ART BRUT ///
INTERVIEW NATALIE MOORE ///
PHOTOGRAPHY RHIANNAN SULLIVAN ///
LORD PALMERSTON PUB, LONDON ///

There are several things everyone should know about Art Brut before reading this interview. Eddie Argos (the singer, named after a shitty British retail chain) likes to set the bar high. So high that he claimed world peace as their ultimate aim on their debut single, "We Formed A Band": "I wanna be the boy/The man that writes the song/That makes Israel and Palestine/Get along." The song was snapped up and released by Rough Trade almost before Art Brut had played any real shows, charting at No. 51 on the UK singles chart in March 2004.

Art Brut are completely obsessed with being on a BBC TV show called "Top of the Pops"-a music half-hour that has certainly seen better days and is more suited to J-Lo-style mime-a-thons than all-out, art-punk rock-outs. Their debut album, Bang Bang Rock 'n' Roll, is just about to see a release on Fierce Panda in the UK and is funny, clever and stupid in equal measure. They like art made by outsiders and music made by non-musicians. Oddly enough, they're really into G 'N' R at the moment and have a strange affinity for George Clooney. I sat down with Eddie, Ian Catskilkin (guitar), Chris Chinchilla (guitar) and Mike (just Mike; drums) in a North London pub to catch up after a triumphant UK tour.

You've just come off tour. How was it?
Eddie: The tour was great! And it made me ill! But I'm OK now. Chris: Was it the tour or was it the booze? Eddie: It was the fruit! (All laugh)

Fruit? Right.
Eddie: Well, I drink a lot. The one thing I did to stay healthy was I added some fruit to my diet. I don't normally eat fruit, you see, and I got sick. Well, they say from booze _ I say from fruit!

How did you work that out?
Eddie: I stopped eating fruit, and I wasn't sick again. Chris: Until we came off _ Eddie: Right. And then I was really ill.

Have you found yourselves becoming a better live band through touring?
Ian: Yeah, you become tighter, inevitably, because you're doing it every night. Eddie: Yeah, we started improvising, too. Oh? Eddie: Like "Good Weekend" and stuff, we started putting "Top of the Pops" in the middle, and we were playing some Guns 'N' Roses as well! Mike: Yeah, we were playing some Guns 'N' Roses in "We Formed A Band."

Excellent! I've just learned the riff to "Sweet Child O' Mine."
Ian: Well, that's what I was playing!

I can't stop talking about it. It was pretty much my life's goal-and now I'm done!
Ian: (Laughs) It's pretty much the high point of your career-until you can play "Free Bird" by Lynyrd Skynyrd.

Wow! Does that also slip into the set?
Ian: No! I mean, I'm not five guitarists! Eddie: "Sweet Child O' Mine" fit perfectly into "Formed A Band." We wish we'd done it to begin with. Chris: I don't! Guns 'N' Roses would have sued us! (laughs) Ian: We might have got to meet them in court, though. Chris: That's true. Eddie: Yeah! That'd be amazing. (laughs) We've all got really into Guns N' Roses in the last couple of weeks.

Do you have any plans to go out to the States at all? Have you been out there yet?
Ian: No, we can't afford to. Chris: There's been lots of call for it, but I think we want to get England sorted first and then go out to the States. Eddie: I really want to go to New York and play. That would be amazing! And Kalamazoo. I want to go to Kalamazoo and play.

You think you pull in a big crowd in Kalamazoo?
Eddie: We can! On my live journal there's loads of people from Kalamazoo. They all got put into detention for singing "Bang Bang Rock 'n' Roll" in the library.

How did you find out about that?
Eddie: I've got a live journal-Chris: Actually, you'd be surprised, through the Internet and file sharing we've got a lot of fans in America. We're the best unsigned band in the UK, according to Blender, and we topped their download chart. So there you go!

Have you got a label out there or anything?
Chris: No, that's the other thing. (all laugh/groan) Eddie: There's actually a fund on the Internet to get us to America. Some kids have started it over there.

Oh yeah?
Ian: How much have we got? Eddie: Dunno, about 25 quid. (laughs) Ian: Well, if you say it in dollars, it sounds better.

That's about fifty dollars! So you have good expectations of going out there.
Eddie: Kalamazoo is gonna be great fun! And obviously New York. And I want to move to L.A., so obviously I should go and check it out!

Right, you wrote a song about it! So why do you want to move to L.A.?
Eddie: Dunno! Chris: It's Morrissey, isn't it? Eddie: It's because when I wrote the words for that, I'd split up with my girlfriend. And I thought, "Well what's the point of being here? I could just as well be in L.A. With Morrissey. On a motorbike!" I was just sort of fantasizing about not being here.

No, I agree. It's kind of this fantasy place. I used to live there. Except you never really see anyone-anyone famous or interesting! Although I did have a friend of a friend of a friend who saw Axl Rose shopping once, so that's a vicarious thrill.
Chris: Wow! Cool! Eddie: Shopping where?

Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica.
Chris: Damn. So not buying Pampers in Wal-Mart, then. Eddie: My friends from L.A. know where Morrissey lives, so I could have just gone to his house and hung around.

Right, peering through the gates.
Eddie: They snuck into his bin! They got his phone number out of his bin and stuff.

That's quite psycho.
Eddie:Yeah. I'm not that sort of Morrissey fan.

So you've got a new single coming out in the UK.
Eddie: Yeah. "Emily Kane."

Who's Emily Kane?
Eddie: My first-ever girlfriend, who I'm still in love with.

You're still in love with her?
Eddie: Everyone's in love with their first girlfriend!

Are you still in touch with her, though, or –
Eddie: No. This song was to do that, and it worked!

Really?
Eddie: She's got a boyfriend, though, which is rubbish.

You know, most people generally-
Eddie: After 10 years get over their first love? (laughs)

No! I was going to say most people generally just stalk their exes through websites like Friendster or some shit like that!
Eddie: I tried to find her on Friends Reunited, but she wasn't there, so I thought I'd just write "Emily Kane." Chris: Yeah, just write a song instead. Eddie: And I found her! I love her! So she phoned me up, and I had to tell her that it was ironic.

Because really it would have been-
Eddie: Just too embarrassing. But I've written another song about how that song really isn't ironic, and I'm saying it is because I can't really tell her I love her in a song. And with that one, I'll tell her that's ironic, too! And it'll just go on forever.

Madness.
Eddie: That's not madness! That's romance.

I'm writing for an American magazine. They're going to have no idea what "Top of the Pops" is.
Chris: Really?! Ian: Really?!
Yeah. Well, maybe some really Anglophile indie kids might. But on the whole, no. How would you describe the show?
Eddie: It's amazing! Half-past seven, Friday evening, primetime television. Ian: To translate for America, I guess it would be "Art Brut Soul Train." (laughs)

Or "American Bandstand!"
Eddie: But "Top of the Pops" is amazing, I think. Half an hour dedicated to pop music, once a week. Just about pop music. I mean, I'm not really a fan of Pete Doherty, but when he did "For Lovers" with Wolfman on "Top of the Pops"-that was amazing! It was really, really good. This guy was just singing his heart out in between, you know, Destiny's Child and bloody

-So it's not actually the show you love, it's just music.
Eddie: No, it's the show! Chris: It's like whenever anyone goes on "Top of the Pops," even if they've been on it like five times, they always do their best performance. Eddie: It's had a rich history. You know, Mick-what's his name?-Ronson hugging David Bowie. And Nirvana! I mean, I don't like Nirvana at all, but they were amazing on "Top of the Pops."

I quite like the fact that there's this dual aspect to Art Brut-that you take the piss and mess around at the same time as being deadly serious about what you're doing. You're always urging your audience to start a band, start a 'zine, whatever. What are we battling against?
Eddie: Um, no one particularly.

Really?
Chris: Yeah, we're just saying that you don't have to keep complaining and fighting about stuff; just go and do it yourself. Eddie: I love watching new bands that have just formed. And you've got the bass player singing along, and he doesn't have a microphone. I love all that. And it would be ace to have lots of new bands starting because I'd just go and watch them.

So it's about sharing the excitement?
Eddie: I just love music. And there wasn't any about-well, there was, but it was shit. But we do have a thing against computer games and television. That's the enemy. Chris: Hey, how can we be against TV when we want to be on "Top of the Pops"? (laughs) Ian: I think it's mostly a battle against taking yourself too seriously. Music is supposed to be fun. You're supposed to enjoy yourself, you know? Chris: And you want people to enjoy it with you. You don't want everything to be perfect, but a bit sterile. Ian: Having said that, though, I do like Radiohead. But I think that quote we heard the other day sums it up perfectly. What was it again? Eddie: What, the George Clooney one?

Excuse me. You're about to quote George Clooney?
Chris: (laughs) Well, he quoted it, but I don't think he came up with it. Ian: He said, "Take what you do seriously, but don't take yourself seriously." Eddie: Yeah. That's our motto. (laughs) Ian: So if there are any other Clooneyists in America...Eddie: Come and join our cult! ///