Photo: Press
"Do I have any regrets about confessional lyrics? Not yet!" Bully frontwoman Alicia Bognanno is characteristically cheerful when Gigwise sits down with her for a drink at London's Ace Hotel.
Dressed in a tattered baseball t-shirt and a kimono from Little Tokyo in LA, Bognnano makes for lively company - not least when she's discussing stealing her parent's Ace Of Base LP, running the sound desk at the Stone Fox in Nashville and the joys of wearing Vans on the tourbus. Bully have had a truly spectacular start to the year and live offer an intense jolt to the system.
Described recently by Ryan Adams as "the best band in the world at this very moment" the grunge quartet already have support slots lined up with Best Coast and will be one of the must-see acts at this year's Great Escape. To mark their UK dates Bognnano talked to Gigwise about being unlikely Nineties revivalists, her deep love of the Replacements and why she's reading Sylvia Plath's journals.
Gigwise: What's the biggest misconception about Bully?
Alicia Bognanno: I think it's really funny that everyone thinks 'I Remember' is about an ex-relationship. It's really the only love song I've ever written. Everytime I see writeups about it I think 'Really it's not'. [Laughs]
The biggest misconception is probably the whole Nineties thing that everyone loves to use. It's not like I have a problem with it but I was born in 1990. There is no intentional replication of the Nineties feeling! You rarely read about Bully without seeing the Nineties with it. It's not incorrect but it was not the goal at all. A lot of the artists I like and that influence me come out of that era so it makes sense that subsciously it would turn out like that. But I couldn't sit down and be like "What kind of genre do I want to write?" Because I'm not even a good enough guitar player to do that! So I guess we're just doing this Nineties thing!
What's the most intense show you've ever witnessed as a fan?
When The Replacements played ACL [Austin City Limits in 2014]. That was amazing. The energy that they had on stage because they'd played together for so long - it was so sweet. Paul Westerberg had a hammock on stage and he would lie in it for certain songs. Then Tommy would jump it in and it was really sweet to see them all just messing around and having a good time. And on top of that it was a really good show. I was lucky I got to see that - but there connection they had on stage was really sweet.
Have you met Paul yet?
No. He's probably like 'Who is this creepy girl who keeps talking about me in literally every interview? She needs to settle down."
What's the strangest gift you've received from a fan?
This isn't strange, this is really cool. This guy Ben and his wife Cassie live in St Louis and they really treat most of the Nashville rock bands really well. Any time you go play through there they'll put together a little gift bag of obscure seven inches, comic books, candy. Last time there was a Batman mask and a cape in it. And so I definitely look forward to that every time I got to St Louis.
Is there a place in Nashville you'd recommend?
Wild Cow, it's like a really good vegetarian restaurant but it's so good. I always get the tofu buffalo sandwich. They have really good quinoa salads and everything healthy.
Describe your worst ever gig?
Our worst gig was probably this one show we had in New York in the midst of when we were playing a bunch of shows when we were in town for a short period of time. It was just really thrown together. It was pretty much just a microphone, we couldn't get our gear through. One of our guitar players broke her string but it was so dark he couldn't even see to change it. It was just a nightmare.
When you were 17 you've said before that you were obssessed by The Pixies: which tracks in particularly mean the most to you?
I would say 'Gigantic' that kicked off the whole Breeders thing. Kim Deal's vocals are just super extraordinary and there wasn't a lot of times where she got songs completely to herself. I got obsessed with that. Also I love 'Something Against You': I like how it's fast all the time and so in-your-face and his vocals are all distorted. It's just like a minute and thirty seconds of a rush of energy. Also I'm thinking of 'Broken Face', the one about a woman doing laundry. I've never seen them live. The one time that they did a renuion thing in Nashville it was sold out. But I've seen the Breeders live - I have watched the documentaries with some live footage on there. That's as close as I've gotten!
Bully as a band are apparently big fans of Courtney Barnett. What impresses you most about her?
I love it when bands are just a three piece. That's really cool to me because it's easy to add a bunch of people and have them all do their little thing. But when there's a three piece? There's no bullshit. Everybody's doing a really good job and if you're not you can't pull it off. I really like that.
I like how witty her lyrics are and how she can mix up a little bit of humour and still keep them light. I just love the way that she writes lyrics. 'Pedestrian At Best' I think is still the one for me. That's just her heaviest song on the record and I love her vocals on that song: she wrote down what she wanted to say and then just delivered it like that. It's really cool and I think people should get credit for stepping out of a conventional vocal sound. Especially for women in rock: all those amazing people like Kim Gordon. If that never happened you'd still be like 'I guess I have to find a [different] way to sing it.' But I just loved the way she delivered it. You can feel the energy she had inside when she wrote it.
What podcasts do you listen to on tour?
We did Serial. Radiolab. This American Life. I love Throwing Shade: it's a comedy podcast about women's rights and LGBT rights. It's really funny but they talk about what's going in the world all the time. But the two people on the show are just so funny: it's hilarious. I recommend to anybody.
Can you recommend a good book?
I'm reading the unabridged journals of Sylvia Plath. I was reading The Bell Jar and then went into the journals. What I think is just amazing is her progressive thinking in the time that she was in. The fact that she was 18 and saying "I just don't know about marriage". Also her passion for wanting to be a poet at such a young age. In The Bell Jar some guys she's seeing at the time says 'Ha ha, Silvia you don't want to be a poet' and she's like 'No I do!' One part that I loved is when she talks about some biology class that she's taking and how they shorten the words for the periodic table. She's talking about how she hates it and it's so sad to her that there are abreviating these beautiful words. It's the sweetest thing I've ever read.
Also just how dramatic she is. What I want to read - what The Bell Jar didn't get into - is her life, her marriage and her kids and how she was feeling at the time and after she had a few things published. That's what I want to get to but the book is like huge. And I'm not there yet. I'm still in her phase when she's 17. That's what I want to find out more about. But it's good.
There's this weird thing about journals. A tonne of people have read the Kurt Cobain journals and I was always thinking "You can't read that. It's not fair. How do you know that they wanted you to read that?: I just didn't understand. But I was talking to Clay, our guitar player, because he's in Library Studies. I had this huge talk with him before about the book about 'Is this intrusive of me to read these journals?' I don't know why I felt so weird about it. No she was a professional writer. She wants that to be published. She is writing and documenting for a reason. I do think Clay is right: she's a professional writer. She's not writing "Today it sucked. It's horrible. I feel like shit and I hate everybody". It's well thought out entries. Right now where I'm at in the book she's so obssessed because she's so deprived of any attention from men and she wants it so badly.
You interned at Steve Albini's Electrical Audio. What's the biggest lesson you learned from him?
Something I still get blown away is just how good he is. He is a reason every mic is every where. He knows the math to everything. A lot of engineers don't. What I really amdire about him is his work ethic: he cares so much about that studio. He's working because he loves it. He's not working to retire: he's just like 'Yeah I'm going to do this every day and I want to take good care of my things. He always done a good job. He's just such a professional.
You're going on tour with Best Coast. Have you had a conversation with Bethany yet?
She messaged me through Twitter and said "I'm really excited about our upcoming tour!" I was like "Yeah me too!" I like how - and this is all that I can tell through social media - she knows what she likes and she's just not ever embarrassed by any of it. Not that she should be but if she gets called out she's like 'I don't care'. People should give people credit who do that because there are a lot of people who lie about stuff like that.
Also that she was drinking a Margarona. It's a Margarita with a little Corona beer flipped upside down in it. It's so good - everybody's had a Margarita but it cuts a lot of the sweetness out of it. It's really good. She posted a picture of that and I'm like "Tour. We're going to be drinking some Margaronas!"
Is there a lyric you're particularly proud of writing?
I like the lyrics in the song 'Bully'. I like "I'm not your waterboy / I don't want to be on your team." I think lyrically that song makes sense. I don't cringe when I listen to them.
You talked about Chicago hip-hop in your Noisey piece. Where do you stand on Kanye?
I'm so happy! I've never been asked that question. I guess first of all it's amazing how everybody in the world has probably thought about Kanye West at one point of their life. I would like to be like "I don't think about Kanye'' but I do think about Kanye all the time. When he playing Bonnaroo I saw a rant and I couldn't do it I had to leave. Graduation came out when I was in High School and I thought that record was really good. Kanye West should just be able to do what he wants and he does. Good for him I guess.
What comic book would you recommend?
I would recommend Esther Pearl Watson's Unloveable: it's a really hilarious comic book that she based off a journal she found in a bathroom. It's this girl growing up in the Eighties and it's so funny.
Describe a situation where you were starstruck?
One time Kristen Stewart was at the Stone Fox. For some reason actors and actresses are such a different world from the one I'm familiar with. It's more weird than musicians because we all know what everyone is doing. Especially ones in series that teens obssess over: I just remember thinking "I feel weird right now. I can't be over there, don't look over there!"
Bully play the Great Escape on 15 May at 8pm. Their debut album Feels Like is out 23 June (Columbia).
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