photo courtesy of Fanatic Promotion
Boyskout
The East Coast half of this bi-coastal band chats about trying to change the world, one city at a time
By Alyson Mead
Published: November 13th, 2006 | 1:57pm
Hot on the heels of their fall 2006 release, Another Life, bi-coastal band Boyskout is tearing up the country with its dark and heady mix of politics and booty-shakin'. We caught up with them somewhere around Denver, Colorado, on a cell phone rapidly losing reception in the mountains.
How's the tour been going so far?
Leslie Satterfield: The tour is going great. We left a week ago and went up to Portland, and now we're kind of heading out through the Midwest. We're doing long drives, so we're not very excited about that, but we're having a good reception. It's cool; a lot of people have been coming out.
Since it's so fresh in everyone's minds now, I wondered what you guys thought about the recent elections.
[Leslie hands phone to Ingrid.]
Ingrid Dahl: Some of us are very political, and I have a master's in gender studies, so we think the political process is very important. Being in an all-girl band is an activist stance in itself, so sure, we're trying to change the world, at least in terms of gender politics. The election has been hard to follow, because we're on the road, going around in the nomad way. None of us could vote because we were on the road.
Speaking of that, I wondered if a sense of place has any affect on your music. Some of you are on the East Coast and some on the West, right?
[Ingrid hands phone back to Leslie.]
Satterfield: I live in Brooklyn and Ingrid lives in Jersey City, but the rest of the band is in the Bay Area. But I get really inspired in certain areas, for sure. I love the East Coast, and brick, and saturated colors.
Your music also seems to exist outside time, in a way.
Satterfield: For me, I do kind of live outside time. I get kind of caught up in the romanticized thing of wherever I am. We were just in Portland, which was amazing. The leaves were coming down and it felt like it was snowing leaves. It was exotic and really beautiful.
Is that part of your song-writing process as well?
Satterfield: Yeah, I'll write a song when I'm just kind of walking in nature. All the songs come at different times and whatnot, but I tend to live in my imagination. Lyrics come when they come, and I only write when they come — when I'm feeling it.
Does that happen often, or is it sometimes a struggle?
Satterfield: I write a lot of lyrics when I'm by myself walking and feeling, or whenever I'm thinking about something. Some of my lyrics are philosophical, so a really good time for me to write is when I walk in the rain. I love to walk in the rain and I just start singing… (laughs)
So you go all Gene Kelly out there?
Satterfield: (laughs) Yeah.
What was your experience like in recording Another World?
Satterfield: I wanted to be on the East Coast, but I've been in San Francisco because I wanted to make this record, and wanted to make it happen. But after this tour, I'll be in Brooklyn for a while, because I also do film stuff. Then we'll be touring a lot next year.
That's interesting. Can you talk a little more about your film stuff?
Satterfield: I made two music videos for Boyskout, "Back to Bed" and "Jesse James." You can watch them on YouTube and our MySpace. And I did a few videos for the bands Film School and Scissors for Lefties. It's kind of experimental stuff, and nothing's longer than 10 minutes so far, because of funding. I'd definitely love to do something longer, and I'm getting paid for doing videos for other bands, so that's cool. I have a site, it's not really finished or anything, but you can check out my films at sharkboneproductions.com.
Issue #28
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