According to my last.fm profile I’ve played through songs by Girls In The Eighties 260 times in the last 6 months. I fell instantly in love with their album “Teenage Royalty” and it lived in the CD player of my old car (I’ll get to that later) for months. It has all the elements of lo-fi and chillwave with this really interesting take on mixing in both heavily distorted guitars and well layered vocals that seep into the background then sneak up on you. Also Girls In the Eighties is a great name for a band. If they wanted indie cred they could change their name to Girls In The Eighties In Tokyo.
1. Your first few releases were very “bedroom pop” in their nature of being so lo-fi and trashy, but you keep the heavy distortion of guitars alive – do you just have a thing for heavy guitars?
Not necessarily. That’s just the way it turned out. There was a Big Muff in the studio we recorded at and I couldn’t help myself from using it. The guitar sound sort of a nod to the band Deadsy also. That band is the only reason girls in the eighties exist. I’d like to make a record that’s not so heavy in the future, but for the next few I will probably keep this sound. I’ve already got the next 2 albums written and waiting. I’m just trying to finish this one so I can save up money to have them recorded.
2. Do you ever get worried your vocal effects distance the lyrics from listeners too much? I got so freaked out when I was reading your lyrics for the first time because they’re so fucking deep.
It was never my intention to hide the vocals. Again, it’s just the way it turned outcat the time. I don’t have the proper equipment in my bedroom to record vocals or drums the way they should be so I had to make do with the sounds I got. If anything, I want the vocals to be heard! The lyrics are important to me. Most of the songs that will be on our new album were written shortly after I had tried to kill myself and tripped out for the first time so that probably explains why they’re so “deep”. I was using parts of my brain that I had never thought about or wanted to think about.
3. One time I played through Faceless Sonic Boom while my mum and her boyfriend were in the car and my mum nearly started crying. I don’t know if that was because of the music though.
We should put a sticker on our next album that says “Music to make your mother cry”.
4. In your music video for Yesterday’s Don’t Mean Shit there is a split second shot of a water bottle turned into a bong. Does that sort of thing influence your music a lot? (By that I mean helping re-use plastics to protect the environment, obviously.)
I don’t remember the water bottle bong? I don’t use plastics, I prefer the real thing.
5. On the topic of that video, most of it is just you and your friends repeatedly falling or toppling over. I also have a problem with falling over a lot.
I have vertigo.
6. I was blasting your music while driving down a highway and flipped over / totalled my car. As reimbursement can you write a song about me? I like long walks on the beach, winking awkwardly and using adjectives that start with the letter B in conversations whether or not the situation permits it.
I’m going to write a song for you about mothers in car crashes.
7. What’s your plan for future releases? Any chance of going back to your stripped back sound of Clean Your Room and Teenage Royalty?
I think we’re even more stripped down than ever before. Some of the songs on those albums have 20 plus tracks of background noises. The new record is just guitar, bass, keys, drums, and vocals. I do have plans to do a electronic album in a studio, but that will probably be like our fourth album or something. I’ve actually got a few songs written for that and may even re-do some of the Clean Your Room songs.
All their past releases are available to download for free on their tumblr page. I suggest you do so.
– Lonely Kids Club | Boutique T-shirt Label
