Franz Ferdinand interviewed them for their very own issue of the NME, Maximo Park played a gig wearing their merchandise and Hot Hot Heat are just mad about L.A. four-piece The Blood Arm. With their much awaited debut album ‘Lie Lover Lie’ under their belt they have hit the road. Fused squeezed into The Blood Arm’s tour bus to talk about lyrics, live shows and kissing The Fall.
Can you describe The Blood Arm for the kids who haven’t heard of you yet?
Dyan: A raging battle between flesh and spirit.
Zach: Awesome.
Zebastian: An ex-girlfriend that repeatedly breaks your car window.
You supported Maximo Park in Birmingham two years ago. Since then you’ve managed to build up a cult following within the music scene…
Nathaniel (laughs): Only within the music scene, nobody else cares about us. I guess it’s all by word of mouth. People have just been really kind and we’ve been very fortunate to open for many amazing bands. Maximo Park are good friends of ours and they certainly like to have fun on tour and we like to have fun with them. Especially Tiku.
Dyan: Their bass player is a fountain of wisdom. He’s amazing. We had a great time touring with them. After every show we would always hang out, have some drinks, arm-wrestle and play ping-pong.
Nathaniel: And give pony rides to Paul Smith.
Do you reckon there is a new wave of L.A. bands coming over?
Nathaniel: There’d better be! That’s why we are here, we are the first wave. The tidal wave of young blood.
Is it a really supportive scene? Do you work together quite a lot?
Dyan: L.A. is a very big and diverse city. There are a lot of different people playing different kinds of music. But it’s also a very close-knit community despite the diversity of genres. So it’s pretty cool to be able to pull from all these different influences and grow up together with the scene of bands. There are a lot of warehouses downtown where people just put on big parties that kinda go on all night and there are no rules. It’s really chaotic but a lot of fun.
Nathaniel: I can tell you places where not to see good music which is on the Sunset Strip, the Whiskey and the Viper Room. All those places are remains of the late 60s and not based in any sort of reality now. But there are a million places to see music in L.A. which I think is a big influence on us.
Nathaniel, you studied film at UCLA before you started the band…
Nathaniel: Studying film was interesting but only for a few days and then it became very tiresome. I was also making these ridiculous experimental shorts that no one in their right mind would enjoy. At the same time while making these films I would do some music stuff and it seemed like a good idea to start a band at that time. I met Zebastian our guitarist at a karaoke bar, I was singing Animals covers. I had known Dyan from UCLA, she was studying history but I conned her out of it and seduced her with rock ’n’ roll. She came to the band and started playing keyboards. There would just be Zebastian, Dyan and I jamming in his living room and his neighbours would get really upset. But then we realized we weren’t writing any good songs, they were just these ten-minute experimental epics. So finally a friend introduced us to the young Zach. He was the Sergeant Pepper to our Beatles. He really kicked us into gear and after that everything sort of came together and we were playing in L.A. for years and years and years and finally we made a couple of records and things have been going on ever since. And that’s it, the history of the band.
Does the filmmaking sometimes feed back into your song writing?
Nathaniel: I definitely think so. If cinema is about projection I think we are definitely about projecting all our anxieties and fears and interests on people. Even at our live shows we break the barrier and come out into the audience and really embrace everything. But I think it’s definitely an epic venture.
Do you reckon you will get back into filmmaking eventually to produce some weird music films?
Nathaniel: Oh I’d like to. I’m trying to convince these guys to let me direct one of the videos but there is too much money involved and I think I’d blow it all on the catering and make the video for five dollars. But yeah, eventually I’d like to get back into it. But this [music] isn’t too bad right now, I’ll just stick with it for the moment.
One thing that always strikes me when I listen to your songs is the lyrics. How important are the lyrics to you?
Nathaniel: I think lyrics are incredibly important. There is something to be said for off-hand lyrics. They come just straightaway and have a certain thing you can’t put your finger on, they are just really sincere and off the cuff. But when I am writing lyrics I’m trying to combine that with things that I am thinking about and trying to make songs like wholly formed thoughts rather than just things that rhyme together.
Take ‘Suspicious Character’ for example. Lyric-wise you come across quite confident…
Nathaniel: (laughs) I don’t know, I’m full of hot air I guess. Too self confident for my own good, it’s been a problem growing up. I think I am the best. And I think our band is the best.
I’ve heard that you are big fans of The Fall…
Nathaniel: For a long time I wanted to sing like Mark E. Smith. I guess I wasn’t doing it right and then we started getting better after that. Not that The Fall are bad for any reason, I guess imitation isn’t always the best thing. But I kissed Mark E. Smith once! I kissed him on the cheek and then I got thrown out of a club in New York for doing it. But it was well worth it. He’s a handsome man. I love talented men. He’s the Superman to my Lois Lane.
So what exactly happened when you kissed Mark E. Smith?
Nathaniel: We were in New York playing CMJ and we all went to see The Fall. I was super excited, it was the fourth time I had seen them at that point. I guess we had nothing to do that day, so we were just drinking and drinking all day.
Dyan: They were extremely late too. I guess Mark E. Smith had gotten lost in a cab on his way over there or something. So we spend all this time getting all hyped up and drinking and getting all excited about the show…
Nathaniel: Then they came on and Mark E. Smith was wearing this black t-shirt with playing cards pinned on it, it was really weird. They played a few songs and by then I had a lot of confidence, a deep sense of self worth…
Dyan: And I had a camera…
Nathaniel: I just leapt on the stage and I gave him a kiss and I made sure Dyan was taking pictures…
Dyan: And then you turned around and faced the audience in a triumphing roar and jumped into the arms of a security guard who then threw you out and me too.
Nathaniel: I don’t know why they threw you out though, by association? But it was definitely a highlight of my career as a musician.
Dyan: He didn’t even look up from singing as you kissed his cheek.
Nathaniel: Yeah, I think the members of his band were a little more shocked than he was. He’s seen it all I guess.
What do you like about The Fall?
Nathaniel: Mark E. Smith’s lyrics are amazing. He can sing about any subject and rant about anything he wants. I really like that in many songs he is very proud of being from Manchester and from the North. That’s really important, we are really happy to be from L. A. and we are always trying to send forth that there is a whole great scene there. But musically too The Fall are always interesting and always changing. So hopefully we will have lots of changes and musical progression in the same way.
I just hope that you won’t fire the whole band then…
Nathaniel: I can’t. I think they would fire me first.
So what can people expect from your live shows?
Nathaniel: It’s like Super Mario Brothers when Mario eats the mushroom and becomes very large. Before we go on stage we eat the mushroom and eat the flower that gives you the firepower and that’s our live show. It’s a metaphor for Super Mario Brothers.
‘Lie Lover Lie’ is out on City Rockers. The Blood Arm are currently touring Europe.
Words: Christine Franz
Image: Fred Dirtlab