While they toured our country, we shot off a few questions to New Zealand’s favourite sons- Die! Die! Die!
I’m going to start with a broad question. What do you think has attracted people to your band over the years?
Chaos, disorder, good times, sometimes not such good times, a shared link between the bands music and a non elitist feeling that people that are coming to a die die die show or buying a recording are going to experience something that is real and can be believed.
Your sound has strongly been identified with the term “avant garde punk,” is this a label you identify with or try to perpetuate?
Avant-garde represents a pushing of the boundaries of what is accepted as the norm, so in the raw definition we would definitely relate to this, I would never try to push this label on us because in the end of the day pretentious labels are going to put you in a very small box.
You’ve established quite a reputation for your energetic live shows – do you find it difficult translating those strong rhythmic elements coherently in the studio setting?
Playing live has always been the easiest way for us as a band to present our music to people.
With our first recordings we did as die die die we tried to keep them as raw as possible, basically a document of what we do sound like live.
It is hard trying to translate that when you don’t have a PA blasting out, and its a some what sterile enviroment.
Over subsequent recordings we’ve tried to experiment in the studio to find a sound that creates the energy of what it would be live but pushing it in new directions.
What was the vision for your latest LP Form?
Our vision for Form was to create a record that had a unified sound, but with more of a collision of sounds, and to try and push ideas that we had been to scared of to try in the past.
It took shape as we went along though, and ideas and structures bloomed from very simple beginnings.
You’ve worked with some big names previously in production – the likes of Steve Albini, Howie Weinberg, Shayne Carter – how different was working with Nick Roughan on Form? What do you think Roughan bought to the production process?
Nick Roughan brought a really different approach to what we had done in the past, with our previous recordings our main limitation was time, as in we really rushed the whole process.
Nick encouraged us to put in other instrumentation, that was already there but had been used in a more buried way with us in the past.
We never got to precious with dropping ideas we had been working on also, which made the entire project really flexible and a lot of fun.
We started with a large group of songs and as time went on it was obvious what stuff was working and what wasn’t.
Is there a particular song off the new album that you are most proud of? Why?
I’m proud of the entire record, that was a really important thing for us with this latest album was to make sure we wouldn’t be unhappy with any of the tracks on it.
We really wanted it to work as a complete unit and not a collection of songs thrown together.
For long-time fans, what can they expect from the new album? Do you think they will be suprised? shocked? smitten? (all of the above?)
There are no doubt people who have been into what we have previously released will be able to certainly identify with Form and its always been a case for us that we try to push the sound to new places and not make the same record over and over again.
We found that with the release of promises,promises we lost a few people with the change of direction but found a lot more people who got into the band.
Were there any strong influences (musical or otherwise) which directly shaped the new album?
It was the first time we recorded in New Zealand since our first EP so that shaped our experience because we had a lot more people around us to bounce ideas off against.
We recorded over three weekends so we would track and have time that week to make changes to sounds and song structures.
I’m curious about the making of the We Built Our Own Oppressors video – how hard was it to break into to the place to film?
We were playing in New York that week for CMJ and decided the day before we arrived in New York to do a video.
We didn’t have a real idea of what we would do but remembered some building tops that were possible to break into in Brooklyn, it was a case of waiting for someone to leave the door open into the building so not huge planning was involved to get up!
They weren’t the safest locations with us having to get very close to ledges in high winds and a few questioning looks from residents of the building apart from that they were great locations for free, New York kind of is like one big movie set anyhow, I’m not sure if this is a good or bad thing.
For the readers who have criminally missed your tours to date – what can punters expect from a Die! Die! Die! live show?
We may play so intensely on these upcoming shows we’ll internally combust into a giant ball of feedback. But also the audience always turns a show from a good one to a really great one.
How did your last tour of Australia go? Did you have any unexpected good or bad times in places you hadn’t played before?
Our last tour in Australia was great, I’ve always found album release s that much more special though so really looking forward to these shows.
Lastly, what are your plans for the next few months and the Summer? Plenty of touring I’m sure? … this is the “tour plug” opportunity 😉
We are not doing our usual insane touring schedule for the rest of the year, going to be putting together some new recordings and hopefully start releasing some new material in whatever way we decide. The year is far from over, so watch this space.
Questions by Larry Heath, Jennifer Peterson-Ward and David Young
