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Dirty Princess
175 Plays5 years ago
DIRTY PRINCESS is a mischievous alchemy of Francesca, Mikayla , and Jewlz
These women appear as a dark obscurity that rose into the spotlight in early 2018.
Dirty Princess have encapsulated crowds with fuzz guitars, banshee-like vocals, and stand up drums. Their music is a field of energy you can feel starting at your toes and ending in the tips of your hairs.
Wild and Alive rock n' roll will NEVER die!!!
https://www.instagram.com/pcp3k/
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Transcript
Introduction and Band Members
00:00:00
Speaker
You are listening to Something Rather Than Nothing, creator and host Ken Volante, editor and producer Peter Bauer. This is Ken Volante with the Something Rather Than Nothing podcast, and we have for this episode, Dirty Princess,
00:00:28
Speaker
a Portland band that I really enjoy. They have a new release that came out this summer. And I'm lucky enough to have the whole band. Michaela, you might remember from Black Quarter Holy Light, Jules, and Francesca.
Childhood Influences on Art and Music
00:00:48
Speaker
I wanted to thank you for joining the program and welcome all of you. Thank you so much. Happy to be here.
00:00:55
Speaker
So the first question I generally ask is, what were you what were you like when you were younger? Were you always interested in art or music or musical? And I'd love to hear each of your answers. And just in beginning the episode, if you could just mention your name at the beginning so folks can kind of get used to whose voices who. Yeah, this is Francesca.
00:01:24
Speaker
And I was a very creative kid and a fun kind of family. There's a lot of music going on all the time, but I was more into the visual arts and sewing and all sorts of things. And kind of just wild little crafty kids started taking art lessons at a really young age and then kind of got into music more later in my life. But yeah, always kind of always had art, especially painting.
00:01:55
Speaker
Yeah. This is Jules. When I was a kid, I felt like I wasn't here. So there was a lot of mixed worlds. And I think that what helps me write today, I remember hearing music
00:02:20
Speaker
Well, something that affected me for the first time was like a Pink Floyd song. I think it was like either time or it was something like that. And my dad played it. And I was just like in my car seat, but I was pretty young still. And, uh, just like started bawling and shaking. And like, I just was so enthralled that sound could manipulate your emotions.
00:02:47
Speaker
And as a young kid, that was like something that I hadn't grasped yet. Um, and then after that, like, that's all I begged my parents. Like I wanted to play violin, but it was expensive and my parents were pretty poor. So like, I tried to find something else and it was like my acoustic guitar was the closest thing. And I kind of had to like learn from a class that in my fifth grade,
00:03:16
Speaker
how to play, but also just kind of dink around and play whatever. And I just remember playing one note and just living in that. I was listening to it ring out because it was just something that I never experienced. So that's how I got into music. Yeah, it sounds like you had a rather sensitive to have that strong emotional reaction to music and to have that memory. Did you say you were in your car seat?
00:03:45
Speaker
I was in my car seat because I remember looking down at it and seeing the design and like I remember the whole I remember the whole moment. But it was I had to be young like pre fathomable memories. So that's why. Yeah. So that's why it was so intense because it was one of the memories that I that I do remember being so young because I would shift like in and out of this consciousness and like
00:04:12
Speaker
this dream world. My parents thought that I had like ADHD or whatever, which I probably did, but they tried to pinpoint it, but nobody's could really figure it out. It was just maybe when I came out of the womb or something, like I, my spirit has hadn't caught up with my body or something, or my spirit had lived here and my body wasn't catch up caught up. I don't know something like that.
00:04:38
Speaker
Wow, that's like we got into some deep territory really quick there. I mean, I got sidetracked on trying to figure that out. I know exactly what I know exactly what you mean. I recently had some conversations about art and emotions connected to music and color. And I never really kind of made the strong connection of how,
Artistic Influences and Surrealism
00:04:59
Speaker
like you said, you know, music impacts you. The emotion impacts you and it creates that strong connection. Michaela.
00:05:08
Speaker
And I wanted to mention, Mikaela, I sent you a message about this. You're our second return guest on this show, and you've done it in just a few episodes. So I want to thank you for being back, and I also wanted to hear, again, you know, one of the things too, Mikaela, you would have the privilege to answer any of these questions completely opposite or to... Yeah, that's true. It's an honor. Happy to be back.
00:05:38
Speaker
Um, but yeah, the young kid, I was like, I was just super quiet and pretty introverted. I was kind of like always just wanted to do my own thing. And my parents tried to put me in sports when I was a kid, but I just never wanted to go to practice. I always, we had a piano in my living room and I always was sitting at that and just wanted to was always drawn to music. And so my parents finally just put me in like music lessons. I started at piano lessons when I was.
00:06:08
Speaker
like really little. And then I commenced them to get me a guitar when I was like 10 years old and just fell in love. Yeah, there's a really funny picture of me with my first guitar. I just had really short hair. It looked like a boy. I was a super tall boy. Yeah. And what was the, was, was the guitar a certain color or stand out?
00:06:35
Speaker
or anything. Yeah, it was a zebra straight. Oh, wow. I immediately assumed like that that that that Bowie that that Bowie guitar. But no, that that sounds like a great photo. One of the things I wanted to ask each one of you has to do with your art as a whole and the different type of art that you do, including for your music.
00:07:04
Speaker
I just wonder if in asking you who are your artistic influences or main artistic influences? Can you throw out a few names as far as those artists who you see in your work due to their influence? It's hard for me to answer that because I just like listen to like such a wide variety of things and I feel like
00:07:33
Speaker
Um, I'm influenced kind of by experiences a lot and like my environments and like skateboarding is one of those things like for Dirty Princess, especially just kind of like influenced by life. I would probably say just within my writing and stuff, and this is somebody that I've already talked about being like obsessed with is like,
00:07:59
Speaker
Not even in within, uh, sound, but within visual aspect. It's like, I love like Salvador dot Lee. I feel like what he paints or definitely like connected to human consciousness as a dream world. Like in a lot of different things, like, you know how he like puts limbs on like crutches and like makes them fat or really skinny or really tall.
00:08:29
Speaker
Yeah, sure. Like their legs and stuff. I used to have, um, I think they call it Alice in Wonderland syndrome. And it was cool. I only found this out from death Valley girls. Cause I didn't know what to call it, but she said that, um, it's like when you see something, but it changes in size and shape and like length. It gets thin and like, like that kind of, it's kind of hard to explain, but like,
00:08:59
Speaker
seeing his art was like confirmation that I just wasn't going through like these experiences alone. That's what a lot of artists helped me realize within and it helped me reflect it into my music because when you see that and you're like, I'm like, you see that as well. You know, I was just I was just reading and connected to the point.
00:09:29
Speaker
Uh, Dave Mustaine, a mega death. Uh, they put out this new book, um, for rust and peace came out in 1990. Um, just like this, you know, intense, like, I just love this album. And one of the things was strangers, all those guys were just like incredibly jacked up on every drug, like heroin, cocaine, alcohol, super addiction. And they had come out of rehab, but they were all, you know,
00:09:57
Speaker
Let's just say they had a few more pounds on than they were comfortable from before Yeah, yeah, and the thing is on the video which I didn't know that you know They did this and on the video they actually stretched out the film so it looked like these were kind of like big You know imposing, you know metal guy like a metal guy, you know without a shirt You're supposed to look like a metal guy and be big and you know
00:10:29
Speaker
Nowadays. Yeah. Or yeah. Or that is that's funny. I know as I did. I didn't know that. It's actually I actually think it's my favorite album. So I did. I've been doing a deep dive into reading about its making and to end this thing come up a lot in in in funny ways. And in this day I have a kind of of an interest with him. I had his
00:10:59
Speaker
his signature uh what are they fucking my pick-ups pickups and uh my old guitar that actually made it sound really sick you found in a dumpster yeah i found a guitar in a dumpster but i didn't found it find the pickups in a dumpster i got those but um yeah he's an interesting character i like that you brought that up a lot because i'm gonna check that out
00:11:26
Speaker
Well, the the the final thing on my my recent reading of that before we get to Michaela on the artistic, artistic influences is the the the book is a strange one. I mean, it's a book for like I love the album so much and it's it's an important album, like politically as well, I think. But the thing was strange about it was the guys in the band are having all these arguments about
00:11:53
Speaker
who said what, you know, it was typical bullshit. It was like, you know, you walked out of that recording session half an hour early, it was your fault. And there's a fiction about this. And you're like, yeah, like years later. Well, yeah. And it was like, I'm reading this and it's like, look, guys, at least three of you have no recollection of what actually occurred. That's the problem. And you actually, nobody was actually there. Nobody was actually there in a certain way.
00:12:23
Speaker
That's so funny. So yeah,
Dirty Princess Origin Story
00:12:26
Speaker
we'll we'll we'll we'll chat some more about that. Michaela, I don't want to miss you on artistic influences. Oh, I answer. It hasn't answered yet. Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah. So to kind of go off what Jules was saying about how like experiencing visual art and then feeling not feeling alone because of that, like I definitely feel that it's kind of obvious with the band because we're doing it together. Yeah.
00:12:53
Speaker
which is like my favorite part of it. Cause it's like a friendship experience. Yeah. But as far as visual art is concerned, I feel like it does the opposite for me in a really cool way. This is like, this is why I'm complete individual and I'm the only one that can paint this stroke. And this is like, you know, this is, it's individual to me. And that's kind of like, my painting is super personal and the band is like a show.
00:13:23
Speaker
You know, so I think, yeah, but my, as far as influences are concerned, like it's kind of all over the board with music for sure. Um, and in art, like, I don't know, I'm kind of a Picasso fan fan, like, um, Austrian, some Austrian artists and this dude, Hunter Vosser does, did all this architecture. And I think that's really cool because he made these like surrealist looking
00:13:52
Speaker
And there they are, and you can live in it. And to take your art into those kind of realms is really interesting to me. And I want to do some sets and stuff with the band. And we've always talked about making an experience out of our music and using all our senses. And I think that's really cool, artistically, to be able to take people somewhere else, somewhere surreal. Yes. I can agree on that 100%.
00:14:23
Speaker
Yeah, I love that idea of the overall experience of what you're trying to do in the
The Essence of Art and Vulnerability
00:14:30
Speaker
band. One thing I wanted to mention about the Dali, we actually have at the Lawrence Gallery, I think it might be physically in McMinnville. They actually have archives of Dali's sketches.
00:14:48
Speaker
if you if you go there and you ask about that they'll show you some of his sketches and it really yeah expanded it expanded the idea of who I understood Dali to be because right there's this great commercial aspect to his surrealism but yeah there's some beautiful like pencil sketches of like bullfights well I'm a vegan so I shouldn't be you know but you know but like you know
00:15:13
Speaker
Spanish, like, cultural life. Lawrence Gallery. So make sure, you know, and for listeners as well. I believe it's right in McMinnville. Yeah, it's my friend's grandpa is started that why I grew up in the same town. Yeah, Duncan. Yeah, that's where we're finding out some things now. Yeah, it's actually a piece like
00:15:41
Speaker
200 feet away from us in a room at this antiques place next to our house where we are right now. Yeah. So cool to be able to have fine art just right there. Right there. Yeah. They, this person, this, uh, collector guys more than that. I'm pretty sure they have better names. I have, go ahead. Sorry. No, well they, but yeah, they have a dolly piece.
00:16:10
Speaker
And is it like as a more popular piece? No, it's not. It's you can tell like he has different eras and his sketch era was because he started drawing when he was like really, really young. Like he knew that he was destined to do that probably at age. I think he was like 10, something where you get like nine, 10. He was making these beautiful sketches. So
00:16:39
Speaker
Everything has been surrealism, definitely. And most of the time, but it's a little bit before that where like, I love his usage. He has like, I think it was like an egg and then like a horse off in the distance. It sounds like Dolly, but, um, I don't know what the piece is called, but we'll have to figure that out and let you know. Yeah. The, um, I just learned one thing about, uh, Dolly, and I'm sorry, this might spoil your experience, but like I try to create some of this social connection to it. I love his.
00:17:08
Speaker
I love his work. I love Dolly's work. One thing
Art During the Pandemic
00:17:11
Speaker
I didn't know as far as social issues go is he was a rat fink. He basically outed artists at the house on American activities during the McCarthy era, during the Red Scare. And he was maligned because he
00:17:32
Speaker
was basically making statements. Like I saw him at a communist meeting or, and he just basically gave a list over to the, uh, to the U S Congress about, um, artists that were communists. And, uh, yeah. So I, I learned that about a month ago and I'm still kind of reeling from it because, you know, anytime you like,
00:17:57
Speaker
love an artist and then their politics or some breaks from that like I'm like like Morrissey I'm a huge Smiths fan and he's horrible he's like I can't enjoy like anything I used to be able to and then some well shit comes out but then recently he made some super racist remarks like on his last album or some shit for a long long time yeah
00:18:26
Speaker
But the thing with Dolly or whatever, they took surrealism really, really extremely. I don't know if you listen to that podcast, Black Dahlia, but they would like use women and like the people they would do like sacrifice kind of stuff. And like women were kind of objects.
00:18:44
Speaker
And like this one lady died. I don't know. There's like all this crazy dark shit, but they wouldn't, they were like, live is art, you know, like fuck with people and like take, yeah, like really extreme with it. Kind of sadistic, surreal, like they took it really far and women, you know, it was a different time. It was like the forties. Yeah. But that Black Dahlia podcast is fascinating. I had sent it to me.
00:19:08
Speaker
ideas of what they're taking away too far. Yeah. Okay. So I have, I have to be honest that even though that is yes, morally wrong, is it terrible for me to find some sort of fascination, not necessarily calling it right or wrong, but a fascination that he wanted to take it that far where he like put it in front of him rather than just on paper like
00:19:36
Speaker
I do find interest in psychotic people. Yeah, it's fascinating. There's some darker stuff that I wanted to mention, but yeah, the sacrificial kind of stuff. I think some of the people were, you know, maybe you probably would have gotten a robe out and been like, yeah, let's light some incense and I don't know, get some blood and get the goats going. Yeah, I'd probably get the goats going.
00:20:05
Speaker
that I got to check out that podcast. And I know you're absolutely right on those Black Dahlia murders. The idea or the major theory is indeed that these were real life surrealistic exhibits in like the game exquisite works. Right. Are you familiar with that? Where you draw a head and then a midsection and then the bottom part and then you switch them. There was an idea that the Black Dahlia murders were
00:20:34
Speaker
a real life game of exquisite corpse, which is pretty hard, you know? It's so dark. It's fascinating. Of the forties. Cool time. All right. We got to pull ourselves out of the black doll murders. I told you this would happen. We'd say I, I, uh, I have a propensity to, uh, we'll, we'll worry about, you know, maybe, uh, other interviews where we could do a black Dahlia episode.
00:21:01
Speaker
There's certainly plenty of material. So tell me, and this is for all of you or each one of you, and your answer could be a complete fabrication or it can be true. But how did Dirty Princess come to be? I don't want to say something.
00:21:30
Speaker
Let's move to the fabrication version. All right. So there were, there was a plan made by the stars and they connected all of us in strange places when, and then after playing together,
00:22:01
Speaker
Um, we realized that like we had some sort of Trinity, there was something that we couldn't find. We're all very individual, but yet it like, it like is this kind of like balancing wheel, even though there's three ends, but it works in a way of a triangle, you know, so that I have, I've never learned so much about myself.
00:22:30
Speaker
and others from being around like these women. And it's just, I feel like it's brought out a lot in us.
Art as Self-Reflection and Growth
00:22:43
Speaker
I don't know, we met, we got together. We learned a lot in music. We played. We went through all these different emotions together. I think that goes for like,
00:22:59
Speaker
every one of you is, and it's like you making art, like we are, this might answer the other question too, is creativity moving through you and then evidence of that creativity. And that's what music is. It's an evidence of emotions that move through us. And we experienced so much in this body and we've experienced so much in bodies prior.
00:23:27
Speaker
that sometimes music, if you find the right people can give you a reflection of your experiences that also relate to the rest of humankind. So it's not like we're a big band or anything or something super out of there. I think it's just how we've been able to grow from it and see like, traditions and strange things happen.
00:23:56
Speaker
just from like connecting as humans. Yeah, it's like when you play music with people, that's like a connection that you don't have with anyone else. It's just vulnerability and it's just broad, like here you're like giving yourself, you're just connecting with someone in such a way that's just really powerful. And it's hard to like find those people that you can just, that you can make music with and just
00:24:26
Speaker
share that, share those experiences, share yourself. Yeah. Oh, thank you. Thank you for thank you for that. And like I said, you can always have the create the exact versions of the origin. I don't know. I just like seeing the art that you all do and really enjoying your music. And I adore
00:24:51
Speaker
great origin stories because I'm a comic book reader, so that's why I wanted to do it. Well, we decided we're superheroes, so we'll have to come up with a good one. I was trying to get into that. So big, big, big question, and I know that there's already been, you know, your answer in there about this, but I'm asking it specifically, what is art?
00:25:20
Speaker
Maybe you should answer that since I said something about it. That's a big question. It is in so many facets. It's whatever you want it to be. I don't know. It's so hard to define what's the line that makes something art and makes something fucking kitsch or not. Like a craft. You know it when you see it. You know it when you see it. Yeah, I think it's like.
00:25:51
Speaker
Like it could be so many things like intense vulnerability or like something that you've often played for a long time. It's like takes on so many facets. And I feel that in my, as a creative person, like I can't pick one thing. So it's like, I just know that I'm an artist and like, and I make art and I try to live art and, and think about, I mean,
00:26:17
Speaker
dance hall has always blown my mind because I'm like I don't really do it but I just think it's so cool it's like moving moving around moving your body through the art so it's like you can just be a living walking art yeah that's been the conversation a lot it's just like how cool would it be to get so deep within an art that like every single part
00:26:41
Speaker
of what you do becomes a piece of artwork, like how you move your body, how you speak your words, what inflections you use, like in order to make your own reality, like something that is pleasing to you at all times that like helps you live a happier life. Yeah, I'm just evident. So I think it is just like, and I can't take credit for that. It was Alex Gray's wife,
00:27:10
Speaker
who I started following, who's really into spirituality, obviously, because it's Alex Gray's wife. But she was saying that, that like, it's creativity moving through you and then a piece of evidence. So evidence is like our existence. So existence is what we make it like. So it's a part of, it can be a part of any, everything and anything like God,
00:27:40
Speaker
It's my favorite designer if we want to go in that sense. It's like the trees and the clouds. That's why we reiterate it on paper for some of us is because it's evidence for some sort of force outside of our own. Yeah. Dang. There's so many ideas in our interview thus far. I'm thinking about each one of them.
00:28:08
Speaker
And as far as any other comments about what is art and I really I really I really latched on to the idea of you know Like how do you like live as an artist? How do you exhibit yourself as an artist? What it particularly if it forms what? a lot of times if I'm Interviewing indigenous guests of the the reference to medicine of the art right like how it helps heal and and or
00:28:38
Speaker
or running as an activity, that that's the medicine that you take in order to balance things out. And I think art, for me personally, and for me answering and talking to other artists, it has such that pivotal role of how do you keep sane? How do you breathe? How do you be healthy, right? And so I love that question. Any more comments on that, on what is art?
Art's Role in Society
00:29:09
Speaker
I think that thumbs it up. Yeah. Okay. So if we, if we take our, one of the questions I've been asking, uh, for months on, on the program and it's, it's really big and I apologize. It's like such a big question, but it has to do with arts role now. And so let me give you an example. So when the, when I'm doing the podcast, I've done it for about 14 months. And when the pandemic came in,
00:29:38
Speaker
I said to myself, well, why the fuck are you doing a podcast? Like people are like, you know, there's like this disease. Are we going to like all die pretty soon? Like just completely shot. Right. And I realized that that's, you know, a normal reaction. Um, but I accelerated my creativity in various forms in order to kind of just deal with what was going on. So, uh,
00:30:03
Speaker
I immediately understood that artists are now encountering like right now encountering like massive things, right? So what is art's role or your role as an artist in addressing like what is art's role in a pandemic? What's art's role within a racist society? What's art's role in challenging the power structures or whether it's patriarchy or a capitalist power structure? Does art have a role
00:30:34
Speaker
in addressing those things? And if so, what what what is its role? What do you see its role as? I feel like personally, during the as far as the pandemic part of the question, that there's so much there, but I'll just address the one thing that kind of came to me. And personally, it's been therapeutic for sure. I feel like it's. It's just like I can see that I'm still there.
00:31:03
Speaker
by expressing things like that I'm, I'm still me. It's like a reminder and like, it's like a self-portrait or like recording a song. It's like, okay. And that's just been really helpful from a therapeutic standpoint, at least personally. And I know it's the band that's like, when we finally got to get, got to, got to, got, got back together. It was, it really felt good. It was like something was missing, but. Yeah. It's definitely like during the pandemic, like,
00:31:33
Speaker
Just all the ways that like people have just had to get creative, but in just like bringing people together, like despite all this, like whether that be, you know, having band practice outside on the street or like, you know, doing live streams and zoom calls and just like classes online and just all the ways that people have been brought together, like.
00:31:59
Speaker
even though everything seems so disconnected right now, that's like the one thing that can connect people. Yeah. Yeah. And that's something that we need to do so much right now is trying to connect, but it's hard. It's like, um, I do believe that arts role is just like us as humans. You know, some of us have to address the situation head on and
00:32:25
Speaker
be very real about what's happening for those who need a wake up call. And then we have art that is also calming and takes you to another place or, you know, there's an escapism route. I think both are really necessary right now because I know a lot of people who are worrying themselves sick and like injuring themselves from fighting so hard.
00:32:56
Speaker
And then I also know people who are so comfortable that it's, they'd rather not, and that's an option for them not to address it, you know? And it's hard because it's like where, after being in the protest and doing all this, it's like where I'm coming to realize that the biggest thing that art needs to
00:33:24
Speaker
say right now, in my opinion, is the search for the self. Because even within the revolution, within the oppression, there are broken people. Naturally, we're all broken. Like, we've had experiences that change our way of living everyday lives. I think what we need to be focusing on is how can we be better? Because there's a lot of
00:33:53
Speaker
people who point their fingers and refuse to understand what experiences the opposing side has been through to bring them to this conclusion of height of hate and other stuff. Um, but I think the biggest thing is taking a look at ourselves and understanding that we're not always going to be on the right or knowing that as time goes on, we have to be ready to alter our opinions because
00:34:23
Speaker
As you saw in 2020, things are changing left and right where it's not even like, it's not even taking it day by day anymore. It's taking it hour by hour. Yeah. Yeah. So art is definitely like a way to look just like inward and like, just who are we? Like look at ourselves, learn to love ourselves because if we, we can't be working on ourselves and
00:34:53
Speaker
Because our experiences just impact one another so much. We're just also connected in that way. So just a way to look inward and then push that energy outwards. How can we? Yeah. Having conversations about how to be better people individually. I started talking about that with my friend starting up. And this is something I still need to do. And I keep talking about it. But if I keep talking about it, maybe it'll happen there.
00:35:19
Speaker
Um, is like getting a book club together, having people just speak on things that they've learned from reading and how we can work on us to it. Cause that's the thing with social media and everything. Now, everyone's like, this is how you need to live life. Look at me. I have 5,000 followers. This is how I live. This is how I live life. Follow me. And you know, there's all this lot, there's all this lies and deceit behind everything. It's like this weird.
00:35:46
Speaker
And this has shown us that we have to get real with ourselves in order to lead the path. It's rebuilding us as a humankind, I think, because I think this is all new stuff. Humans haven't experienced any of this stuff within the past 10 to 15 years within technology progressing and everything. This is the new Renaissance.
00:36:15
Speaker
writing the playbook for how people are going to live for the rest of their lives. So it's a very, it's a very important time to be focused on art, which is everything.
Band Evolution and Creative Process
00:36:28
Speaker
Yeah. And thank you for that. I know that, I know that it's, it seems to be in general, like a tension, right? And what I mentioned, obviously huge, you know, structural issues. And I'm always interested,
00:36:43
Speaker
in art's place within that because, you know, one answer is, look, art is in its own art's doing its own thing. Right. So, I mean, it's a legitimate answer. Right. It's like it's doing its own thing. And I'm not sure how it's connected to all that. And others, you know, you know, I've been involved in the labor movement, social movements for quite some time when you see what art is doing as an instrument to create consciousness, to disrupt
00:37:11
Speaker
you know, faulty ways of thinking or whatever art is doing, it's kind of placed more centrally to to disrupt or to, you know, or to challenge maybe some of our challenge. Yeah, I like that. To challenge our our way of thinking. Yeah. So I got I got the the question which you might resist about kind of top albums, but
00:37:39
Speaker
And in order to get into this, I'm going to mention my own. So if you had three albums, right. So suspension of disbelief here. There's a record player on an album on an island and three albums you can play and you might be playing them for a long time. I take. As I already mentioned, I'm on the huge Rust and Peace Megadeth. All right. So that's one. I also take it takes a nation of millions to hold us back by public enemy. And I also take.
00:38:08
Speaker
Pink Floyd's album, Animals. Those are my three. So I wanted to just go right out there and say, it's tough to narrow three albums down, but I did. What about for each of you? What albums do you're just gonna, these are the ones? I'm gonna say this one album. I think it's a Herbie Man album.
00:38:38
Speaker
It's this really, it has this really cool album cover, but it's this weird harmonica, like, harmonica songs that Pitbull and Prussia ended up stealing for one of their songs, which is so weird because it's the most random, and it's very surrealist in the, but yeah, I can't think of the name, but I have it. And I think that one, I like things that, that mix me up, you know?
00:39:09
Speaker
I have things I like to listen to and I have things that I like to kind of mix me up. I can't think of top ones. Probably Royal Trucks, Turn of the Century.
00:39:31
Speaker
I'm going to keep thinking. You guys, you guys think I would definitely bring Neil Young on the beach. Um, you know, we're going to be on an Island. It's fitting. Yes. Oh, this is on an Island. Shit. Maybe I won't bring those. The physical, the physical location is an Island. Yes. You're right. You're deserted. Okay. I would bring thin Lizzie's jailbreak. Uh-huh.
00:40:02
Speaker
and Melvin's Houdini. Nice. Those are just always very therapeutic albums for me. Yes, yes, yes. I think I'm going to do Rolling Stones, Sticky Fingers, because it has a home in my heart. I don't know. I love it.
00:40:28
Speaker
I'm gonna go with the Minuteman double nickels on the dime because it's us. How many songs are on there? Fucking 40. It has like the most beautiful acoustic guitar piece in it but also like the best fucking punk rock song ever so I don't know I think that maybe that and then
00:40:50
Speaker
I'm going to cheat a little bit on the third and I just, cause it was over here. And I was like, if I had that I was on Island, I probably like, I really want a compilation, you know, come on, easy writer soundtrack. Oh yeah. Oh, that's the good one. I have that. I have that album. Um, what's the album. What's the Duke Ellington album that has it in the sentimental mood on it? Does that do that? Yeah. I don't know the album. Right.
00:41:16
Speaker
I don't know the album. I've been listening to that recently, like for my morning songs and that playlist. Let me tell you it. That's what I'll need. If I'm on an island, I'm going to need some sex, sweet saxophone, some Trump. I'm going to need some horns on that beach. I am going to
00:41:43
Speaker
We're going to have a quick break. I don't know if you know, we're going to cut to one of your songs and allow you to get some of like that, you know, like everybody right now, you're supposed to walk away from the computer screen fatigue, all that type of stuff. So I'm going to play, and I want to know this for sure. Is the title Mad Cat or Mad Cat Lives? It's up for debate. Okay. It's whatever you want. We,
00:42:11
Speaker
I thought it was named Mad Cat Lives that I like. It was a typo. But Mad Cat definitely lives, but it depends on how you want to respect his name. All right. So I'm going to play it now. We're going to cut
New Music Projects and Directions
00:42:29
Speaker
to it. And a couple more questions when we come back. Sound good? Sounds good. Here we have our dranky do's. All righty. Cheers. Good stuff.
00:43:15
Speaker
You shine your day
00:45:18
Speaker
I love that song. Thank you. I love that song.
00:45:24
Speaker
I was listening to the album again recently, last couple of days, and that the visceral, and I was playing it really loud, of course, the visceral like fuzz sound like pounding you is so much fun. It's like a physical beast you've created. Yeah. Yeah. So.
00:45:54
Speaker
That's how definitely our live shows have been, but to be completely honest, I'm like, it reminds me of like the previous self. Cause I feel like I've learned a lot and I'm still learning. I can't say that like I'm done. I'll never be done, but, um, I was a lot more intoxicated, allowing my, my fears or demons to show themselves. Um,
00:46:23
Speaker
allowing my deep pain to kind of just be let out, which was good. But I am really looking forward to this new music that we've been writing because I've actually been able to give a piece of myself without the thorns and all the leather and sticks and rocks and bats and shit.
00:46:53
Speaker
It's funny, like when you're going through healing processes, like what stuff comes out, you know? Um, but yeah, it's been, I think it reminds me of like different, different thoughts, but I'm still very proud of it. But because I've seen, I'm seeing a new horizon, the reason why I'm like, shunt it a little bit.
00:47:25
Speaker
Yeah, well, it's it's it shows. I mean, I think as artists, if you if you present something, you show something like when we're talking about the definition of art there, you're like, here it is. You know, when you see it, you put that out there and then it doesn't tell the whole story of the artist. Right. So I think you're pointing to like, look, yeah, that's a manifestation of that's a manifestation of what that is. But, you know, there's other there's other pieces to it. Right. Exactly. Yeah. I think what I became obsessed with
00:47:55
Speaker
And the girls have heard it so many times. I'd like to say the same thing I've heard over again, because I'm happy if I need to share it. But just like being not a one-dimensional character. And that happens in rock and roll a lot. And the best, they overcame that, like Bowie, Prince, all these people that were big,
00:48:24
Speaker
allowed evolution to happen within themselves. That was when really cool stuff was being created. I've just been really obsessed with never being one dimensional, like one character to fit the music. It needs to evolve and change just as we do. Yeah. And I think artists, us as humans and us as artists, definitely, we fall into that.
00:48:53
Speaker
You know, I think with our economic system too, right, is like, I think, you know, you all work in music and you're around and see what happens, I think.
00:49:01
Speaker
You know, there's this tendency on music to latch onto what the thing is and market that to death. And you're not allowed to be like, hey, look, this is a ballad. And it's cool. You know why? Because I'm the artist and I'm making a ballad. So here it is. So, you know, the whole thing that kind of goes with that, that we wanted to do, it's like a rock opera. Yeah. Like we grew a lot as musicians or whatever in the last few years, you know? And I feel like now we're at a point where we can kind of
00:49:31
Speaker
express something specific. And like, if we could tell a story, that would be really cool, you know, and then make it an immersive kind of art project. We're really worried about the experience now. We always have been, but I feel like since we've had all this time, when we do get back on the stage, we wanted to really tell a story within our own style.
00:49:56
Speaker
Yeah, we have a new single that's going to be coming out and it's like an introduction to this new route that we're exploring. I'm so excited about that.
Conclusion and Gratitude
00:50:09
Speaker
That's cool. Do you have a name for that or can you talk about that now just as far as when that's out and things like that? Yeah. Our goal, it might change, sometimes things change, but our goal is October,
00:50:25
Speaker
31st is full moon and is also Halloween. Oh, right. Yeah. Um, and yeah, it's just, it's, it's different. It's different. And we are really excited about it. It's called the saga of mother night and it's a three part, three part song. Yeah. Three part experience. Dang. Uh, looking, looking, uh, oh, so much looking forward to hearing that.
00:50:56
Speaker
Well, at the end we'll chat a little bit more about how folks can connect with you. We'll fill that up a little bit, but I can't forget the main question for each one of you is why is there something rather than nothing? Well, I don't fucking know man. Yes, what is nothing? I was just watching a Neil deGrasse Tyson video about what is nothing
00:51:25
Speaker
Yeah. And he just talks about how you could go like, oh, is the air nothing? No, it's air. But if you go up into space, there's no air. Well, there's still particles. If you go in between stars, in between galaxies, there's still little particles and cubic meters. And there's still, even if there's not the particles, there's still the laws of physics. And I don't know. I thought that was interesting. Yeah. I love Neil deGrasse.
00:51:55
Speaker
He's so enticing. He's like, what is life? Oh, but he, yeah, I think the same thing. So I think we can't even fathom what is nothing because we've always been something. So it's like, we've had to make do with that. If they're, it's hard because it's like, uh, the opposite end of a battery or the same end of a battery by saying what is something rather than nothing. That's like, we have no idea.
00:52:25
Speaker
idea of what nothing is. So we couldn't even like elaborate on what nothing is. We don't even understand it. Yeah. And on the question itself, I mentioned this before, as far as how it's posed, and you mentioned Tyson, as far as scientists always repose the question, said it's the wrong question. The correct question is how is there something rather than nothing? Yes.
00:52:56
Speaker
And it could obviously be asked both ways. But I love that repositioning of that question of like, well, how is it that this is the case? Yeah. And it's a very different question, too. So I've been definitely thinking about that all the time. Since it's the big question, I want to make sure that I didn't cut any other answers off. Any other stabs at why is there something rather than nothing? No, I think it would be.
00:53:25
Speaker
Just conscious. Yeah, I don't know. If I was a hummingbird, I wouldn't even have that thought. So at the end here, I just wanted to open up, you know, for each of you and for Dirty Princess, you know, as a whole, telling the listeners
00:53:47
Speaker
you know, what ways to connect with your art, your music individually as a band, please feel free to share of, you know, to your level of comfort, uh, how to, uh, come in contact and, uh, get more of your art. Yeah. We have, uh, all the regular ways of Instagram and a Facebook dirty princess band. You got to put the band on that, on that and Portland, you know, you'll find us.
00:54:13
Speaker
Instagram Facebook, so if you have an email and a website through the purchase band.com Yeah, and I have my visual art up on my Instagram chartreuse to loose Check that shit out to paintings and stuff and yeah Yeah, especially on on that painting Skateboard decks decorated skateboard decks as well, correct?
00:54:39
Speaker
That's in the works. It's in the work. Yeah, we're we're. Yeah, we got mercantile. We're other sort. Yeah, we're trying. We are like ready to basically it's like getting ready to do the big hall. So like promotion and all this other stuff. And so, yeah, we we work a lot through just like Instagram stuff. We don't like this. I mean, we stay up on social media, but like it's. Um.
00:55:10
Speaker
But yeah, just look us up. Dirty Princess band anywhere. Um, yeah, I just, I think the only thing, the only thing maybe to add on after the episode is given that the way the band presents itself and, and, you know, some obvious aspects of, you know, being badass, you probably need some action figures. You might need some action figures, right?
00:55:36
Speaker
Yeah, I'm making a plan to do the like, you know, how the Ramones did like the weird science comic book cover. Oh, yeah. A little. Yeah. So I'm going to do a Dirty Princess, one of those. And yeah, we're Josie and Pussycats. We're very we're very character character like. I wanted to thank each one of you. I got to tell you, it's very stimulating conversation. And I just wanted to thank you for being
00:56:03
Speaker
you know, gracious with your time and thinking about these questions. And I tell you, like the nature of the conversation, I always say that there's an element. I do this for myself to be intellectually engaged with artists. And so I really appreciate your thoughts and your time. It's actually been a great pleasure and a great, great, great fun for me. Thank you so much. Thank you. We love your conversation. This is what we live for.
00:56:32
Speaker
And I do have to say that given some discussion earlier on or some of the darker stuff and black dolly and everything like that, somewhere down the road, we get to figure out maybe a free for all kind of. Oh, you know what, even towards Halloween, Halloween episode, I'll be great because it'll be right around the time. Yeah. Yeah. I love that. Keep it in contact. Yes. Thank you.
00:56:58
Speaker
Thank you all and for today. Enjoy the, you know, enjoy the wonderful sunshine in the Pacific Northwest. Thank you so much. This was fun. All right. Bye now. See ya. Bye. You are listening to something rather than nothing.