Their savvy use of online media may’ve helped drag the spotlight in their arena, but as many one-hit wonders can attest, novelty value only gets you so far. After two years of solid touring, TV appearances, live shows, festival spots and endless stream of myspace and twitter updates, it’s safe to say the best part of OK Go is still the music.
Just weeks after releasing their new album ‘Of the Blue Colour of the Sky’ the paisley-clad lads from Chicago and self-confessed “DIY band in a post-major label world” sit down for a chat with Sweatin’ Beats about being on the road, cool clips and heartbreak…
Sweatin’ Beats: Your new album has is the “danciest” yet. Tell us about the move in that direction?
Damian: When we first started playing it was very much inspired by the punk rock we were listening to as teenagers, and now our music has veered pretty far from punk rock. We went on tour for two and half years and played over 700 shows almost back to back, and as much as I still love the majesty and power of a rock n’ roll guitar, its pretty hard to crank up the amp in my garage and impress myself anymore.
Plus writing songs the old way didn’t seem to be working, it didn’t feel right anymore so we had to come up with a new way.
SB: Which act would you love to collaborate with?
Damian: I’m really excited about a lot of dance music right now. I really like the band Discovery, the side project of the guy from Ra Ra Riot. I was actually in Paris last week and met Gaspard from Justice and I was pretty excited about doing maybe a remix with him.
SB: The record deals with heartbreak. Are you writing from personal experience?
Damian: It’s all a reflection of yourself. I’ll leave it at this - if you go on tour for two and a half or three years, your relationships are very very restrained. It’s very hard to have a normal life when you live the same day over and over again in a different city. I think everybody came home feeling a little like a ghost in their own skin.
SB: What’s the best thing about being on the road?
Damian: The shows. 23 hours of the day are either boring, annoying or both, and that 24th hour is like pure bliss. It’s a trade off.
SB: You appeared in the movie ‘I Love You Man’. Would you like to do more acting?
Damian: I love the opportunity to try other creative things. And if the right opportunity came along I’d love to be in films.
SB: Your known for your creative videos. What can we expect from the next one?
Damian: For four months we’ve been building a giant machine. It’s been months and months of design and playing with it. There are 20 engineers whose day jobs are like NASA and all sort of craziness. I’ve been having so much fun learning physics from them.
We also have four other videos in various stages of production, ones an animation, another one we’re shooting in March and another in June.
SB: What advice would you give to wannabe musicians?
Damian: Make good things. Wanting to be a musician is a pretty vacuous aim and one if you actually get it without wanting it for the right reasons will make you miserable. Fame or notoriety are not worth it. There’s no reason to do it unless you love making things.
Copyright : Sweatin' Beats
