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Rating: Exile on main street
What do we ask of our favorite "musicians"?
To live more frenetically than us and to burn through stages by experimenting with things we wouldn't dare to think about even on pain of death. We want them to seize every opportunity to tell immense tall tales to the press. We want them to throw punches and knives in the backstages of mega festivals. We want them to gorge on beer yet keep their beautiful well-toned six-pack. We want stories of escapes, chases, and phantasmagoric clinics in Thailand. We want aggressive women vomiting champagne on fluorescent miniskirts, and we even tolerate their artistic shortcomings, as long as eventually they die of overdose in the midst of an orgy. Oh yes! All of this is very rock'n'roll.
And what do we want from The Kills? For Vv to sway her hips on stage while swinging a rubber phallus like her illustrious colleague? And for Hotel to drag himself among cables like a possessed animal foaming at the mouth? Is this really what we ask of them?
Michigan. A little house in the countryside. Little traffic outside, none of the rumbling noise of the city. Fresh air, fields of grain. The main road is the only option, the rest are just paths. Here, two people, two "musicians," are in the little house at the edge of the only road, in exile, not caring about all the expectations of those outside. No intruders, just them, just the two of them.
Her with matted hair and socks loosened around the ankles, him with a long beard and kangaroo-like circles under his eyes. Two who talk and talk endlessly, argue and argue, shout and rant. Doors slammed. Passion. And then love, peace, a nice gentle lovemaking, then straight back to work. Two brains clashing, forming one that admits no outsiders. A walk in the air, oxygen, and sudden, striking ideas. Rushing home, and notes, words, music, guitars, and then love again, and then more arguments over a guitar riff, his beard grows visibly, she gets sleepy eyes. Many cigarettes, hundreds, butts on the ground. Remembering at four in the morning that they haven't eaten all day. And down to wolfing bread and peanut butter. And then love, despite the crumbs. And the phone ringing and no one answering, and the milk bottle clinking in the morning with the others forgotten outside the door. And music, guitars, songs. Exhausted on the couch, legs intertwined watching a Lynch movie. Heavy breath, sticky tongue, and a few empty liquor bottles rolling on the floor, amongst sheets full of notes and dust balls. Is it day? Is it night? Feeling as one, and to hell with everyone else out there. To the devil with those who imagine us as they want us to be. And let no one meddle. What the heck do they want from us? I have you, you have me. We don't need anyone else, it’s just us.
Few means, saturated guitars, a shared dream: the moog. We can't get a moog, honey... So let's torment the guitars, give them tetanus. And the electronics... you are the blues one, but I am the English one, dirty and radical. Acid voices, resentful, hearts laid bare, eyes locked on eyes. Direct action without any mediation. Live the music, bite it, and suffer like a cat chasing its tail. A path beyond, introverted, instinctive, claustrophobic, misanthropic.
No Wow, no wonder. It's all here, raw and unrefined.
Feeling like martians, like two refugees, two outcasts, while finally on the streets of London, with the recordings in our pocket. The subway thundering at you, frenzied people jostling you, passing by with their meticulous smell of the walking dead. People are strange, when you're a stranger. Lights assaulting the pupils, and the clangor, and the diaphragm above the stomach beating frantically.
Shortly, all of this will be in the hands of others, predators who will lay their greedy claws on it...
A look of understanding, unique and wild.
What do we do now? Do we run away?
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