Cute Is What We Aim For
We caught up with singer Shaant hours before their UK live debut.
When Cute Is What We Aim For banded together in Buffalo, New York, last summer, they never believed for one second that in just over twelve months time they'd find themselves on an almost sell-out tour in the UK. We caught up with singer Shaant hours before their UK live debut to talk English Literature, inspirations and scrapping with sound guys.
Ok, let's start at the beginning: where did Cute Is What We Aim For come from, as a band name?
It was just a joke between my friends and I, I didn't think it would stick!
What's your favourite thing about touring?
Playing. Yeah, I really like playing. Playing is my favourite thing. People say meeting people, and I really enjoy meeting people, but playing is what we all started this for.
What's your worst live experience?
Oh man, there are a lot. Too many, too many! You know what, I almost got in a fight with the sound guy at CBGB. That was great. You know, every band's got bad experiences, we've just got a lot of them, but they're all fun and you all learn from them, so at the end of the day it's all fun.
Are you expecting a big difference between UK and US crowds?
I have no idea, I have absolutely no idea. I hear they're really inviting and it's really fun and the energy is really high, so I'm hoping for that but I have absolutely no idea. I'm nervous. I'm never nervous to play. The only time I'm nervous is when I guest vocal, but I'm actually kinda nervous.
Your debut album, 'The Same Old Blood Rush With A New Touch', broke Fueled by Ramen's internal record by almost 4,000 copies. What was that like?
Oh, it's insane. I dunno, it still hasn't sunk in, and I don't want it to because that's when you get big-headed. It's a number, it makes you wanna keep going and make it bigger and bigger. We might have beaten Panic's first week, but Panic have set the bar three times as high as any Fueled By Ramen band ever so you're always gonna be in that shadow.
What's your favourite song on the album?
I don't have one. No, it's too hard, just because we wrote every song with the same intensity. Actually, you know what, there's a B-side, there's a song that I wrote everything for, the music and everything, and I really enjoy that. But I don't know if that'll ever see the light of day.
On your single 'There's a Class For This' you worked with William Beckett of The Academy Is...; what was that like?
We did it with a remote location, he recorded it on the back of Panic's bus. So working with him, he's a great guy, really nice, he's helped out a lot.
Didn't you work with Conor Oberst from Bright Eyes too?
No, I'd kill myself if I did that. That would be just too much. That would be when I'd be like, "Ok, I'm done." If I ever got that opportunity... he's my biggest influence.
The album's been described as being "lyrically accentuated power-pop". How important are the lyrics to you?
Lyrics? Lyrics are everything. Lyrics are what we base all our songs on; the record is based on lyrics. I can't listen to a record if I don't like the lyrics. That's why Conor and Bright Eyes, and bands like Cursive, are extremely important to me. I'm a huge fan of Peter Doherty just because his lyrics are so... you just sit there. I can't emphasise enough how important lyrics are, I think they're the best thing ever. You can always listen to a song and you can hum it, but what are you singing? You don't go to a show, or a gig, and hum along to a guitar part, no, you're singing, right?
What are your aspirations for the future, are you going to do another album?
Another album? Of course, yeah. We're gonna do as much as we can. But aspirations are, I guess, just to go as far as we can go and get in as many doorways as possible. 'Cause you can never be like, "I wanna do this, this and this," because then when you don't do it, you're all like, "Shit." Yeah, I just wanna try and make this the best it can be.
So why did you go with Fueled By Ramen?
Because they were the only label that wanted us. No other label was interested at all. John just randomly called me. You know it's funny because everybody asks me that and every time I say it, they're always like "Really, you mean Fueled By Ramen is the only label that was interested, the only label that offered?" So, hopefully, now some other labels are going "Shit!" But Fueled By Ramen is the best. I couldn't, or we couldn't, have been luckier, just for the fact that sometimes in my off-time, when I'm home, I just fly to Fueled By Ramen and stay there and just hang out for a week, even though I'd really like to be home. They're my best friends, everyone at the label is fantastic.
[Tour manager enter and hands Shaant the set times.]
Oh, there are three bands tonight? I was wondering, I was like, "How the fuck are we gonna fill all that time?"
So do you not meet the bands beforehand, that you're playing with?
I met Kids in Glass Houses, a few of them, briefly. And they're great. When we're done, I'm gonna hang with them. I was just saying to Jack [Marin - temp bassist] that I love opening bands. Just because I remember - we're really fortune enough to be headlining and stuff like that - I remember the feeling that I got, even if it was just a small show in front of like 200 people, I was just thrilled with the opportunity. And so it's really cool to be able to talk to them and see the excitement.
Everything exploded really quickly for you, didn't it? With the internet and everything. How did that come about, just recording songs in your bedroom and putting them on Myspace?
Yeah, exactly. No, that's exactly it. There's not much more to it. It's phenomenal; I love it!
You've been compared quite a lot to Shakespeare, in the way that you write your lyrics. What do you think of that?
I don't know. I don't know anything in reference to writing. I don't know the proper terms and the proper ways to write; it's just something that goes on in my head. So that's great, it's really cool, it's kinda funny. I guess I just got lucky. There are certain writers that try to write in metre and stuff like that, I don't do that at all. I just write what I write. You know what, sometimes in Literature it's great that you set yourself the guideline and it's proper just for the fact that the reader can actually absorb it. But in music, luckily you have your voice and you're the narrator yourself, and you can use pitch and intonate to emphasise your points. I respect it in Literature but music, you know, unless you're really good and you write really cool stuff like Bob Dylan - he's amazing - I can understand it, but for me, I'm just lucky.
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