Words by Nicholas Fox Ricciardi
“Why would a band call themselves ‘Love is All‘?” you might ask. Because all of the songs on their first album, Nine Times That Same Song, focus on love, morbidly twisting it into the sadistic and the obsessive. The band’s singer, Josephine Olausson, screams lyrics that range from “I keep the one that I love in the freezer” (“Ageing Had Never Been His Friend”) to “I looked at him, he turned away/I followed him for a while (“Used Goods”).” Ultimately, the Swedish group’s debut is a nine-song argument for filing a restraining order on your ex. Throughout the record, you’ll find plenty proof of not-quite-sane pop, flush with disco bass and drums, “Fernando”-style male back-up vocals and a resident saxophonist. They’re helplessly Swedish. I don’t know what else to say. Love is all.
I’m not sure if I remember the last band with a permanent sax player [it was probably the Zutons - Ed.]. At what point did Fredrik come in with the saxophone?
Fredrik: I was just asked to do some sax in the end of “Spinning and Scratching.” Love is All had already existed for a half-year or so before that. I was one of the biggest fans, took a very expensive cab to their first show. I’ve played with Markus before in a couple of bands, and I was friends with Nick’s brother. I think their idea was to get some chaotic Lora Logic/James Chance thing into the pop they were doing. I was really into the Contortions and all of the No-Wave bands and, of course, Lora Logic, X-Ray Spex and so on. I knew what they wanted but I hadn’t played sax for like two or three years, and I played really poorly. But they liked it. On the recording day, I ended up playing on four or five songs. Some weeks later, they had this afternoon show and they asked me if I wanted to play. I did, and a couple of weeks later, there was a show in Stockholm. Suddenly, I just slipped into the band.
I can’t help but be reminded of David Bowie and – this is probably just a personal thing – but also Bruce Springsteen, especially in “Turn the Radio Off” with that repetitive hook and the xylophones.
Fredrik: I think the sax inspiration still mostly comes from Essential Logic and James Chance, but also a big part of early Roxy Music and early Psychedelic Furs. I listen to a lot of free jazz, and am trying to bring as much Albert Ayler, Ornette Coleman, and late Coltrane as I can. I think the contrast and tension between the really singable pop, the chaotic punk jazz, and the danceable drums and basses is the heart in LiA’s music. Of course we had Springsteen in mind on the “Radio” song as well as we had Stockholm Monsters while doing “Used Goods.”
Any favorite sax songs/bands?
Josephine: I love Lora Logic, Roxy Music, and James Chance.
Fredrik: Favorite sax songs, I dunno. Maybe the solo on Beach Boys’ “Kokomo.”
The Yeah Yeah Yeahs had been performing a lot of the songs on “Fever to Tell” for a while and tried to get as close to their live feeling on that album as they could. I hear a similar kind of live energy on your record. Besides the obvious facts of the female singer and pop/punk thing, to me this seems like a plausible reason for the ubiquitous comparisons between your band and the YYY’s. What was the recording process actually like? What do you think of the comparison?
Nick: We recorded the album during a 3-year period; it wasn’t meant to be an album. Glad to hear that people regard it as a homogenic piece. I believe we need to thank Woody [Taylor] who mixed all the songs (also during a long period) for making it a one-piece album. About the Yeah Yeah Yeahs: We’ve been compared with them a bunch of times, and I guess all bands remind people of some other band. I think we’re lucky to be compared with the YYY’s. It could have been a band we didn’t like, you know. And I guess I can understand the comparisons as far as a non-perfectionist-but-still-not-easily-put-together-live-on-record kind of sound.
Josephine: Actually, some of the songs just came together like, minutes before we recorded them. We record everything in our practice space onto a 16-track hard drive thing. And then there are some songs that we have been playing forever and recorded in various different versions until they sounded right, or until we couldn’t be bothered doing it all over again.
Fredrik: I like some of the early singles by the YYY’s, but I don’t listen to them that much. I often don’t understand the comparison.
On the album, I find it interesting that the male vocals are all very sweet and melodic, and Josephine’s vocals are very wild and gruff. I think there is a wonderful balance vocally between the male and female voices. It is also an interesting kind of role reversal – the female backup singers being replaced with the choruses of male vocals. How did the vocal arrangements come about? Are you challenging the state of heterosexual love?
Nick: I like that interpretation!!! Yes, Josephine has a history of being really into the Riot Grrrl scene and I believe I’ve been influenced by that (besides being a feminist and believing in the importance of always questioning any value that only has a function as an unequal duality – in this case man/woman).
Josephine: It’s just simply because I can’t really sing, so, when it comes to singing real nice melodic stuff, it’s much better to have the boys doing it. I prefer just sort of improvising some sort of melody.
Fredrik: [I will say that] it’s a deep comment to the pop-political sex debate. Our goal is to blur the borders of the traditional pop-cultural roles of sex.
At times, it seems like you guys went through the archive and picked out the best things from the last 50 years of pop music and managed to put them together and make them work. What kinds of music influence you guys? How do you go about writing?
Nick: We all have different influences, and that’s what makes it sound that way. I have the least PC record collection but still I write the major part of the music (the basic song: chords and a melody and a hint of what kind of a song it is) with help from Josephine’s lyrics. But as soon as everyone has heard the first couple of chords, the song gets a totally different shape – it becomes LiA. Every song is a long process, because everyone needs to fill it with themselves. That’s what makes it bearable to play music. I can’t understand bands with a band dictator. They should go solo!
Josephine: Most of the time, I might have some words that I give to Nicholaus, and he then comes up with some sort of melody, some chords and stuff. We play it through a couple of times and then everyone just starts deconstructing whatever idea was there in the beginning. I don’t think there are any specific bands that have influenced Love is All as a whole; we all have different ways we wish the songs sounded. We all have different favorites amongst our own songs too. I think it almost accidental that we sound the way we do. It’s all misunderstandings and frustration.
Fredrik: I think there’s only one band that we all agree on though: Roxy Music. We all have very different taste in music. Josephine writes the words first; after that, Nick usually brings some kind of chords and hints of a melody. Then we start to mess things up. It’s a very long process; a song can take over a half year to get finished. But not every time. “Make Out…” didn’t take any time at all to make and record, maybe an afternoon. Much of the sound comes out of Woody Taylor’s sick brain when he’s mixing. He’s the Eno behind LiA.
Although your songs are for the most part about love, you dish them out with what comes across as a good measure of irony. Do you see yourselves as avoiding conventionalities by screening them through irony or humor? Is it now possible to take the concept of a love song seriously?
Nick: We love music, we play music, we need to experiment with it and contemplate what makes us making progress as a band to keep it glowing, but we’re not and will never be an ironic band making fun of other artists. No one can ever beat Weird Al, right? But we like humor, and I think it is important to have some kind of distance from what you do, not taking yourself too seriously.
Josephine: I don’t ever think things over that seriously when I write words to songs. All I know is that it’s hard to write a love song and not use clichés. Whenever I try, I find myself feeling sort of embarrassed. I think it a lot more interesting taking on the role of the desperate, insane person. Sometimes when people sing about love it just seems so self-flattering, and I can’t really stand that.
Fredrik: Has pop music ever been serious? I don’t think so. It’s just two different kinds of humor. Good or bad. And no, you can’t seriously try to make pop music as it was created the first time in history. You just can try to avoid bad jokes.
