Benjamin Goode and Little Dragon talk breakfast and melancholy.
It takes a special kind of awkward simpleton to do an interview like this. Ladies and gentlemen, the very affable (and patient) LITTLE DRAAAGON....
(Yukimo Nagano, Hakan Wirenstrand, Erik Bodin, Fredrik Wallin)
What is it about Sweden?
Fredrik: I think it is a mix of things, first of all it is very cheap to live, there is a big community of creative people, so you can see that it is possible from the past to get there [pop success] and you can actually make music and live your life and that's very inspiring and uplifting.
I noticed your sound is very sparse, under-produced almost?
F: That's interesting because I think you're the first one that has ever said that, everyone has said that they can hear that there is a lot of production in it, and there is. But I think you're right because it is kind of spontaneous and it's played and if something is played wrong you just carry on. It's not very picky, but there is a lot of effects and stuff.
Kim: Definitely the writing process is the recording process. The guys would sit and jam with the synthesiser for a certain amount of time and when you feel like you have something, it gets recorded, and I'll do the same thing and we will do that with a bunch of ideas.
Having signed to a bigger label were you susceptible to the pressure to fulfil the album hit quota and the radio play lists as opposed to the album as a work of art as a whole?
K: The process is pretty similar [as the first album].There may be the aspect of having released another album you try and stay away from paranoid thoughts about what the expectation would be of making something that would be acceptable for radio. But even though we may have these thoughts in the middle of writing we try and do what we like and what we feel is exciting. But there is no continuous theme, there is no concept.
F: We tried to make a pop hit (wistfully gazing into the distance) but I think it is about politics.
Politics?
F: Certain songs if you play them many times on the radio they become hits. I think some songs are really great tracks but mostly it is the politics.
K: I think a lot of people are scared today because it has to have a certain sound.
Yes, paranoia is something I can relate to. I can imagine that you can get quite precious about your songs? Because once they are out there in a way they are not yours any more and people can say whatever they want about them.
K: Definitely, I can get sensitive. For me I have a few of those issues with certain songs that are released. The more time goes you begin to accept everything because you can be a little bit more objective and you stop thinking that the whole world is about your album. That people care enough to say that they don't like it is actually better than nobody knowing that it exists. There are a lot of great albums that I love that have not necessarily been loved so you should try and not feel hindered by possible reactions.
What's next?
K: We've been on tour so much so we feel like we have to be home and write more songs with a positive vibe and have an even higher mountain of songs to choose from.
Is home still Sweden?
K: Definitely.
You've all be friends for such a long time that I can only imagine what a lovely feeling it is to be getting paid to make music with your friends?
K: Absolutely.
You're most famous song Twice, lyrically is a beautiful stand alone poem (my ex girlfriend played it to me just before breaking up with me) I was wondering if you could explain it to me?
[Laughter ]
K: I don't know if I can. It wasn't even a song it was just the piano bit...
The piano is amazing.
Hakan: Thanks.
K: ..and he was making songs for this children's book, and I was like noooo, don't use it for the children's book I have to write something to it. I wrote something really spontaneously. Stuff that was going on at the time, definitely some heartbreak. You try to hide it all in a bunch of metaphors.
It's a beautiful song and that really comes through, why write in English?
K: Two reasons Swedish bands write in English and my mum is American so expressing myself in English is not something that I struggle with.
F: We are kind of focussed on England culturally.
Why is that? The Swedes have a wealth of writers, thinkers, such as Ibsen...
F: Er no he's Norwegian, but similar I suppose. But yes in the melancholy of Bergman, Strindberg, there is a lot of anxiety. It runs through our folklore and folk music and is really rather beautiful.
K: The hard winter, potatoes, more potatoes, eating potatoes for breakfast. You know, but it's a good melancholy.
Full English?
F: We had the English breakfast today, the full Monty.
What did you think?
E: Not my cup of tea,
H: Well I liked it apart from the beans.
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