the no-fi "interview" with

conducted by chris beyond at the smell, downtown los angeles, September, 16th, 2006


There is a band on this planet that is called NEW COLLAPSE. They, like you the reader, exist. Their sound harkens back to the punk rock roots of the new wave sound. Listening to them you're reminded of THE SCREAMERS or the film Liquid Sky. When you hear one of their recordings, it's almost hard to believe that a real person is playing the drums and that fast. It sounds like two different people are playing keyboards, but it's just one. And the lead singer's voice perfectly cuts into the sound with a mix of anger and anguish. Two of NEW COLLAPSE's members used to play keyboards for THE CENTIMETERS. Now they don't. This is NEW COLLAPSE. They exist and so do you.

This interview took place at The Smell after the "New Wave Fuck Fest" night which also featured BUBONIC PLAGUE and FIFTY ON THEIR HEELS. We did the interview just outside the front door of The Smell which happens to open into the alleyway from which the name of The Smell gets its name. A peculiar river runs down the center of the alleyway which opens into the streets of Downtown L.A. on both sides. The source of the river seems to some from various corners of the building lining the alleyway and behind trash bins. This is the same alleyway where years ago I've interviewed THE SILVERSUN PICKUPS...twice. Each time the tape recorder failed me.

I chance fate and press the record button...

S: Sophia - Sings, Q: Quinn - Keyboards R: Rich Bitch - Drums
C: Chris Beyond - Tape Recorder
CC:: For lack of my own better way to describe your music, how would your grandmother describe your music?

SS:: Well my dad asked me, "What do you call that?" So, that would be my answer.

QQ:: My grandmother? Hmmm. She would describe it as "too loud" probably.

RR:: Um, my grandma's dead...so...

CC:: She would just be silent.

RR:: I don't know. I didn't really know her that well.

QQ:: He needs to get to know her better.

CC:: Yeah, seriously. She's been waiting on you. Ok... Should the United States be allowed to torture Republicans that support torture?

SS:: Hmmm. I have a heavy stance against violence in general.

QQ:: Wait, that question is what?

CC:: Should the United States be allowed to torture Republicans that support torture?

QQ:: Ummm... No. (Everyone laughs) I'm going to take that as a serious question.

RR:: Oh... I would say no. I don't know. I'm not really into torture so...

CC:: REALLY?!? (laughs) If you had...

RR:: ...unless you want to be tortured.

SS:: Then you can pay for that.

QQ:: They'd probably volunteer for that!

RR:: I'm sure some of them would pay for it. People pay to get tortured.

CC:: If you had three dollars and fifty cents, what would you spend it on first?

SS:: A record.

QQ:: Can you get a record for...

SS:: A three dollar record!

QQ:: I guess you can get a used record for 3 dollars and fifty cents. Yeah.

RR:: Uhh... If it's around here I'd probably give it to some homeless person or something.

CC:: We are in front of The Smell.

RR:: They get at least that much from me when I come here.

QQ:: An umbrella.

CC:: Who are some of your favorite local bands right now?

SS:: Ooh, I love FIFTY ON THEIR HEELS from San Diego.

QQ:: BUBONIC PLAGUE... MASTER BETA...

SS:: Yeah MASTER BETA is good. YEAR FUTURE.

QQ:: YEAR FUTURE. Uhh... Why don't you ask us bands and we'll tell you if we like them.

RR:: Yeah, basically what they said and... So local bands we're talking about?

CC:: Yeah, well, you know.

SS:: I liked MODACHINE. They just recently broke up, but they were amazing. They were suppossed to play tonight, but their no longer together.

(Loud laughter can be heard in the distance.)

SS:: Oh! LIPSTICK TERROR from Mexicali are REALLY awesome!

QQ:: They're not local.

SS:: No, but I just mean bands that are happening now.

QQ:: There's a lot in San Francisco.

RR:: Yeah, a lot of our friends are up there. There's a lot of good stuff up there. There's a lot of good stuff down here too.

SS:: It's more of just a community that we all play around together and it soesn't matter if we're from south, north, you know. We all just just kinda stick together, run together.

CC:: (Laughs) Well local for us is now is whatever's local anywhere. (To Rich and Quinn) Tell me about that transition between THE CENTIMETERS and NEW COLLAPSE.

RR:: You're asking me first?

CC:: Yeah.

RR:: Uhhh...Oh.

CC:: Or both.

RR:: Well...

CC:: At the same time. In the same voice.

(Everyone laughs)

QQ:: What...uh... What was the transition?

CC:: The transition getting from THAT band to th...

RR:: So you're asking Quinn the question now. Let's clarify that.

QQ:: Ok. Quinn says that uh, it's very easy. It all makes sense to me. All of it.

SS:: Can I answer? I think this is more something that's theirs. That they didn't come into. That they created.

CC:: I actually didn't get to see them with you (to Quinn) in the band. I'm sorry.

QQ:: That's ok.

RR:: The transition from CENTIMETERS to... Uh, well there's a couple of other things that I tried between CENTIMETERS and this band and... Those things never... They never amounted to anything.

QQ:: We've been playing this kind of music for a while so it it's totally... You know... It's very easy.

CC:: (long pause) It's very EASY to be in NEW COLLAPSE!

(Everyone laughs.)

QQ:: You stick a microphone in my face, I totally don't know anything anymore.

CC:: That's why I put it away from MY face. Force OTHER people deal with it.

QQ:: You should dress it up in a trout.

RR:: Or a little cozy. Yeah, me and Quinn were in a few different things...before THE CENTIMETERS even. Um. He was the first one to be in THE CENTIMETERS and I took his spot after he left. He moved back to Florida. He lived in Florida for a while. When he moved back to L.A. years later, that's when me and Quinn started playing music again and that's how NEW COLLAPSE started. And we didn't even know what the arrangements of instruments was gonna be. We just got a rehearsal space and started fucking around with stuff and this is what happened. Came together I guess. Then we met Sophia. She jumped in on it.

SS:: This is actually my first band. The second thing I've ever done, but my first band.

QQ:: If THE CENTIMETERS were still playing, she'd start playing with them at some part.

SS:: Only not very well since I don't play instruments. (Laughs)

CC:: Have you ever held a monkey?

SS:: Unfortunately no. I call my cat a monkey. Does that count?

CC:: I think that kinda could qualify...in the days of the internet.

QQ:: I've never held a monkey, but my mother was scratched by a monkey and got monkey fever.

CC:: She got monkey fever? Is that in a disco-cute kinda sense?

QQ:: No, she got monkey fever. She got really sick.

CC:: That's really racist.

(everyone laughs)

RR:: Uhh...No. No. No. I haven't held a monkey. No. I should not be holding a monkey. A monkey should be jumping around in the trees.

SS:: Handicapped monkeys that do everything for you... Do your laundry...

CC:: Oh, that'd be so horrible. Monkeys in wheelchairs.

QQ:: I'd like a monkey friend. A nice monkey friend.

RR:: Oh, you know I have a stuffed sock monkey that my friend made me so that's as close as I've come to holding a monkey.

QQ:: I'd hug a monkey.

CC:: I would give a monkey a hug. What is the best album you've heard all this year. 2006?

SS:: Oh my god.

QQ:: Oh, that's hard.

SS:: Devendra Banhart "Cripple Crow"

QQ:: Uhhh. 2006, huh? Uhhh...

RR:: We're...really bad with current stuff. Sophia's more into the current stuff. We're just kinda behind the times or something.

CC:: Or ahead.

RR:: Uh, FUCKWOLF just put out a CD. That's good. And uh... What else? I don't know.

QQ:: Oh, THE WEEGS!

CC:: Oh, THE WEEGS! That's really good. Along those same lines, what is the best ice cream you've had all year?

QQ:: Neapolitan. It's, you go from strawberry and then move on to the vanilla and then move on to the chocolate.

CC:: Are you one of those people that will go through a color, like if you have a block of it?

QQ:: & SS:: Yes. Yeah.

SS:: I like the coconut sorbet. I eat ice cream, but I like sorbet.

CC:: I think it counts for this.

SS:: I think so too.

QQ:: Rich is taking this very seriously.

CC:: He's crying a little bit.

RR:: I kinda like a pecan praline...or a good pistachio.

CC:: A good one.

RR:: Yeah. I'm not usually into ice cream, but you know... Those two are up there. Even just French vanilla. I really can't each too much dairy though. It doesn't really sit with me for some reason.

CC:: What about that new Gellato place. (Referring to the new popular gellato place in Silverlake.)

RR:: Oh god!!! Please!

QQ:: What is gellato anyway?

RR:: It's the beginning of the end.

QQ:: Gellato's really old. It's as old as the Neanderthals.

RR:: Gentrification!

SS:: I already moved out of Silverlake because of it.

QQ:: Cavemen were eating gellato. It's so old!

SS:: Yeah. The Italian cavemen?

RR:: Actually I got a hold of a bite of it. It's pretty good. (Chris laughs.) I haven't had it from that place though.

SS:: I just go there to be seen, really.

CC:: I just sign autographs.

RR:: Yeah a lot of people are seen there.

SS:: (Laughing.) I would never go anywhere to be seen.

CC:: Would the world be a better place if we dropped massage tables instead of bombs?

SS:: Absolutely. Without a doubt.

QQ:: (pause) Yeah.

RR:: Yeah, I like a good massage.

SS:: I mean, not on my head, but yeah.

CC:: That's what I'm thinking because, like, wouldn't some of those massage tables hit somebody?

SS:: That's still bad.

CC:: And then if you drop them, they're gonna get broken.

QQ:: That can be taken as a threatening act. You know, you drop a massage table.

SS:: It would pretty much hurt and kill ya.

QQ:: Some countries may not understand massage tables. They may take that as a threat.

CC:: It would be really hard to drop them without... You really have to have a parachute.

SS:: But shouldn't we find alternatives to mindless violence?

QQ:: Then they retaliate and drop, uh...

CC:: Yeah they might drop like...like a sauna.

RR:: Ice cream coolers.

QQ:: Saunas.

CC:: Yeah.

QQ:: Whirlpools.

CC:: Uh. who are your influences and who are they dating?

SS:: I don't know. They're all dead pretty much. Howlin' Wolf, Betsy Smith, Hazel O' Conner...

CC:: (quietly) Who are they dating?

SS:: Victoria Wilcox is married to Robert Fripp. (silence) That's a good one. That's a power couple.

CC::(finger quotes) "Power couple!"

QQ:: Rich is my influence and dating Amy.

SS:: There you go.

CC:: Oooohhh.

SS:: Quinn and Lindsey and Rich and Amy and I'm single fellas, so uh, anytime.

CC:: Like ALL of them. You'll take them all at once.

SS:: (laughs) Fuck yeah!

RR:: Geeze...Rod Serling. I'm a big fan of Rod Serling...the writer of Twilight Zone. I don't know if that really filters into the music I play. (laughs) I get a lot of inspiration from my friends, their bands, and solo projects, what they're doing... As far as music it's across the board like all the way from, just like... Who knows? 20's, 60's, 70's, 80's, rock, psychedilic, blues,...

SS:: Yeah any genre of music across the board. I think any good musician can appreciate anything that has depth and...

CC:: That's the politically correct...

SS:: No, honestly that's the way I feel about music. I mean, I love Bob Seager and I'm not ashamed.

(silence)

QQ:: ...Oh wow. Really?

CC:: I actually just saw his album at Costco... But that also means I was at Costco.

QQ:: Do you like mustaches?

(The guys from FIFTY ON THEIR HEELS come by and I get a No-Fi "Radio" station ID from them before they leave...)

RR:: As far as an inspiration thing... I love my girlfriend Amy a lot and she's my best friend. A good person...and I love her a lot.

CC:: I love Amy too. Is that ok to say?

RR:: She's a great person.

CC:: I have to agree with that. How can people as far away as Kabul or Torrance hear your music?

QQ:: Well...I can mail them a letter.

SS:: Torrance? Kabul? Where's that?

CC:: It's in the Middle East...of South Central.

SS:: Hopefully they have a computer and they can get on Myspace.

QQ:: No, I'm going to send them a letter.

CC::(laughing) and just describe the music to them?

SS:: I can't even imagine what those people would do if they saw NEW COLLAPSE. Those women would be totally fucking liberated though.

(I compare the hideous shrieking of Middle Eastern women to the sounds of NEW COLLAPSE and we all agree that they could get into that. I also recognize that this paragraph isn't very politically correct. This is also probably the first time that a No-Fi "interview" has used the term "politically correct.")

QQ:: Or horribly beaten for listening to us.

SS:: Yeah that's true. Or they might come and burn me at the stake finally.

CC:: What's your exact web address?

QQ:: It's myspace forwardslash...

SS:: newcollapse?

CC:: Is it newcollapse?

QQ:: It's just newcollapse. Our e-mail is newcollapse underscore 2 at hotmail dot com.

CC:: Last question!

RR:: Yeah.

CC:: And you guys can do this together or on your own. It doesn't matter. What are your final words of wisdom for our No-Fi readers?

QQ:: Uh, go to school. Read a book.

SS:: I want to live.

CC:: Awww.

RR:: I don't know if I can sum it up to just...

CC:: Or sounds!

RR:: Sounds. Um... Just try to be in touch with your instincts, I guess. That's one. There's probably other things I can say, but...

SS:: Be kind to the Earth and the animals cuz we need them.

CC:: Awwww. That's sweet. And that's a nice way to end the interview.

RR:: See ya!

QQ:: Bye!


I say my thanks and goodbyes and we make our way out of the alleyway of The Smell. Past the curious mini-river and into the night. NEW COLLAPSE plan to play less shows in the near future in order to concentrate on recording their debut album. Until the you can find them on Myspace at http://www.myspace.com/newcollapse. Extra special thanks go to NEW COLLAPSE for their patience in waiting for this interview...



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