WQHS Interviews Cameron Bird from Architecture in Helsinki
On November 16th, the darlings of the Melbourne indie scene, Architecture in Helsinki, arrived in Philadelphia amidst a whirlwind US tour that featured the cheeky use of synthesizers, extremely unsafe activities performed on exercise bikes and thick, thick, thick Australian accents. In between making a creatively nutritious smoothie and gearing up for his show at Union Transfer that night, the band’s front-man Cameron Bird went on the air with S and N’s Sumi Naidoo to speak about the band, the tour, and his favourite member of the Wu Tang Clan (all of them). See the full interview after the jump.
Sumi Naidoo: So, you’ve lived in New York and Portland for a bit, and I know some of the other members have lived in San Francisco and Brazil, but the band has basically been in Melbourne since its formation; do you think there’s something uniquely Australian about Architecture in Helsinki’s sound?
Cameron Bird: I’m not sure, I feel like there must be something, but yeah I think that we couldn’t sound the same if we came from somewhere else. I think that the geographic isolation of Australia always makes for artists that are a little bit off the beaten track.
SN: So there are no plans to incorporate like a didgeridoo or anything like that?
CB: Ah, no.
SN: Are you a little bit worried about losing your accent with all this traveling?
CB: Oh no, that’s fine. I mean, usually when I’m in America I speak exclusively with an American accent to anyone in a cab or if I’m on the phone to someone. Like, I learned very early on that you needed to speak with an American accent or you don’t get very far in life.
SN: Can we hear a little bit of yours?
CB: (laughs) Oh no, it’s terrible.
SN: It can’t be that bad if it’s served you well so far, but okay. Can you tell me when the moment was that you knew that Architecture in Helsinki had graduated from playing in Melbourne pubs and was, like, a big deal now?
CB: Er, well, I’m not sure. I guess as a band we’ve just sort of done our thing the whole time, and I think we’ve always taken things in stride, so I don’t think we really had an epiphany when there was that moment when we were like: “oh my god.” It was probably the moment when we first played outside of Melbourne. That was exciting.
SN: Where was it?
CB: Oh, just, you know, in Sydney.
SN: Did it go well, or were there any embarrassing moments?
CB: Yeah, there are always embarrassing things, but there are probably too many to list any one as being the standout.
SN: Architecture in Helsinki has a very arresting visual presence, both at concerts and in music videos… how important is the visual aspect of Architecture in Helsinki?
CB: Yeah, we’ve always placed a huge importance on it. I mean, I still consider myself much more of an artist than a musician, I would say, by virtue of the fact that I guess I’ve never really had a great desire to learn to play instruments properly, it’s always been more about ideas and visuals to me than anything. So, you know, which, I mean, in some ways is not so good, but in other ways I think it’s what makes our band the way that it is; it’s very much about the visuals and the ideas.
SN: How would you describe your visual image?
CB: Er…I’m not sure, I think it’s sort of constantly evolving, so I don’t know if there’s any way to sum it up. I think we’re really into all kinds of visual arts from film to like, expressionist paintings, to fashion, like all those things are really important and interesting to us, so I think we have little bits and pieces of all of those things.
SN: That’s very cool. Have you ever considered doing a short film like Die Antwoord did?
CB: Um…maybe. That could be fun; I think we’ve talked about doing that. We wanted to make like an album where we essentially make a film clip for every song, so the album is a film, I guess. It never really happened. It costs too much money.
SN: So, I’ve heard your earlier music described as “a first kiss: messy, passionate, exciting and floaty”, what base would you say the band was on now and why?
CB: (laughs) er…I’m not quite sure where we’re at. We treaded water for a little while, but um, I don’t know. I guess we’ve grown up a little bit and we’re still messy, but, I dunno, I think we think a little more about things then we used to, which is inevitable when you do the same thing, or make records. You’re always going to. You can’t keep that degree of naivety unless you choose to live in a bubble. I think that we’re pretty engaged with what music happens around us and how we go about making it, so I think it’s inevitable that the things that we do are going to become more and more, you know, moving on in the bases, but also, I dunno, have a bit more behind them, I guess— not as innocent.
SN: If I was going to put your newest album Moment Bends on a playlist, what else should be on that playlist?
CB: Food, cooking podcasts, like probably, sports things, film soundtracks, I’m not sure. A mix of things. Yeah, I’m not sure. I think anything that has a level of romance we’re inspired by, whether that be food or sports or other movies or music, I think we just love. We’re really into things that have, like, honesty and romance.
SN: Just for my listeners, at least from what I’ve heard, Cameron’s really serious about food. He was giving instructions just before this call for some killer smoothies from the sound of it. So I hope you enjoyed that.
CB: (laugh) I’m really embarrassed that you heard me talking about that.
SN: Oh no, it sounded delicious. So, you’ve professed your love of the Wu in several interviews; have you any plans to expand into the hardcore rap scene? I would totally buy that album, just saying.
CB: I haven’t listened to the Wu for a few years. Yeah, they’ll always hold a special place in my heart. I think at the height of their powers they brought chemistry and energy and made some incredibly music so, I’m sure that we could, you know, hopefully one day do something with one of them. We’ll see what happens.
SN: Would you have a favourite to work with?
CB: Do I have a favourite? Oh, that’s too hard. I go through phases, I think, with those guys. I think for a while it was… probably each of them. I had a soft spot for each of them.
SN: What can we expect from your show in Philadelphia tonight? Any chance of the exercise bike making a re-appearance or some nifty trampoline work like in the “Hold Music” video?
CB: I don’t know about that, but we’ll see. I think we’ll be still playing quite a lot of our new record, as is the case when you’re touring a new record. But yeah, you know, a bunch of old stuff as well. Hopefully an experience to shake off the shitty weather here today.
SN: Thank god. Although it must be reminding you of Melbourne.
CB: Nah, that’s true, that’s true. I was hoping it would be colder, to be honest. I was hoping for some of that exotic cold weather that we don’t really get.
SN: I’m so sorry. Is it true that you don’t play with a set list?
CB: Um, technically, well, often, we used to not play with a set list at all. But now, we kind of have like a skeleton and the order of the songs change, like, a little bit. Like, I guess, usually what happens at the start of a tour is that we learn a set of songs, and because we have different instruments and a different drummer to what we’ve had in the past we can’t, sort of, just play any song in our catalogue. We learn, probably, like 30 songs and that’s all we can play. It’s kind of like a small pool to choose from, I guess.
SN: Speaking of all your extra instruments, how do you travel with all that stuff? It must be pretty hectic.
CB: Well, we don’t really anymore. At the start of this year, when we were making this show, we had a new album and we decided that we were going to strip it back a lot, and Gus wasn’t going to play anymore trombone, and we didn’t want to take anymore big percussion stuff. We wanted to exercise doing our songs in a much more minimal stripped back way, just for, like a creative exercise, and an exercise in practicality and space. So yeah, that’s been really cool.
SN: Last question: if Ben and Jerry’s made an Architecture in Helsinki flavour of ice cream, what would be in it?
CB: Salted Caramel.
SN: Salted Caramel— why?
CB: I love salted caramel. It’s my favourite flavour.
SN: That makes sense I guess. That sounds delicious, as does your smoothie; I hope you really enjoy it.
CB: (laughs) Thank you.
SN: Thank you so much for speaking with me
CB: No worries. It’s been a pleasure. Take care.
- Sumi Naidoo, S and N (Thursdays from midnight to 2AM @ WQHS.org)
