Over the course of two records, Montreal duo Handsome Furs has created an electro-pop style that mixes the kind of catchy songs and buzzy tones that made Depeche Mode stars, but with gritty guitars and stomping beats.
The band's third record for Sub Pop, "Sound Kapital," is encased in an eye-catching sleeve, but one that suggests the duo – Alexei Perry and her husband, Wolf Parade's Dan Boeckner – is holding nothing back.
Written entirely on keyboards – a new approach for Handsome Furs – and recorded quickly, "Sound Kapital," manages to feel at once both retro and modern, and despite it's often dark, metallic sound, "Sound Kapital" has a human and celebratory feel.
Handsome Furs hit Milwaukee on Thursday, July 28 for a WMSE Radio Summer Camp gig at The Rave.
We got the chance to ask Perry a few questions about the band, the record and touring.
OnMilwaukee.com: Is it true that you wrote it exclusively on keyboards for the first time? Did you constrain yourself to leaving your guitar in the case or did circumstances lead you to make the record that way?
Alexei Perry: We did do a lot of the writing while on the road and, logistically, using synths and beats made that process easier. Also, we felt with the lyrical and thematic content of the songs we were writing that instrumentation made more sense to express our ideas. That said, however, there is guitar all over this record. Heavy awesome guitar when it was needed.
OMC: I heard that you recorded "Sound Kapital" pretty quickly, too. Was
that unusual for you or did you do the others in a burst of energy, too?
AP: We like to record as quickly as possible. Given the nature of the tools we use, like drum machine, the tendency in other bands is to do a lot of tweakery in post-production. We aren't that type of band. As soon as we get the sound we want and can physically play the song through (even just once!), we're ready to record.
We like to keep the integrity of the song in tact so it feels right to get those ideas down as immediately as possible. In fact, the first song on the new album was both written and recorded on our last day in the studio!
OMC: What were the upsides and downsides to taking these different
approaches?
AP: There were only upsides for me to be honest, otherwise we likely would have done the process differently! We don't have any one telling us what tools we should use or what time constraints we have because we don't have management and the folks at Sub Pop are loving and good to us. We're pretty DIY, so we do things in the ways we feel we should. We're lucky.
OMC: Because there is so much more keyboard on the record, can we expect that you won't strap on the guitar as much when you come to Milwaukee in July? Or do you tinker the arrangements for the stage?
AP: There's guitar on every song except one on the record and though it's more heavily electronic, Dan still plays the sh*t out of his guitar on stage as well as rocking out some new beautiful synths that make me equally proud and impressed.
OMC: I liked the "what we saw" listing on the sleeve. Did you feel like
those moments were key influences on your outlook and the music while
you were making the record?
AP: They were indeed wholly important to creating this record. On the sleeve, I tried to mention some experiences we had on tour with some pretty remarkable people that changed our lives. I have had my eyes f*cking opened by what I have been lucky to witness in my life.
I feel hugely inspired by people making art in difficult regions, by people expressing their ideas under difficult governance and I feel such global kinship with these people – politically, culturally, artistically – that their motivations definitely crept into my own. Some experiences were hard, depressing, violent, some were joyous and liberating and all were equally shocking and triumphant and truly truly meaningful to me.
OMC: "Sound Kapital" comes in a rather provocative, eye-catching cover but
one that also seems to say, here's everything we've got, we're not
hiding anything. Did you hesitate at all about the cover and did you
face any opposition from the label or anyone else?
AP: For me, in what I do, I am trying to most honestly express what it means to be human in this time. You can not get more raw than nakedness underneath an oppressive overpass. The rest of the album artwork came from a waterpark in the dead centre of Beijing – a very human oasis despite the surrounding skyscrapers.
To me, it is so important to do the best you can to be honest and to live honestly no matter how terrifying and strange and difficult and absurd that all is. The album cover has been met with prudish conservative mentalities – even from our journalistic "peers" – and censorship in some places and I feel, despite the censorship, I am paying homage to the fellow artists I just mentioned in other countries by doing my best to express myself most openly no matter who tries to tell me not to. We were lucky that Sub Pop took the risk with us.
OMC: Have you been to Milwaukee before? If not, do you have any
expectations/pre-conceived notions? If so, do you have any fond – or
not so – memories of the city?
AP: I like touring in the Midwest. I think a lot of touring bands neglect that region of the United States, save Chicago, because their booking agents tell them that it isn't worth playing "secondary markets."
Obviously, we don't listen to that noise, because we're very close friends with our booking agent anyhow – she's rad. We like playing everywhere in the f*cking world, especially the more overlooked ones. So I anticipate the show will be awesome. I trust you folks.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
