SLEIGH BELLS INTERVIEW

by Dan Lomas, 07 December 2010

I met up with them awesome dudes, Sleigh Bells to chat about Allergys, Ol Dirty Bastard, Richie Valens, M.I.A. and Jerry Springer... I know right. Another rad interview.

 

 

KEY

D - Derek (the boy)

A - Alexis (the girl)

 

D - So what are we gonna be doing today?

There’s a petting zoo?

D - A petting zoo?

Yeah.

D – I’m like kind of, an allergy dude.

Oh so maybe not there then.

D – Ha-ha, It’s maybe not the best place to go. Ha, but we’ll think of something.

So you arrived here yesterday, have you got much done?

A – I got my nails done, we drank some cider.

D – I’ve actually just had a bunch of cider.

So where did you two grow up?

D – I was born in Pahokee, South Florida and raised in a place called Jupiter. like it; it’s a cultural void, but its home.

A – I grew up on the ocean too. I grew up in New Jersey. A small coastal town called Manasquan. It’s like an hour from New York.

So when you were younger, were you destined to be musicians?

D - I dunno. I definitely was obsessed with music since I was very young. I remember being obsessed with Ritchie Valens, actually.

A – Ha-ha

D – I had one of those boom boxes, that had a built in mic, I wish I had the tapes, because I used to do an A Capella version of ‘La Bamba’, but I didn’t speak any Spanish so I was just making sounds that are like, erm…

A - ‘Ba bada bumba lababa bum ba deepdeepdo dadomda’

D – Ha-ha, yeah.

A – My dad was a musician. So he has recordings of me when I was like 2, and he’d be like ‘My God. She’s humming. On key! She’s only 2!’ But it’s just me being a baby.

How did you guys meet?

A – I went to college in the City and was working in New York. And he was working in a restaurant. I was out for dinner with my mom, and she’s rather talkative and friendly. So she struck up a conversation with Derek. He said he was looking for a female vocalist, so my mom was like “Oh, Alexis is a singer” and I turnt red.

Is there such place as The Brooklyn Zoo? Like with the Wu Tang reference?

D – Brooklyn is a zoo.

Is there anything behind the name?

D – Nope. There was nothing behind it. Zero significance. It was something I used, since ’05, anything I worked on, by myself, and I would always label it under Sleigh Bells. No other reason than the fact it hadn’t been used yet.

How was it having M.I.A in the crowd at one of your shows?

D – We met before she came. Were fans, so it was great. Really flattering. She’s like my favourite MC in the past, fuck, 10 years. She’s awesome.

Was it a bit unnerving?

A – She came to like one of our third or fourth shows. For me it was a little like ‘Oh shit, we have enough to worry about’

So do you know who did the video for Kids?

D – We have no idea, its really good though right? That ones really disturbing, but really great. I feel they totally got the darker side of the song. So going with girls in G-strings, and surfboards and shit was really funny. That song has a real dark side, the video oddly enough really highlights that song.

 

 

If Sleigh Bells were on Jerry Springer, what would be the description of the show?

D – Why I killed my lead singer. Haha

A – Alright fine, I’m gonna leave now.