Pitchfork

Between playing approximately 662 shows at a certain Austin festival-- which led to their being designated "the hardest working band at SXSW" by The New York Times-- and prepping to take the EU by storm, Black Lips managed to squeak in a few words with Pitchfork.

One of Vice Records' latest signings, the Atlanta punk-rockabilly quartet has already recorded the follow-up to this year's live album Los Valientes del Mundo Nuevo. Oh wait, make that Atlanta flower punk quartet.

"People will slap terrible descriptions on us," Lips drummer/vocalist Joe Bradley told Pitchfork, "so we're going to call ourselves 'flower punk.' We don't need a term to generalize everything. I heard us called rockabilly before; I didn't know we played rockabilly. Flower punk is tough, but wimpy. Ugly but beautiful." Frank Zappa would be proud.

Flower punk, it should be noted, is quite different from regular old punk. "A lot of people are trying to say that Black Lips are a punk band," Joe lamented. "But in Atlanta, if you're called a punk, that means you're, like, a little bitch. So we just want to set the record straight: we're not punk."

No little bitches, these hard-working flower-punkers hope to have the new disc out in early September-- which would make it the second Black Lips full-length already this year. They've recorded and mixed 19 tracks, and plan to pare those down to around 12 or 13. "The songs are so short that [Vice] might put on more," Bradley said, "but we don't want any more than that."

Song titles include "Veni Vidi Vici", "Navajo" ("about Native Americans") and "How Do You Tell a Child That Someone Has Died?" ("that's a country one"). Claimed Bradley, "there's a bunch of different types of songwriting on there. We had a song that's, like, satanic jungle music, and then the country song and a punk song...a brutal song...tons of shit."

You'd think the Black Lips would keep the boys busy enough, but bassist/vocalist Jared Swilley has plenty more on his platter. "I have a doo-wop group with Bradford [Cox] from Deerhunter and this other girl, but we never get to play because we're never in town at the same time. Hopefully in April we'll get to record an EP or something."

"Me and Cole [Alexander] have a really shitty band called the Gay Blades," Bradford added. "We've also got our other band, the Spooks. It's a whole Atlanta collective. Hopefully we'll have an LP out by the fall, finally. We've been playing the same eight songs for like three or four years."

Spooks shows are a spectacle, to say the least. "We'll get a hunchback to carry around a goat's head, or one time we had a big octopus tentacle, or we'll get a dead squid and throw it at the audience," said Bradford. "We had a big cow's tongue once and we were slapping it around." Charming!

The Lips also run a record label down in the ATL, Die Slaughterhaus, and it sounds like they've got some hot prospects. "[We're] working with this rap group call Incognegro...it's got Clucklist, Doo-Rag, Night Train, MC Kibbles and Beats, U.G. Railroad, O White...a couple others. There's like eight or nine of them.

"They're real weird guys though. We just met them-- they were grilling us or something-- and we told them we had a record label. There were like 'really?' and they wanted to come out and do something. They have a little bit of stuff put together, but they're not very inclined musically. So we've been trying to help them out, try and figure out a way to actually make their songs work. It's going along pretty well, but...there's still a lot of work that needs to be done."

So is there anything these boys won't do? "There's a lot of hippie stuff coming back," said Bradley. "I don't like stuff like that...Yeah, we're not all into those chicks who don't shave or bathe and rub oil on their faces and shit like that. I've got to remind them to buy a bar of soap," he added with a laugh.

Catch Black Lips tearing through Europe this spring.

04-26 Liverpool, England - Korova
04-27 Edinburgh, Scotland - Cabaret Voltaire (Triptych Festival)
04-28 Glasgow, Scotland - The Classic Grand (Triptych Festival)
04-29 Manchester, England - The Roundhouse
04-30 Brighton, England - Ocean Rooms
05-01 London, England - Cargo
05-02 Groningen, The Netherlands - Vera
05-03 Utrecht, The Netherlands - Ekko
05-04 Den Bosch, The Netherlands - W2
05-05 Haarlem, The Netherlands - Bevrijdingspop Festival
05-05 Rotterdam, The Netherlands - Waterfront
05-06 Amsterdam, The Netherlands - Paradiso
05-08 Copenhagen, Denmark - Vega
05-09 Gothenburg, Sweden - Pusterviksbaren
05-10 Oslo, Norway - Blå
05-11 Stockholm, Sweden - Debaser
05-12 Malmo, Sweden - Debaser
05-14 Helsinki, Finland - Kuudes Linja
05-16 Berlin, Germany - Vice Party
05-17 Nuremberg, Germany - Muz Club
05-18 St. Gallen, Switzerland - Palace de Gallen
05-19 Munich, Germany - Monofaktur
05-20 Vienna, Austria - Arena
05-21 Zagreb, Croatia - Zagreb Teater
05-23 Milan, Italy - Circolo Degli Artisti
05-24 Schaffhausen, Switzerland - Tap Tab
05-25 Brussels, Belgium - Recyclart
05-26 Nancy, France - Autre Canal
05-27 Chalon-sur-Saône, France - La Péniche
05-29 Bordeaux, France - Heretic
05-30 Paris, France - Tryptyque
05-31 London, England - Corsica Studio
06-01 Barcelona, Spain - Primavera Festival
06-02 London, England - Proud Gallery
06-03 Liverpool, England - TBA
06-04 Glasgow, Scotland - ABC 1
06-05 Leeds, England - The Faversham
06-06 Manchester, England - TBA