Andyman: We’re awful glad to have you here. Thanks for making your way out
today.
Stellastarr*: Thank you.
Am: This is the eve of something big for you here. Your new album’s coming out
tomorrow. Harmonies for the Haunted. Give them a hand on that. You
got a show tonight at The Basement. So it will be festive like.
S: We hear they have great chicken wings there.
Am: They have great chicken wings there at the basement. Hey. Do they have
chicken wings at the basement? But they do have tickets available for the show.
There are a handful of tickets left so why don’t we jump into a song just right
away.
S: Sure, right away. I guess we’re going to do a song off the record called born
in a flea market first.
Am: Stellastarr* in the CD101 big room. (applause and music starts)
Am: Stellastarr* in the CD101 big room. Alright, that’s the way to kick things
off.
S: Big room with a basketball hoop. So we can play after.
Am: Yeah. We’ve got Arthur, Michael, Amanda, and Shawn all here. The last time
you guys were in town connected with CD101 was that big CD101 day show we did in
2004.
S: Yeah that was crazy. It was like a line of sheep in here. Ya know, band in
band out. Fans in fans out. It was craziness.
Am: And you guys put on one hell of a show that night.
S: Ah, thanks.
Am: What’s been going on with the band since then, internally, externally?
S: We’ve hibernated. We’ve slept for a bit and recorded another record. I mean
we wrote. We came back from tour in August last year and we kind of just hid
away and wrote the record and recorded it and just sort of took a bit of time
off so that we could sort of come back strong.
Am: Yeah and you feel like you’ve done that and you’re ready to get out and tour
the world.
S: Yeah and we’re just starting our tour. I mean this is going to be our third
night really and we just did two Canada dates so we haven’t really played
America basically yet for this record so this will be the first American date.
Well, I guess we played Boston.
Am: I was going to bug Darrin about some maybe road stories. Some embarrassing
road stories but you’ve only been out for two dates.
S: We’ve only been out for two dates.
Am: Is there anything that you want to share?
S: I’d rather embarrass Darrin to be honest with you. He’s the sound engineer.
Am: Okay.
S: I can’t because he’s looking at me now and he’s threatening me through the
glass. I don’t know. I have to tour with him for another month so I don’t want
to you know. No tension. No tension on the bus.
Am: Do you guys have fun when you tour? When you do, I know it’s been awhile,
but is it a fun thing for you?
S: It’s fun, yeah, I mean it’s. The gigs are fun. Sometimes the drives aren’t so
fun. Driving for twenty hours straight is a little bit tough sometimes.
Am: Favorite method of passing the time?
S: Truck stops.
Am: Truck stops?
S: Arthur likes to find bathrooms in other hotels actually. It’s sort of a thing
for him.
Am: You’re twisted. He’s a drummer.
S: Yeah, he’s a drummer. He has to be. It’s his thing, ya know. Michael what do
you do?
Michael: I read a lot and I listen to a lot of music.
Am: The rock n’ roll lifestyle is something else isn’t it?
S: There’s nothing like getting in a van and driving for thirteen hours,
sleeping for six, getting up driving another thirteen hours. It’s a great time.
Trust me, you’ll have a blast.
Am: Everybody get out and buy a guitar right now.
S: We’ve got this little guitar actually. That’s what we do. We’ve got this
little tiny guitar with not a lot of strings and it’s totally out of tune, but
we play it. It goes really high up on your chest so you look ridiculous with it.
It’s a great time.
Am: But you’re together and there is a togetherness there and you’re having fun
with that.
S: No, we don’t talk to each other.
Am: Oh, there you have it. But you play well together. You guys ready for
another song?
S: Sure, why not?
Am: See, jump right into it. They’re playing tonight at the basement once again,
Stellastarr* in the CD101 big room. (applause and music starts)
(applause and music ends)
Am: Stellastarr* in the CD101 big room. Michelle, I’m going to focus on you for a
second here. Yeah, just for a second cause for the last two songs, I was
listening, I was thinking, ya know, his vocal style. There’s nobody else that’s
doing anything like that right now. Did you have an influence on how you sing or
why you sing like you do? Because I love it.
Michelle: Well, the thing is when we play live shows or when we play radio shows
or things like that, I often like to just change the melody a lot of times. And
I just change the melody all the way up while we’re writing and up until we’re
recording. So, a lot of times, I’m just. I don’t know if that has anything to do
with anything. But a lot of times for the melody for the final song is not what
was rehearsed or written in the first place and the melody for the song on the
live show is usually different. Ya know, I just like to change it up. I don’t
know if it’s boredom or what it is. But it’s just nice to constantly go to
different kinds of notes and things.
Am: When did you start singing?
Michelle: In this band. Well, I can’t say that I guess. I was in a band with
Mandi and Arthur and I did a couple songs then, but really for this band is when
I first started to sing.
S: That’s when you became the front man.
Michelle: Yeah I guess you could say that.
Am: You got some silver boots for tonight right? As the front man. A Freddy
Mercury jump suit.
Michelle: Yeah, absolutely.
Am: Do you write all the songs?
Michelle: No, we write them together.
Am: You right them together, okay. How does the song writing process work out
with you guys as a group?
S: Well a lot of times, Michael has a riff and I say remember that. Because what
will happen is Michael will forget that and he needs to remember that. So, he’ll
have a riff and I’ll say remember that and maybe I’ll come in the next day with
another couple parts and the song will sort of form from there. Or sometimes
I’ll have a song laid out in my head and then I come in and they basically just
change it a little bit around and those are kind of the main ways that we come
up with songs. And there’s a couple times where. There’s a song on the record
called “The Diver” where I remember Arthur and Mandi were just sort of playing
and me and Michael kind of wandered in the room and just started playing along
with them and that was kind of the basic foundation of the song. So, they come
out different ways.
Am: I’ve always liked the lyrics of your songs too mainly because I always
thought that there was some biting to them. There was some darkness and that’s
always my favorite thing. When you have a pop, and I mean that with all the
warmth in my heart, a great pop song with really dark lyrics. There’s nothing
better in the world. So is there anything with the lyric writing that comes
together as a team or individually?
S: Generally, I write all my lyrics myself. And I kind of once in a while. The
way it works really is I’ll sort of improv lyrics while we’re writing songs so
I’ll have the melody and sometimes like Michael will say I really love that
line, you gotta keep that line, from when I’m improving, when I’m adlibbing
rather. So if I’m adlibbing, sometimes, there’s some songs that are just pieces
of what I was singing on the spot in the room and I just kind of pieced them
together. Like the lines that I liked and then decided okay what’s this song
really about and just sort of reformed it to be cohesive, but a lot of lyrics
are just on the spot and they just kind of make it to the final cut.
Am: I do want to point out that I did refer to you as a band as a team and I
feel kind of silly about that so let’s huddle up and have one more song and get
people ready for the show tonight at the Basement. Alright?
S: Okay.
Am: Stellastarr* in the CD101 big room. (applause and music starts)
Am: Stellastarr* in the CD101 big room at the Basement tonight. There are still
some tickets available. Pick them up. Tomorrow you want to pick up Harmonies for
the Haunted. It’s in stores tomorrow. Congratulations on that record again. So
thank you very much Amanda, and Arthur, and Michael, and Shawn. Give them
another big hand. And we turn it back over to command central.
