Interviews

Lemonade

Hugh Worskett 22/10/2009

Recently I had the chance to ask Sunday Best's new signing Lemonade a few questions. I took them to task in a strangely irreverent mood and luckily they replied in kind. You can decide for yourselves how successful the whole thing turned out to be…

Hi Lemonade. Firstly, why Lemonade? Why not Dr Pepper, Pepsi Max or Diet Tango? Or are you making a stand against branded soft drinks? Fanta's all right isn't it?

We sing about pools of Fanta on our forthcoming EP. It's one of the more abstract moments lyrically. Ben can't wait to try whatever Diet Tango is.

Your music makes me want to take lots of things with complex chemical structures and run off to find a beach to have a gritty and completely unromantic encounter. How do you ever make it through your gigs, or do you employ people to push you back on stage and restrain you from running off to the seaside?

Unromantic? Find the love inside of you. We think about running to the seaside all the time, but if we did that, we wouldn't make music that yearns so much for it, so we would fail as Lemonades. We make it through our gigs because there are all sorts of people dancing and having a great time so it's a good place to be. Let the beach be in your mind you know? Or when you come to a gig- all of our minds at once. We can all share a mental sunburn.

Next up: New York. I could be wrong, but I hear this is where you're currently based. I don't associate the NY scene with your kind of music. Is it very much a case of West coasters having to teach a thing or two to the East coasters?

We live there now. Yeah, it's not so New York in attitude or sound, but it's not totally California either. I think the Lemonade energy is actually homeless, but it is not a bum (as in vagrant).

I notice your MySpace banner feature lots of sweet and citrus fruits, plus an eyeball. Is this how you would summarise your sound, lots of fruity goodness, some sweet, some tangy with a jelly eyeball surprise to top it off?

Yeah that sounds good to us. There is a glowing crystal too and some tentacle-like plants.

I notice you use programmed beats and samples a lot. How do you, as men, find working with machines? Is there a place for nature within your music?

We work with machines but we are the natural accompaniment. We play live instruments and percussion and sing. The coldness and the warmness contrast one another and it becomes a cyborg, which is the perfect creation. The music is filled with nature, flaws and emotions. Nature is all around us, in some ways people are allowing themselves to be more primitive and less constructed while being so technologically constructed and sophisticated.

Does an artist have a responsibility to comment on cultural and sociological issues ala Thom Yorke or Jay-Z, or should musicians just put up, shut up and play the goddamn songs?

Nobody has to say or do anything as an artist. When music speaks to you and causes you to open your heart it is an act of peace and understanding. Cultural and sociological issues are up to the individual. Jay-Z is an arrogant maniac who wants to be the CEO of rap. That is lame.

If you had to swap minds with any other artist, who would you choose, bearing in mind the implications both for their music and for your own?

A good Lemonade Freaky Friday would be us and Nikola Tesla, revving up the coil and discussing early new age occultism. Yeeeah... why not?

And finally, “The best way to appreciate art is to make copies, lots of copies.” Discuss.

Nah. Art is not supposed to last long and you shouldn't feel the need to possess it physically. However, if you want to start a cultural phenomenon it has to be accessible, and a cultural phenomenon is as frustrating as it is fun!

Thank you very much Lemonade.

Lemonade release the single Bliss Out on the 26th of October. It's taken from their self-titled debut album which is out now.