel about the current person—to understand that you don’t really know what using Bumble & Bumble, Photo Assistants GILLES O’KANE, JOSHUA wave of feminism, especially how it’s playing out in the you’re doing. It’s hard, but it’s better, because it’s easier to NEWMAN, Fashion Associate MARGAUX SOLANO media? America is in this really interesting place, with the take things for granted if you think you know everything. president and the current administration constantly rolling And life isn’t as mysterious as we think. When you cut the back protections for women, and other-bodied people, and net from underneath you, you expand the possibility of in Hollywood, we see almost the opposite, where it’s trying everything around you, and that can be scary, because it also to fix itself with the #MeToo movement and outing all of expands the possibility for all of the worst things, like loss, or the men that have been fucking shit up for years and years failure. But it doesn’t bug you as much when you get older— and years. I’m always careful with this kind of question loss does, of course, but not so much failure, at least for me. when I’m talking to female artists because I recognize it It generally all works out. can be incredibly annoying or condescending, or even just repetitive, to constantly be hearing things like, ‘What’s it MS — Is there a freedom in writing songs like the ones you like as a woman in the music industry?’ but I do find your did with Danger Mouse? Like, do you feel less pressure to perspective particularly intriguing because you have been in uphold a standard you set for yourself with previous music, it for almost 20 years. or with Yeah Yeah Yeahs songs, since that is, in a lot of ways, your home base? I imagine that it’s maybe less personal than KO — It’s been such a long time coming, and the message writing something like Crush Songs. is finally out that it’s not cool to sexually harass or assault women and think you can get away with it. In my lifetime, KO — It’s one hundred percent a different vibe. There’s this is a brand new thing, that it’s finally out in the open, just much less pressure in the sense that it’s a brand new and I feel like because it’s been such a long time coming, start, a blank canvas, and you only get that once, when the heat and the rage and the energy is just so hot—it’s you work with someone for the first time. But it’s just crazed—because the floodgates have finally opened. So, like like any sort of recipe in a cookbook—you put a couple with anything, there has to be a period of time for that initial of ingredients together, and you don’t know exactly what shock, and upset, and rage, to sort itself out, so that it’s not you’re going to get, but sometimes it turns out delicious. so raw. But for me, I’m so appreciative of the #MeToo and For that first time especially, you get the innocence back, #TimesUp movements, especially because I have a little boy, and I just love it. Are you going to work with new people and I want him to grow up knowing that it’s not cool to treat for your next record? women that way, and that society won’t accept it, instead of thinking, ‘Oh well, boys will be boys,’ like it was when I was MS — Yeah, probably. I like working with different growing up. And for little girls growing up now, it doesn’t producers on different things, and right now I’m working have to be ambiguous that if someone is being creepy with with four people I’ve never worked with before. It’s you, or mistreating you, you don’t have to just accept it. been really fun and freeing in a similar way. After I made Before, you’d find yourself in these situations, and especially the first record I was very quickly like, ‘Oh let’s make for women in the entertainment industry, you’d want to another one because now I know how to actually make a leave, but have to think, ‘Shit, is this going to ruin my career record.’ But I’m finding now that maybe I don’t, because if I ghost on this pervert?’ So now, finally, you can walk away I’m working with new people and doing things I’ve never and say something. done before.

MS — Speaking of your son, you said in the press release KO — I think any artist worth their salt would say the for the album, that the more you’ve lived, the less was clear same thing. Even going in with Danger Mouse, it took a to you. That surprised me, because after being in the music minute to break the ice between us because we didn’t industry for so long, one would expect that you’d be like, an know each other very well. One day, we would do oracle, and have learned all the tricks of the trade. Do you something really awesome and think, ‘Oh my god, this is think that feeling is connected to your new role as a mother, the best, we’re nailing it right now.’ Then, an hour later, ‘I and what you’ve been learning from that? don’t think I have it anymore, I lost it, I don’t know what I’m doing here and this is super embarrassing.’ It doesn’t KO — That’s definitely a huge part of it. In a way, you start matter how long you’ve been doing it for, or the level of over when you have a kid—it’s a brand new life, a brand new success you’ve achieved, or how much experience you chapter, and you actually have no idea what you’re doing as have, whenever you start something new, you’re starting a new parent. Even though I had my son later in life, and I from square one and you just have no idea if it’s going thought I was pretty dialed in by that point, I had him and to be any good. When you’re finished, hopefully you’ll the rug got pulled out from under me. Especially when he feel good enough about it and yourself, that whatever was a newborn, I felt like, ‘I’m not passing this with flying happens in the world, you can be happy and stand behind colors right now. I have no idea what the fuck I’m doing.’ your work. — END But that’s actually an amazing feeling to have later in life, because it’s incredibly humbling, and it makes you a better

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