Looks can be deceiving. Just ask the Horrorpops. Constantly pegged as a rockabilly-psychobilly hybrid thanks largely to its 50s-rooted fashion sense and double bass-slapping aesthetic, the Danish-American sextet can hardly blame the critics for classifying them as such.
Interview by Steve Tauschke | steve@staff.truepunk.com | with Patricia Day of The Horrorpops.
"Of course,
I can understand how having an upright bass, and now two quiffs in
the band does give the impression that we’re a rockabilly band,"
laughs singer-bassist Patricia on the phone from her home in Los Angeles.
"It’s just the image that controls your brain on that one. We
don’t deny our background but with us there’s a huge difference. Personally
I don’t like psychobilly, as music. It’s not my background, it’s not
where I come from."
The Horrorpops
were founded at Germany’s POPKOM festival in 1996 when Patricia’s
then Copenhagen-based group Peanut Pump Gun opened for psychobilly
kings Nekromantix with whose leader Kim Nekroman she discovered a
mutual adoration for The Cramps, Depeche Mode, surf, ska and pure
rock n’ roll.
"Nekroman
and I started talking and ten minutes later we agreed we wanted a
band together," says Patricia, a former piercing artist. "We
were tired of old sub-cultures and rules and we wanted to start something
that was fun. And the easiest way was to start over again and write
songs. In another way was to swap instruments. So I got the upright
bass and he got the guitar. About 12 years ago I saw an upright bass
out of classical context for the first time in my life and I just
had to try to play it."
Over the next
five years, the pair recorded a cache of demos that eventually fell
into the hands of Californian label Hellcat who in 2003 released the
Horrorpops’ debut album Hell Yeah, through Epitaph.
"We never
intended to do an album but we realized that we wouldn’t get any further
unless we did put one out," Patricia admits. "We didn’t
really want to do it because we all came from different bands that
already had been signed. We just wanted to be in for the rock n’ roll.
But we had these 13 songs we’d already recorded and they were so diverse
when it came to songwriting styles.
"And that’s
Horrorpops, we don’t want to commit to one style. It’s just rock n’
roll, the rest is just bullshit. Rock n’ roll is dead in Europe and
in the US rap has pretty much taken over so do we really need to divide
the few people who are into rock n’ roll by putting labels on them?
It will die if people keep that mentality."
A minor coup for
the band was recently drafting on board former Tiger Army/AFI bassist
Geoff Kresge, who has since taken on guitar and songwriting duties.
"Karsten,
our second guitarist, had to go back to Denmark so we had to find
a new person," Patricia explains, "and we didn’t really
give a fuck if they could play or not. It was a question of ‘they
had to be a friend’, that was most important to us. Geoff turned out
to be the best guitarist we ever had.
Also, the old
songs were written by Nekroman and I, and all of a sudden getting
a third party in really gave us a push and it felt amazing. You could
feel the drive and the energy of the three of us. The songs are very
rock n’ roll, very AC/DC-type rock n’ roll this type around."
Due in September,
the band’s forthcoming album Bring It On was produced, much to Patricia’s
delight, by Brett Gurewitz, Epitaph label honcho and founding guitarist
with LA punk legends Bad Religion.
"I still
haven’t realized that Brett Gurewitz is actually the producer of the
album., I still can’t get over that fact," she enthuses. "When
we got the offer to use a producer Hellcat didn’t want to step on
our toes by suggesting anyone. They asked who we would want to work
with and we had no idea. We thought ‘ok, what are our favourite albums,
what is the sound we like?’ And it was rock n’ roll in its purest
form and who is around today that makes that sound? And it was Brett."
