Transcript of the LA PUNK NOIR interview - June 15, 2010
Here is the transcript of our interview with www.funkygraffish.com for the LA PUNK NOIR II SHOW on 6.19.10
MUSIC TO *UCK TO
Interview with “Too Pretty for Porn” by Cristian Rene Guzman
An email was sent to the band, “Too Pretty for Porn,” a Venice based band, not afraid to create, they believe that songs are smart, songs create themselves and they value this. If a song wants to be a funk song, they will allow it to be or if it wants to be a pop song, they honor the songs decision; they are accepting people. Waiting for a response, which finally came within the next 24 hours, a plan for a phone interview with L.A. Punk Noir and “Too Pretty for Porn” was made yet the finalization of the decision turned into a “meet with the band during rehearsal” interview rather than the impersonal phone call/interview. The excitement of this plan boiled through L.A. Punk Noir Universe’s veins since they are one of the bands that will be performing in the upcoming L.A. Punk Noir music festival on June 19th, 2010.
Finally the meet was on the go, parking on Pacific and walking towards the beautiful beach of Venice, California, it couldn’t get better than that. Then a call, Sean Young, the bassist of the band greets us at the door of their studio, where 10 years of musical creation has taken place. A hand shake with deLUXE, the almighty singer/bassist of the band, then a few songs were personally played for L.A. Punk Noir Universe, it was definitely a treat for the ears.
And finally the interview…
Cristian: Hey! I know by the music that you two make, that you are definitely "Too Pretty for Porn," how did you guys become "Too Pretty for Porn"? (The evolution of the name...)
deLUXE: Well, this first album that was released called "Essesin," a lot of the songs were sexual but I thought they were really beautifully written...haha...Sean and I both write the lyrics, but I thought that they were more artful and poetic than most songs that you hear about sex, so the name just kind of came to us...you know...Sean do you want to add...
Sean: no...That’s good...haha…
deLUXE: there is definitely a strong sexual message and vibe to the music but it’s not crass...
Sean: but to pretty for porn is not necessarily sex, it’s just too pretty for porn, commercial and that whole vibe.
deLUXE: its just that it is sexual, but we write about a lot of things, but we just wanted to say that its not dirty music, its beautiful music, its too pretty for porn.
Christian: How did you two meet and start creating music together? (deluxe and Sean Young)
deLUXE: we met…we actually met on a beach, in Malibu, I saw him surfing, I said, "I have to have him...haha, I'm sorry...am I not supposed to say that...haha...well I lived in Venice, long story short and he came to a party one night...and we met and we started making music together...
Sean: we had mutual friends...
deLUXE: and he had a guitar, somebody left a bass at my apartment and I just started playing bass and we just immediately started writing songs together, it was a weird chemical reaction, it just happened, immediately...
Christian: Were you always a bassist?
deLUXE: no...
Christian: What did you play before?
deLUXE: I was a violinist, I played classical music for years, I studied music, you know, theory and composition, I thought I wanted to be a composer, I thought initially, well I am, but I mean a classical composer, and I took voice lessons and all that kind of stuff, I grew up in the church, I was always a musical person, but never played the bass...self taught, just like him (Sean Young).
Sean: we basically learned our instruments, writing our songs...you know what I mean, we had the music but we learned to make them...
deLUXE: our songs were better than we were when we started out, I would hear these amazing melodies but I couldn’t play them, so I learned how to play them by imitating what I heard in my head...
Cristian: How did you two discover that you wanted to do music as a profession or is it not a profession? Is it just a hobby?
Sean: we consider it our life, its our being, playing music, its definitely not a hobby, its an obsession, its a biological imperative, its not like, "hmmm...I'm going to play music," its like, I have to play music...I have to play on my guitar and I have to play with deluxe and write songs...
deLUXE: music is, we spoke earlier and I was saying that music has always been around, its always been in my head, I can dream music, its not a hobby, its just who I am.
Cristian: Who is the first person that directed you to the notes of a song? Do you remember the first song that attracted you?
deLUXE: well, I started writing music when I was seven, so music has always been in my head, so I think I'm just one of those people who that it comes natural...but you know my mother would always have amazing music around, so I responded to everything, jazz, really good jazz, like Coletrane, and old funk and R & B and rock, I respond to everything, there is not really one thing that I can just say that "oh that’s the first song that turned me on..." its just that music is, its how I...process things...haha...
Sean: when I was really young, a kid, I lived in Australia, I remember listening to ABBA, light orchestra, when I was super young...I remember listen to my parents albums, ABBA...my mom is a piano teacher and she directed a children’s choir, so I started playing piano, violin at an early age too...
deLUXE: there is not really a first memory...music is everything...
Cristiain: Is there anything that you would have changed about your musical journey?
Sean: no, for me, its just that everything that happens makes the notes we play today, its just who we are...I wouldn’t change anything.
deLUXE: ill just stay quiet...haha...
Sean: maybe we wouldn’t be so hard on drummers, when we first started; we used to write these crazy songs that had like 80 different movements...
deLUXE: you know how crazy our songs are right now...they used to be like 10 times as long...haha...
Sean: we'd make these poor drummers remember these parts and things and then we'd fire them.
deLUXE: but I do wish that...since song writing is a process, I wish I had been a better editor, but you learn, you have to learn how to write songs...
Cristian: Do your remember creating your first song? When you listen to it now, what do you think about it?
deLUXE: the very first song was, "all I ever wanted was a..." something about being in a box...but it was really simple...I think its "mother love..."
Sean: (plays the melody of the song)
deLUXE: I think its mother love...its actually a really pretty song, its simple...I still think its a really pretty song, its really straight forward, but we wrote a bunch of songs simultaneously, we just sat down and wrote like 3 songs in one day.
Cristian: When it comes to musical influences, who would you say were your top 5? or name as many as you want?
deLUXE: I would say, the funkadelics,
Sean: Parliamant, Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, Stevie Wonder, Donny Hathaway
deLUXE: there is so many it’s overwhelming.
Sean: Pharcyde, Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul
deLUXE: I love old hip hop, I love the roots, Outkast, stuff like that...there is a band called Tones on Tail, a Goth band that had a huge influence on me...I had this really big Goth thing deep inside me. A lot of classical music, like I really like Bach and his movements and corals, just different stuff. A lot of old school and R & B, Nina Simone and Sarah Vaughn, the legends, you know what I mean...haha...and Curtis Mayfield.
Sean: and James Brown.
deLUXE: I love all kinds of great music, James Addiction...you shouldn't have said name as many...haha...
Cristian: In your band "Too Pretty for Porn" you blend rock, funk, jazz and R & B....How did that come about? Am I missing any other genres of music that you include in your musical compositions?
deLUXE: blues, definitely and I’d say classical...
Sean: its kind of baroque...
deLUXE: we got a kind of baroque feeling to some of my basslines, I think its because I play violin, a lot of my bass line motifs come from classical music in a really strange way.
Sean: I would definitely say that its not conscious, its just that there is the song and the song is, it just happens to be a blend of the music that we like or that we are inspired by but we never go "lets write a song that is kind of like a funk song or a jazz song," this is the song, and it just is what it is...they never end up sounding like what you think they are going to be, they just have a life of their own...
deLUXE: Sean will write a really cool guitar part and he will think its one song and I will play this bass line and it will turn into a whole other thing...
Sean: songs kind of dictate themselves, they have a mind of their own, they are almost like children, you think you are going to raise them to be one thing, but they run away from home...this song has misbehaved itself...if you hear the record, deluxe wrote the beats.
deLUXE: I really love hip hop, its such a huge influence on me as far as the beat making to my phrasing when im singing, I put meters in my songs.
Cristian: I noticed that there is a darkness to your music, although it is dark, there is still a lightness that pours out of the music, an upbeat lightness that makes me want to dance, I normally do not notice the two in music, how is it that you combine the two so well?
Sean: that’s just human nature, we are complex fucking people; it’s not just us...
deLUXE: I like dark music, I like heavy dark minor music, but I also like cartoony kind of things so I think that comes out in my music, sort of playful, I'm inspired by a lot of music I hear in cartoons or music that is meant to be pop, I'm the pop one but I have a dark side, so I guess it all comes out.
Cristian: I would have to definitely say that your music is definitely cool music, when I listen to it, I feel like my attitude changes, like I can pick up on any girl in the world and actually succeed with the pick up, would you agree?
deLUXE: its definitely music that you can fuck too...haha...
Cristian: if you were not in "Too Pretty for Porn" what would you think about this style of music?
Sean: I would be fucking in love with it, I'm serious, because when push comes to shove at the end of the day, we are making the music that we want to hear, this is the music that we love, we are making it because it doesn’t exist for us, so we are creating what we want to hear, I know it sounds horribly egotistical but I don’t mean it that way, I just mean that we are playing our music, we indulge ourselves.
deLUXE: if I were going to a show, I would want to hear it, I don’t know what I’d call it if I saw it, I've asked people at our shows what they’d call it, but they didn’t have an answer, so I don’t know what to call it.
Cristian: What is next for "Too Pretty for Porn"? What should we all expect from you? Will you be releasing a self-debut album any time soon? Will you be touring?
deLUXE: Yeah we are actually working on an album right now and we are recording it, but we are barely working the second song right now, we want to release the songs as they come out and we definitely want to tour, but we need to solidify our band member situation...we are looking to fix that as soon as possible and then we want to tour all over especially the east coast, I want to go back to Philly because that is where I am from and New York and then eventually tour the world...I want to go to London, Japan, I just want to go. I'm excited to play music for a non American audience, a lot of times in Europe and overseas they kind of get it more, they aren’t really into labeling they are more open minded sometimes, they don’t mind it being weird or undefined, like "what are you?" they don’t give a fuck...haha, I really want to hook up with some other bands like us and kind of start our own scene in L.A. because every time we book a show we are usually solo, I know there is a lot of great bands in with our same vibe and I just want some build up to promote our own night.
Cristian: What is it like being a band from L.A.?
Sean: you know its like the act of doing our thing, this is our thing, you know we are playing music for ourselves, writing and creating and doing it...being from wherever, if there is another band or a bunch of other bands, it does not really matter...I'm excited to go to this festival, and to see all these different bands, new L.A. bands who are kind of like, you know bands of color and different people playing together, its going to be killer...plugged in and playing with a bunch of different music’s, I'm really excited about playing at this festival checking everyone else out, especially to see what people are doing, I'm inspired by other music, its exciting...
deLUXE: I really think we have a unique voice and you know, you heard us...and I think that’s going to be our theme at this festival, its a double edged sword because you know there is so many bands but this is the place to be if you are a dreamer...haha...
Cristian: How do you feel about being part of the L.A. Punk Noir party?
deLUXE: I think it’s going to be cool.
Sean: yeah, I'm very excited; I'm excited to go as a fan.
deLUXE: I've been checking out the bands and they all sound really good and diverse, even though I was just saying that I don’t like diverse, it can be diverse, I just don’t want to play with a country band, its diverse in a perfect way.
Cristian: Is there any advice that you would like to leave the readers of L.A. Punk Noir Universe?
deLUXE and Sean: If you're waiting for something to happen, it won't. Turn off your TV and go create something original.
MUSIC TO *UCK TO
Interview with “Too Pretty for Porn” by Cristian Rene Guzman
An email was sent to the band, “Too Pretty for Porn,” a Venice based band, not afraid to create, they believe that songs are smart, songs create themselves and they value this. If a song wants to be a funk song, they will allow it to be or if it wants to be a pop song, they honor the songs decision; they are accepting people. Waiting for a response, which finally came within the next 24 hours, a plan for a phone interview with L.A. Punk Noir and “Too Pretty for Porn” was made yet the finalization of the decision turned into a “meet with the band during rehearsal” interview rather than the impersonal phone call/interview. The excitement of this plan boiled through L.A. Punk Noir Universe’s veins since they are one of the bands that will be performing in the upcoming L.A. Punk Noir music festival on June 19th, 2010.
Finally the meet was on the go, parking on Pacific and walking towards the beautiful beach of Venice, California, it couldn’t get better than that. Then a call, Sean Young, the bassist of the band greets us at the door of their studio, where 10 years of musical creation has taken place. A hand shake with deLUXE, the almighty singer/bassist of the band, then a few songs were personally played for L.A. Punk Noir Universe, it was definitely a treat for the ears.
And finally the interview…
Cristian: Hey! I know by the music that you two make, that you are definitely "Too Pretty for Porn," how did you guys become "Too Pretty for Porn"? (The evolution of the name...)
deLUXE: Well, this first album that was released called "Essesin," a lot of the songs were sexual but I thought they were really beautifully written...haha...Sean and I both write the lyrics, but I thought that they were more artful and poetic than most songs that you hear about sex, so the name just kind of came to us...you know...Sean do you want to add...
Sean: no...That’s good...haha…
deLUXE: there is definitely a strong sexual message and vibe to the music but it’s not crass...
Sean: but to pretty for porn is not necessarily sex, it’s just too pretty for porn, commercial and that whole vibe.
deLUXE: its just that it is sexual, but we write about a lot of things, but we just wanted to say that its not dirty music, its beautiful music, its too pretty for porn.
Christian: How did you two meet and start creating music together? (deluxe and Sean Young)
deLUXE: we met…we actually met on a beach, in Malibu, I saw him surfing, I said, "I have to have him...haha, I'm sorry...am I not supposed to say that...haha...well I lived in Venice, long story short and he came to a party one night...and we met and we started making music together...
Sean: we had mutual friends...
deLUXE: and he had a guitar, somebody left a bass at my apartment and I just started playing bass and we just immediately started writing songs together, it was a weird chemical reaction, it just happened, immediately...
Christian: Were you always a bassist?
deLUXE: no...
Christian: What did you play before?
deLUXE: I was a violinist, I played classical music for years, I studied music, you know, theory and composition, I thought I wanted to be a composer, I thought initially, well I am, but I mean a classical composer, and I took voice lessons and all that kind of stuff, I grew up in the church, I was always a musical person, but never played the bass...self taught, just like him (Sean Young).
Sean: we basically learned our instruments, writing our songs...you know what I mean, we had the music but we learned to make them...
deLUXE: our songs were better than we were when we started out, I would hear these amazing melodies but I couldn’t play them, so I learned how to play them by imitating what I heard in my head...
Cristian: How did you two discover that you wanted to do music as a profession or is it not a profession? Is it just a hobby?
Sean: we consider it our life, its our being, playing music, its definitely not a hobby, its an obsession, its a biological imperative, its not like, "hmmm...I'm going to play music," its like, I have to play music...I have to play on my guitar and I have to play with deluxe and write songs...
deLUXE: music is, we spoke earlier and I was saying that music has always been around, its always been in my head, I can dream music, its not a hobby, its just who I am.
Cristian: Who is the first person that directed you to the notes of a song? Do you remember the first song that attracted you?
deLUXE: well, I started writing music when I was seven, so music has always been in my head, so I think I'm just one of those people who that it comes natural...but you know my mother would always have amazing music around, so I responded to everything, jazz, really good jazz, like Coletrane, and old funk and R & B and rock, I respond to everything, there is not really one thing that I can just say that "oh that’s the first song that turned me on..." its just that music is, its how I...process things...haha...
Sean: when I was really young, a kid, I lived in Australia, I remember listening to ABBA, light orchestra, when I was super young...I remember listen to my parents albums, ABBA...my mom is a piano teacher and she directed a children’s choir, so I started playing piano, violin at an early age too...
deLUXE: there is not really a first memory...music is everything...
Cristiain: Is there anything that you would have changed about your musical journey?
Sean: no, for me, its just that everything that happens makes the notes we play today, its just who we are...I wouldn’t change anything.
deLUXE: ill just stay quiet...haha...
Sean: maybe we wouldn’t be so hard on drummers, when we first started; we used to write these crazy songs that had like 80 different movements...
deLUXE: you know how crazy our songs are right now...they used to be like 10 times as long...haha...
Sean: we'd make these poor drummers remember these parts and things and then we'd fire them.
deLUXE: but I do wish that...since song writing is a process, I wish I had been a better editor, but you learn, you have to learn how to write songs...
Cristian: Do your remember creating your first song? When you listen to it now, what do you think about it?
deLUXE: the very first song was, "all I ever wanted was a..." something about being in a box...but it was really simple...I think its "mother love..."
Sean: (plays the melody of the song)
deLUXE: I think its mother love...its actually a really pretty song, its simple...I still think its a really pretty song, its really straight forward, but we wrote a bunch of songs simultaneously, we just sat down and wrote like 3 songs in one day.
Cristian: When it comes to musical influences, who would you say were your top 5? or name as many as you want?
deLUXE: I would say, the funkadelics,
Sean: Parliamant, Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, Stevie Wonder, Donny Hathaway
deLUXE: there is so many it’s overwhelming.
Sean: Pharcyde, Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul
deLUXE: I love old hip hop, I love the roots, Outkast, stuff like that...there is a band called Tones on Tail, a Goth band that had a huge influence on me...I had this really big Goth thing deep inside me. A lot of classical music, like I really like Bach and his movements and corals, just different stuff. A lot of old school and R & B, Nina Simone and Sarah Vaughn, the legends, you know what I mean...haha...and Curtis Mayfield.
Sean: and James Brown.
deLUXE: I love all kinds of great music, James Addiction...you shouldn't have said name as many...haha...
Cristian: In your band "Too Pretty for Porn" you blend rock, funk, jazz and R & B....How did that come about? Am I missing any other genres of music that you include in your musical compositions?
deLUXE: blues, definitely and I’d say classical...
Sean: its kind of baroque...
deLUXE: we got a kind of baroque feeling to some of my basslines, I think its because I play violin, a lot of my bass line motifs come from classical music in a really strange way.
Sean: I would definitely say that its not conscious, its just that there is the song and the song is, it just happens to be a blend of the music that we like or that we are inspired by but we never go "lets write a song that is kind of like a funk song or a jazz song," this is the song, and it just is what it is...they never end up sounding like what you think they are going to be, they just have a life of their own...
deLUXE: Sean will write a really cool guitar part and he will think its one song and I will play this bass line and it will turn into a whole other thing...
Sean: songs kind of dictate themselves, they have a mind of their own, they are almost like children, you think you are going to raise them to be one thing, but they run away from home...this song has misbehaved itself...if you hear the record, deluxe wrote the beats.
deLUXE: I really love hip hop, its such a huge influence on me as far as the beat making to my phrasing when im singing, I put meters in my songs.
Cristian: I noticed that there is a darkness to your music, although it is dark, there is still a lightness that pours out of the music, an upbeat lightness that makes me want to dance, I normally do not notice the two in music, how is it that you combine the two so well?
Sean: that’s just human nature, we are complex fucking people; it’s not just us...
deLUXE: I like dark music, I like heavy dark minor music, but I also like cartoony kind of things so I think that comes out in my music, sort of playful, I'm inspired by a lot of music I hear in cartoons or music that is meant to be pop, I'm the pop one but I have a dark side, so I guess it all comes out.
Cristian: I would have to definitely say that your music is definitely cool music, when I listen to it, I feel like my attitude changes, like I can pick up on any girl in the world and actually succeed with the pick up, would you agree?
deLUXE: its definitely music that you can fuck too...haha...
Cristian: if you were not in "Too Pretty for Porn" what would you think about this style of music?
Sean: I would be fucking in love with it, I'm serious, because when push comes to shove at the end of the day, we are making the music that we want to hear, this is the music that we love, we are making it because it doesn’t exist for us, so we are creating what we want to hear, I know it sounds horribly egotistical but I don’t mean it that way, I just mean that we are playing our music, we indulge ourselves.
deLUXE: if I were going to a show, I would want to hear it, I don’t know what I’d call it if I saw it, I've asked people at our shows what they’d call it, but they didn’t have an answer, so I don’t know what to call it.
Cristian: What is next for "Too Pretty for Porn"? What should we all expect from you? Will you be releasing a self-debut album any time soon? Will you be touring?
deLUXE: Yeah we are actually working on an album right now and we are recording it, but we are barely working the second song right now, we want to release the songs as they come out and we definitely want to tour, but we need to solidify our band member situation...we are looking to fix that as soon as possible and then we want to tour all over especially the east coast, I want to go back to Philly because that is where I am from and New York and then eventually tour the world...I want to go to London, Japan, I just want to go. I'm excited to play music for a non American audience, a lot of times in Europe and overseas they kind of get it more, they aren’t really into labeling they are more open minded sometimes, they don’t mind it being weird or undefined, like "what are you?" they don’t give a fuck...haha, I really want to hook up with some other bands like us and kind of start our own scene in L.A. because every time we book a show we are usually solo, I know there is a lot of great bands in with our same vibe and I just want some build up to promote our own night.
Cristian: What is it like being a band from L.A.?
Sean: you know its like the act of doing our thing, this is our thing, you know we are playing music for ourselves, writing and creating and doing it...being from wherever, if there is another band or a bunch of other bands, it does not really matter...I'm excited to go to this festival, and to see all these different bands, new L.A. bands who are kind of like, you know bands of color and different people playing together, its going to be killer...plugged in and playing with a bunch of different music’s, I'm really excited about playing at this festival checking everyone else out, especially to see what people are doing, I'm inspired by other music, its exciting...
deLUXE: I really think we have a unique voice and you know, you heard us...and I think that’s going to be our theme at this festival, its a double edged sword because you know there is so many bands but this is the place to be if you are a dreamer...haha...
Cristian: How do you feel about being part of the L.A. Punk Noir party?
deLUXE: I think it’s going to be cool.
Sean: yeah, I'm very excited; I'm excited to go as a fan.
deLUXE: I've been checking out the bands and they all sound really good and diverse, even though I was just saying that I don’t like diverse, it can be diverse, I just don’t want to play with a country band, its diverse in a perfect way.
Cristian: Is there any advice that you would like to leave the readers of L.A. Punk Noir Universe?
deLUXE and Sean: If you're waiting for something to happen, it won't. Turn off your TV and go create something original.