St. Vincent

A songstress and a siren, St. Vincent's soft and dangerous ballads are all we're into these days.  Seriously.

And she's absolutely beautiful.  If  that even matters.





Chief Magazine: How is the tour going?

St. Vincent: So far the highlights included helping a couple get engaged during my show in Boston.  A really sweet man came up and proposed to his girl by singing "Marry Me" to her. He had to change the words a bit, you know, to make it less fatalistic. It was so sweet and adorable, I was just beside myself.  Speaking of fatalistic, John, Dave, and I went in the middle of the audience during John's encore to sing his song, "Nikki Oh Nikki," whose chorus is, "we're going to die."  To our surprise and pleasure, everyone started singing along, culminating in an entire room full of people singing, "We're going to die!  We're going to die!"

I saw that John put out a call for help with vocals and bass in each city on this tour, are your two collaborating at all?

Like many power trios before us---Rush, The Police, etc---I am joining up with team JV on bass.

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Your album has been finished for a while, are you playing any new songs on tour?

I am playing some new songs this time - a murder ballad called "Bang, Bang" and some new instrumental segways…. anything to keep it fresh and to insert as much guitar shredding as possible.

You auditioned for the Polyphonic Spree and 4 days later you were on tour with them in Europe, is that really how these things work?

Well, if you don't count the blackmail, bribes and nepotism. The lord works in mysterious ways.  So mysterious, in fact, that you're pretty sure he doesn't exist.

And how did you get connected with Sufjan Stevens?

I toured with Castanets, who is also on Asthmatic Kitty.  Shara Worden, of My Brightest Diamond, was looking for a lady to fill her enormous shoes (or bejeweled slippers) in the Sufjan touring band, and recruited me for the role.  She is amazing.  We love her.

Do you enjoy life on the road?

Music is actually a ruse for my real passions:  Cracker Barrel and Days Inn Motels.

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Are there any major differences between touring in the US and Europe?

Europe has intensely better coffee and wine and cheese... And bigger, better cemeteries.  Don't get me wrong, however.  I truly do love America.  It's so various and haunted and gorgeous and insane.

After this tour, are you going to go back to playing in those bands or will you focus on your own music?

I have submitted my petition to the universe to add an additional 16.3 hours to every day.  Unfortunately, that petition has been ignored and St. Vincent has been keeping me busy for 24 hours these days.

What did you do after high school? (Not after class each day... but in between then and now.)

I moved far, far away from Texas.

Have you ever had a near-death experience? If so, feel free to elaborate.

I was riding a bike in San Francisco and a lady opened her car door right in front of me.  I went flying, nearly missing a bus in oncoming traffic.  Egads!

Is your album title, "Marry Me," to be taken literally? Are you truly ready to get married?

I like to think of the record as a really longwinded personals ad.

What inspired your song "Paris is Burning"?

It seems that inherent in the definition of the word, "power," is the implication of the abuse of it.  Government war propaganda.  Levees breaking.  Neglect.  The human violence we internalize, emulate, recreate.  History gets far enough away from some wars to idealize, romanticize, even glamorize them. It's a frenzy dirge.  A fire lamentation.

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Downloads
St.Vincent-ParisIsBurning.mp3
St.Vincent-TheseDays.mp3


Websites
www.ilovestvincent.com
www.myspace.com/stvincent


Photos
Tod Seelie

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