British. Synchronized. Glamorous. The Puppini Sisters are many, many things, but "average" is not one of them, and thank god for that. Stephanie, Marcella, and Kate, from left to right, aren't really siblings although, hey, that never stopped the Ramones; they're united by their music, wherein they produce the close harmony sound created by 1940s groups like the Andrews Sisters. They go all out with the 1940s things, actually: they even dress to the nines, in fantastic-looking matching outfits straight from the decade. The Puppini Sisters have become known for their covers, in close-harmony style, of songs like 'I Will Survive' as well as those like 'Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy'. But in their second CD, which has just dropped in the US, they not only give songs like 'Crazy In Love' the Puppini treatment but sing some really great original tunes as well. I got to sit down with the Puppini Sisters to talk about their latest CD and god knows what else; in this monster interview we discuss skinny jeans, spaghetti-burning, and god knows what else.Kate Mullins: Oh, I love your dress!
Thank you! Target, all the way!
Marcella Puppini: Target, eh?
KM: Oh, we ought to check out a Target while we're here. Do you know—we're staying on the Upper West Side—are there any Targets thereabouts?
There are places all over the city. I'm a Brooklyn girl, so I always go to one in Brooklyn, but… I'm sure there are ones in Manhattan!
Stephanie O'Brien: We'll look around!
KM: Yeah… yeah, I definitely want to go.
Thank you! Target, all the way!
Marcella Puppini: Target, eh?
KM: Oh, we ought to check out a Target while we're here. Do you know—we're staying on the Upper West Side—are there any Targets thereabouts?
There are places all over the city. I'm a Brooklyn girl, so I always go to one in Brooklyn, but… I'm sure there are ones in Manhattan!
Stephanie O'Brien: We'll look around!
KM: Yeah… yeah, I definitely want to go.
So, I have some questions.
KM: Ah, good!
So I just wanted to start talking about your sound, because you never really hear that 1940s sound any more at all, which makes you really unique.
SO: Thank you!
[laughter]
KM: Good!
SO: Great start to the interview!
I understand that, Marcella, you found Kate and Stephanie at Trinity College and formed the group that way; how exactly did it happen that you ended up forming a group with this particular sound?
MP: It was—it was complete coincidence. I mean, we were all studying jazz so we were all dabbling in that sound all the time. And the three-part harmony thing just happened—because I was toying with the idea of putting together a harmony group, and I really liked the Lambert Hendricks and Ross sound.
Oh, they're great, yeah.
MP: And then I was watching this movie called Belleville Rendezvous.
Oh, Triplets of Belleville?
KM: Yes!
KM: Ah, good!
So I just wanted to start talking about your sound, because you never really hear that 1940s sound any more at all, which makes you really unique.
SO: Thank you!
[laughter]
KM: Good!
SO: Great start to the interview!
I understand that, Marcella, you found Kate and Stephanie at Trinity College and formed the group that way; how exactly did it happen that you ended up forming a group with this particular sound?
MP: It was—it was complete coincidence. I mean, we were all studying jazz so we were all dabbling in that sound all the time. And the three-part harmony thing just happened—because I was toying with the idea of putting together a harmony group, and I really liked the Lambert Hendricks and Ross sound.
Oh, they're great, yeah.
MP: And then I was watching this movie called Belleville Rendezvous.
Oh, Triplets of Belleville?
KM: Yes!
MP: Yes, exactly!
SO: Ah, yes!
Oh, that's a fantastic movie! So creepy.
KM: Oh, yeah, it really is.
MP: well, that's really what inspired it, because it's a combination of sound and fashion, which is definitely a part of our thing.
Yes, that is a huge part of your—
MP: Yes!
KM: Oh, absolutely.
SO: Yes, it is!
KM: and also the soundtrack to that is so—it's so influenced by the past but it's very very modern as well. It's very quirky.
Yeah. It's an incredible movie.
KM: Yeah. And it was an opportunity to create this style—
SO: Well, no one was doing it!
Exactly! I mean, somebody's gotta do it!
MP: Exactly!
KM: Yes, exactly!
SO: Yes!
You do a lot of covers of 1940s songs, like 'Sisters'. But you also do covers of more modern songs too, like my favorite, 'Heart of Glass' (I'm a Blondie fan!) and you cover songs that don't necessarily seem like they would work in this style, but—for example, Wuthering Heights has a very particular sound, but your cover works great.
MP: Well, actually, I did that arrangement and I remember the way it happened was completely by accident because we wanted to get a gig at a gay club in London. It's a fantastic nightclub, called Ducky and it's a very popular, a very cool—
KM: A very discerning kind of place.
MP: Right, and they have acts like Kiki and Herb, really super edgy and trendy, and they weren't so sure because, you know, "What do three girls want from us? We're a cool and trendy gay club!"
KM: And singing the Andrews Sisters, too!
MP: So my husband, who was trying to get us a gig, said "Oh, they do this amazing cover of 'Wuthering Heights', and 'Wuthering Heights' is their anthem, they play it every night—
Well, that's the ticket!
MP: Well, that was his idea—
KM: So he talked us into it! Totally!
MP: And as I was arranging it, I remember, as I was listening to it, my flatmate upstairs shouting at me, "You can't do that to 'Wuthering Heights'!"
[laughter]
MP: And all the crying and shouting—"It's not working!"
[laughter]
And look at that, they were wrong!
SO: I think the best thing to do is just to take the most unexpected song and do something that people would never even think of. And we've had a lot of comments on 'Crazy in Love', which is so typically R&B—it's Beyonce, she's the diva in the R&B world. And you would never think—
KM: It's gotta be so different. Otherwise you're treading on dangerous ground because, you know, you can't replicate it, so you might as well do something completely different.
Right, so you have to reinvent it.
KM: Exactly! So actually for the same gay nightclub—that's one of the reasons why we did 'Panic', because that came about for some night they were doing—and I think Steph, with 'Crazy in Love', just wanted to do something that was a bit more contemporary?
SO: I just had an idea about making it. I mean, my arrangement was quite inspired by the sound we had achieved live with a song from our first album, which is 'Bei Mir Bist Du Schön', which is one of my favorites to perform out of the older songs from our repertoire. And I just thought, "Well, could this work? Maybe, I dunno." And I remember singing it with our guitarist, and Kate—
KM: On the tour bus.
SO: Right, on the tour bus, and I said, "Oh, I have this idea for 'Crazy in Love'," and she was like, "Are you sure? You know, it's R&B, what're you doing?" And I said, "Well, no, listen to it," and I sang through it, obviously without the girls at that point, but she was like, "That's great! It's gonna be good!" So, the most unexpected is often the…
MP: Yeah, and it's got to be fun to perform. Like 'Walk Like An Egyptian'—the license for dance moves, and the bit in 'Crazy in Love' in the middle that sounds a bit Russian—it's just got to be fun to do, you know?
Yeah, when I was at your Highline show in December, I remember thinking, "When are they gonna play 'Walk Like An Egyptian'? When are they gonna play it?"
[laughter]
KM: Ah, right at the end!
Right at the end! And it was like, "Thank you! My prayers have been answered!"
[laughter]
Have the original artists of any of the songs contacted you or had any sort of reactions to your versions?
KM: Nah, they haven't contacted us. And we don't know if they've heard it! But some of their fans have responded really, really well. Especially Kate Bush and Morrissey fans.
MP: Yeah, there was a spate of Morrissey fans at one point on Myspace—from California, because there's a big pocket of Morrissey fans from Mexico that live in California—and there was a period of time when we got so many of those fans just writing, saying, "Oh my god, I never thought that we would hear 'Panic' performed like that, and it's great!"
Right. And then there are your original songs. Your first album didn't have any original songs, they were all covers; was that on purpose or did that just happen?
MP: That was just the development of the band; it was its early days, and—
SO: We weren't ready, at that point. You know, we'd started with the Andrews Sisters, we'd been gigging it in London, we'd been causing a buzz; you know, we'd been moving on to the covers, and that's about the point that we met Universal [Music]—
KM: We met Universal very early on.
SO: Yeah, it captured that moment in our time as a band, but now was the time to…
KM: I think we always intended to write our own stuff. We just needed to go back and learn what to do and then replicate, and then—wreck it, as it were!
Oh, that's a fantastic movie! So creepy.
KM: Oh, yeah, it really is.
MP: well, that's really what inspired it, because it's a combination of sound and fashion, which is definitely a part of our thing.
Yes, that is a huge part of your—
MP: Yes!
KM: Oh, absolutely.
SO: Yes, it is!
KM: and also the soundtrack to that is so—it's so influenced by the past but it's very very modern as well. It's very quirky.
Yeah. It's an incredible movie.
KM: Yeah. And it was an opportunity to create this style—
SO: Well, no one was doing it!
Exactly! I mean, somebody's gotta do it!
MP: Exactly!
KM: Yes, exactly!
SO: Yes!
You do a lot of covers of 1940s songs, like 'Sisters'. But you also do covers of more modern songs too, like my favorite, 'Heart of Glass' (I'm a Blondie fan!) and you cover songs that don't necessarily seem like they would work in this style, but—for example, Wuthering Heights has a very particular sound, but your cover works great.
MP: Well, actually, I did that arrangement and I remember the way it happened was completely by accident because we wanted to get a gig at a gay club in London. It's a fantastic nightclub, called Ducky and it's a very popular, a very cool—
KM: A very discerning kind of place.
MP: Right, and they have acts like Kiki and Herb, really super edgy and trendy, and they weren't so sure because, you know, "What do three girls want from us? We're a cool and trendy gay club!"
KM: And singing the Andrews Sisters, too!
MP: So my husband, who was trying to get us a gig, said "Oh, they do this amazing cover of 'Wuthering Heights', and 'Wuthering Heights' is their anthem, they play it every night—
Well, that's the ticket!
MP: Well, that was his idea—
KM: So he talked us into it! Totally!
MP: And as I was arranging it, I remember, as I was listening to it, my flatmate upstairs shouting at me, "You can't do that to 'Wuthering Heights'!"
[laughter]
MP: And all the crying and shouting—"It's not working!"
[laughter]
And look at that, they were wrong!
SO: I think the best thing to do is just to take the most unexpected song and do something that people would never even think of. And we've had a lot of comments on 'Crazy in Love', which is so typically R&B—it's Beyonce, she's the diva in the R&B world. And you would never think—
KM: It's gotta be so different. Otherwise you're treading on dangerous ground because, you know, you can't replicate it, so you might as well do something completely different.
Right, so you have to reinvent it.
KM: Exactly! So actually for the same gay nightclub—that's one of the reasons why we did 'Panic', because that came about for some night they were doing—and I think Steph, with 'Crazy in Love', just wanted to do something that was a bit more contemporary?
SO: I just had an idea about making it. I mean, my arrangement was quite inspired by the sound we had achieved live with a song from our first album, which is 'Bei Mir Bist Du Schön', which is one of my favorites to perform out of the older songs from our repertoire. And I just thought, "Well, could this work? Maybe, I dunno." And I remember singing it with our guitarist, and Kate—
KM: On the tour bus.
SO: Right, on the tour bus, and I said, "Oh, I have this idea for 'Crazy in Love'," and she was like, "Are you sure? You know, it's R&B, what're you doing?" And I said, "Well, no, listen to it," and I sang through it, obviously without the girls at that point, but she was like, "That's great! It's gonna be good!" So, the most unexpected is often the…
MP: Yeah, and it's got to be fun to perform. Like 'Walk Like An Egyptian'—the license for dance moves, and the bit in 'Crazy in Love' in the middle that sounds a bit Russian—it's just got to be fun to do, you know?
Yeah, when I was at your Highline show in December, I remember thinking, "When are they gonna play 'Walk Like An Egyptian'? When are they gonna play it?"
[laughter]
KM: Ah, right at the end!
Right at the end! And it was like, "Thank you! My prayers have been answered!"
[laughter]
Have the original artists of any of the songs contacted you or had any sort of reactions to your versions?
KM: Nah, they haven't contacted us. And we don't know if they've heard it! But some of their fans have responded really, really well. Especially Kate Bush and Morrissey fans.
MP: Yeah, there was a spate of Morrissey fans at one point on Myspace—from California, because there's a big pocket of Morrissey fans from Mexico that live in California—and there was a period of time when we got so many of those fans just writing, saying, "Oh my god, I never thought that we would hear 'Panic' performed like that, and it's great!"
Right. And then there are your original songs. Your first album didn't have any original songs, they were all covers; was that on purpose or did that just happen?
MP: That was just the development of the band; it was its early days, and—
SO: We weren't ready, at that point. You know, we'd started with the Andrews Sisters, we'd been gigging it in London, we'd been causing a buzz; you know, we'd been moving on to the covers, and that's about the point that we met Universal [Music]—
KM: We met Universal very early on.
SO: Yeah, it captured that moment in our time as a band, but now was the time to…
KM: I think we always intended to write our own stuff. We just needed to go back and learn what to do and then replicate, and then—wreck it, as it were!
[laughter]
Even amongst your original songs you achieve a lot of different sounds. You have 'And She Sang', which is very ethereal, and then you have 'I Can't Believe I'm Not A Millionaire', which is really—
MP: Stupid?
[laughter]
—snarky, and it's just not got the sort of lyrics you'd expect to hear 40s-style!
KM: Well, this is the kind of juxtaposition we like!
Exactly. So how do your songs develop? Do you lean more toward one particular writing style?
MP: We're all quite different, actually, in the way that we approach it. And we're all also finding our style, because in the particular context of the Puppini Sisters our individual writing styles are developing in a different way to how they might have developed in other circumstances, because the writing is—
SO: For three.
KM: We're kind of just merging into one ugly sort of beast, in the middle!
MP: But I think we are all quite different in the way that we write, because we haven't really written together yet. I mean, Steph and Kate have just written a song together but that's the first time it's happened. Normally each of us will write their own song. So each of us has their own thing. For instance I realized after a while that all the songs I've written are about being heartbroken, and my husband's actually now complained about it! "Why!?"
Even amongst your original songs you achieve a lot of different sounds. You have 'And She Sang', which is very ethereal, and then you have 'I Can't Believe I'm Not A Millionaire', which is really—
MP: Stupid?
[laughter]
—snarky, and it's just not got the sort of lyrics you'd expect to hear 40s-style!
KM: Well, this is the kind of juxtaposition we like!
Exactly. So how do your songs develop? Do you lean more toward one particular writing style?
MP: We're all quite different, actually, in the way that we approach it. And we're all also finding our style, because in the particular context of the Puppini Sisters our individual writing styles are developing in a different way to how they might have developed in other circumstances, because the writing is—
SO: For three.
KM: We're kind of just merging into one ugly sort of beast, in the middle!
MP: But I think we are all quite different in the way that we write, because we haven't really written together yet. I mean, Steph and Kate have just written a song together but that's the first time it's happened. Normally each of us will write their own song. So each of us has their own thing. For instance I realized after a while that all the songs I've written are about being heartbroken, and my husband's actually now complained about it! "Why!?"
[laughter]
MP: So, yeah, we all have different things that we write about.
KM: But we come to the forum with a song finished and written out. So we'll sight-read it, and then—but then I guess once you put the voices on top and it's no longer squeaky and going "nyehhh, nyahhh", then it starts to take on a different life. And it's when you hear it sung—
SO: Because you sound really, really—
KM: And you still have kind of different images in your head.
So, Marcella's songs are the ones about being heartbroken… how do I tell who wrote which of the rest?
KM: Well—have a guess. Have a guess.
Hmm. So, wait, Marcella didn't write 'I Can't Believe I'm Not A Millionaire'?
MP: Oh, yeah, I did. That's a song about being heartbroken about being poor! So, ah, poor and dumped, that's me!
Um… Hm. I'm guessing the toy piano one, 'It's Not Over (Death or the Toy Piano)', is Kate's?
KM: Oh, yeah! [laughs]
Okay, so, Stephanie… 'And She Sang'?
MP: No, well, that's a song about being heartbroken.
Ah, right. Okay. This is hard!
[laughter]
MP: Well, we've put you on the spot!
SO: Yeah, that's not fair. I wrote 'Soho Nights'. So I guess my style, for the group, I always picture us being onstage, the most outrageous song, big, dance-y, gay anthem or track. I listened to a lot of showtunes back in my days at the college.
Ooh, showtunes… I mean that in a good way, by the way!
SO: Oh yeah, absolutely! I mean, I was studying in a classical music school and I was quite alternative there because I was singing West End, you know, theatre songs, because I loved them, and you know, they're just so much fun to sing. So I guess that sort of spirit—we're all very over the top and camp when we want to be. So I guess I brought that to the writing, to the band.
And then there's your cover of 'It Don't Mean A Thing (If It Ain't Got That Swing)'. I haven't heard it on the CD, but I know that in concert it essentially turns into a medley in the middle.
SO: It's great!
MP: Oh, yeah, that's really fun.
KM: And there's lots of different songs in it as well. It actually started as a bet to see how many different songs we could fit into it! Actually, it's a bit of an homage to Ella Fitzgerald.
MP: Yeah, cause Ella Fitzgerald—there's a famous song that she did called 'Airmail Special', and when she did her scat improvisation she always used to stick in as many songs as possible, so it actually quotes, "When the moon hits your eyes", and then she does 'Davy Crockett'—
KM: 'She'll Be Comin' Round The Mountain When She Comes'… and she's brilliant, because we studied jazz vocals and we all got quite sick of scat, a bit—
SO: It's just Ella's great way of improvisation. And that's great.
MP: And really, that was just about, the same way as Ella, Ella did it to be silly, and—
KM: Tongue in cheek.
SO: But it's really hard to sing!
KM: It's really—that song is a marathon! You start out and it's just like—
Wait, so is the middle entirely improvisation?
KM: Nah.
MP: Ah, no.
It's just tiring?
KM: We can't improvise.
SO: But if it sounds improvised that's really good!
MP: It's just because it's relentless. There's all this stuff going on.
SO: Yeah. It's like we're going through the set and I see it written down, and I'm just like, "Uh-oh… here we go, take a deep breath!"
KM: Yeah, we just can't improvise at all, really.
MP: It's also all of us deciding what we're going to do on the stage, we can't—it would be great to be that in tune—
SO: It's actually, I know, the only song on the album where my voice has been pushed to the extreme. I sound like a cartoon! My part, if you took away the other two parts, if you just isolated mine—I'm a soprano, I sing the top line—it sounds crazy!
[Kate does an imitation in a Mickey Mouse-type voice]
SO: Like really ridiculous.
KM: She sounds insane.
SO: [whispering] I pride myself on it!
[laughter]
And then in the show you also have your different instruments—the violin, the toy piano, the accordion. Was that just because "Hey, I play these instruments, let's put them in there"?
MP: We thought we could fit it as well, because, you know, we didn't just want to do swing, we wanted to use a lot of outer influences as well, and I mean, we love that eastern European/gypsy/Oompah music, we love it.
SO: I mean, when we were studying our instruments—I was studying violin since, what, since I was eight I started the violin, and it was so scored and studied and you do your exams, and now we're playing our instruments in this really sort of wonky way and it's so much more fun!
KM: It's much more fun! Yeah, I think I played the toy piano when I was like six. I mean, I do play piano. I also play the saxophone, I just don't do it onstage. I'm the one who plays the most useless instruments and I'm proud of that.
SO: But as far as what Marcella was saying, it does open up the sound. And it's also visually very exciting to see us not only hold them, but play them as well, which people are often taken aback by. It's a great thing to have.
KM: Yeah, it's a good asset.
You're also so put together, visually. You've got your polka dots, and your forties dresses, and everything matches! Groups don't really do that any more.
MP: Exactly.
KM: They do, but they match in a totally different way. Groups dress now to look casual, to look like they haven't thought about it, but…
MP: Of course they've thought about it! Like, indie bands: they probably spend as long as we do to get ready in the morning.
SO: Yeah! Whereas we have no shame!
KM: Longer, actually, because they have to get that "I don't care" look.
MP: They have to get that straightening iron out!
Exactly! Do you know how long it takes to make your hair look like you've just gotten out of bed!?
SO: I know! But we have no shame in saying, "Hey, we spent some time getting ready this morning to look good." And that's fine.
KM: But I really don't believe in—I think it's really rubbish when artists say that they don't care about their appearance because they—
SO: They do.
MP: And if they don't care about making an effort, then they're making a statement anyway. And there are very few artists that don't make an effort, and when they don't they usually end up looking like a dog's dinner anyway!
KM: Well, Britney Spears makes an effort, and she still ends up looking like a dog's dinner.
[laughter]
MP: Poor Britney!
SO: Let's not—
KM: We were talking about this in another interview…
Well, anyway, you do see the whole idea of the cohesive look in other groups. It does seem to be making a comeback.
SO: Well, it's not only the look that we're bringing back. What we're also bringing back is this cohesive sound. So that is a very old concept, but a very new one today. I mean, we've done so many TV appearances and radio appearances, for example, and even today, we've all been fit to sing... "Really? Can you do that—can you do that now? Can you do that, like, at the same time? And you don't need any separation or…?"
[laughs] I'm going to ask you three to sing later, by the way!
[laughter]
KM: But we come to the forum with a song finished and written out. So we'll sight-read it, and then—but then I guess once you put the voices on top and it's no longer squeaky and going "nyehhh, nyahhh", then it starts to take on a different life. And it's when you hear it sung—
SO: Because you sound really, really—
KM: And you still have kind of different images in your head.
So, Marcella's songs are the ones about being heartbroken… how do I tell who wrote which of the rest?
KM: Well—have a guess. Have a guess.
Hmm. So, wait, Marcella didn't write 'I Can't Believe I'm Not A Millionaire'?
MP: Oh, yeah, I did. That's a song about being heartbroken about being poor! So, ah, poor and dumped, that's me!
Um… Hm. I'm guessing the toy piano one, 'It's Not Over (Death or the Toy Piano)', is Kate's?
KM: Oh, yeah! [laughs]
Okay, so, Stephanie… 'And She Sang'?
MP: No, well, that's a song about being heartbroken.
Ah, right. Okay. This is hard!
[laughter]
MP: Well, we've put you on the spot!
SO: Yeah, that's not fair. I wrote 'Soho Nights'. So I guess my style, for the group, I always picture us being onstage, the most outrageous song, big, dance-y, gay anthem or track. I listened to a lot of showtunes back in my days at the college.
Ooh, showtunes… I mean that in a good way, by the way!
SO: Oh yeah, absolutely! I mean, I was studying in a classical music school and I was quite alternative there because I was singing West End, you know, theatre songs, because I loved them, and you know, they're just so much fun to sing. So I guess that sort of spirit—we're all very over the top and camp when we want to be. So I guess I brought that to the writing, to the band.
And then there's your cover of 'It Don't Mean A Thing (If It Ain't Got That Swing)'. I haven't heard it on the CD, but I know that in concert it essentially turns into a medley in the middle.
SO: It's great!
MP: Oh, yeah, that's really fun.
KM: And there's lots of different songs in it as well. It actually started as a bet to see how many different songs we could fit into it! Actually, it's a bit of an homage to Ella Fitzgerald.
MP: Yeah, cause Ella Fitzgerald—there's a famous song that she did called 'Airmail Special', and when she did her scat improvisation she always used to stick in as many songs as possible, so it actually quotes, "When the moon hits your eyes", and then she does 'Davy Crockett'—
KM: 'She'll Be Comin' Round The Mountain When She Comes'… and she's brilliant, because we studied jazz vocals and we all got quite sick of scat, a bit—
SO: It's just Ella's great way of improvisation. And that's great.
MP: And really, that was just about, the same way as Ella, Ella did it to be silly, and—
KM: Tongue in cheek.
SO: But it's really hard to sing!
KM: It's really—that song is a marathon! You start out and it's just like—
Wait, so is the middle entirely improvisation?
KM: Nah.
MP: Ah, no.
It's just tiring?
KM: We can't improvise.
SO: But if it sounds improvised that's really good!
MP: It's just because it's relentless. There's all this stuff going on.
SO: Yeah. It's like we're going through the set and I see it written down, and I'm just like, "Uh-oh… here we go, take a deep breath!"
KM: Yeah, we just can't improvise at all, really.
MP: It's also all of us deciding what we're going to do on the stage, we can't—it would be great to be that in tune—
SO: It's actually, I know, the only song on the album where my voice has been pushed to the extreme. I sound like a cartoon! My part, if you took away the other two parts, if you just isolated mine—I'm a soprano, I sing the top line—it sounds crazy!
[Kate does an imitation in a Mickey Mouse-type voice]
SO: Like really ridiculous.
KM: She sounds insane.
SO: [whispering] I pride myself on it!
[laughter]
And then in the show you also have your different instruments—the violin, the toy piano, the accordion. Was that just because "Hey, I play these instruments, let's put them in there"?
MP: We thought we could fit it as well, because, you know, we didn't just want to do swing, we wanted to use a lot of outer influences as well, and I mean, we love that eastern European/gypsy/Oompah music, we love it.
SO: I mean, when we were studying our instruments—I was studying violin since, what, since I was eight I started the violin, and it was so scored and studied and you do your exams, and now we're playing our instruments in this really sort of wonky way and it's so much more fun!
KM: It's much more fun! Yeah, I think I played the toy piano when I was like six. I mean, I do play piano. I also play the saxophone, I just don't do it onstage. I'm the one who plays the most useless instruments and I'm proud of that.
SO: But as far as what Marcella was saying, it does open up the sound. And it's also visually very exciting to see us not only hold them, but play them as well, which people are often taken aback by. It's a great thing to have.
KM: Yeah, it's a good asset.
You're also so put together, visually. You've got your polka dots, and your forties dresses, and everything matches! Groups don't really do that any more.
MP: Exactly.
KM: They do, but they match in a totally different way. Groups dress now to look casual, to look like they haven't thought about it, but…
MP: Of course they've thought about it! Like, indie bands: they probably spend as long as we do to get ready in the morning.
SO: Yeah! Whereas we have no shame!
KM: Longer, actually, because they have to get that "I don't care" look.
MP: They have to get that straightening iron out!
Exactly! Do you know how long it takes to make your hair look like you've just gotten out of bed!?
SO: I know! But we have no shame in saying, "Hey, we spent some time getting ready this morning to look good." And that's fine.
KM: But I really don't believe in—I think it's really rubbish when artists say that they don't care about their appearance because they—
SO: They do.
MP: And if they don't care about making an effort, then they're making a statement anyway. And there are very few artists that don't make an effort, and when they don't they usually end up looking like a dog's dinner anyway!
KM: Well, Britney Spears makes an effort, and she still ends up looking like a dog's dinner.
[laughter]
MP: Poor Britney!
SO: Let's not—
KM: We were talking about this in another interview…
Well, anyway, you do see the whole idea of the cohesive look in other groups. It does seem to be making a comeback.
SO: Well, it's not only the look that we're bringing back. What we're also bringing back is this cohesive sound. So that is a very old concept, but a very new one today. I mean, we've done so many TV appearances and radio appearances, for example, and even today, we've all been fit to sing... "Really? Can you do that—can you do that now? Can you do that, like, at the same time? And you don't need any separation or…?"
[laughs] I'm going to ask you three to sing later, by the way!
[laughter]
Because I've heard that you do that—just randomly start singing—like, as I read on your website, when your car was in the repair shop!
KM: Yeah!
MP: Oh, yeah.
And I heard it paid for the repairs.
MP: Oh, yeah!
SO: Yeah! Well, not quite.
KM: We got a really heavy discount.
SO: I remember when we saw the boys later, we were like, "Yeah, the car broke down and we got it fixed and we only had to pay like a hundred quid!" and they were like, "What, for all that, you only got it for a hundred quid!?"
KM: "What the hell did you do!?"
SO: And we were like, "Nothing dodgy!"
KM: "We sang out way through that whole album!"
But speaking of the cohesiveness as a group, there's one other group where I always find myself drawing parallels, seeing as they've got harmonies, they've got a cohesive look: the Pipettes.
SO: Yeah.
MP: We're so different, though.
Well, yeah, absolutely, but even with your differences, you both are sort of breaking out a new way for bands to be put together.
MP: Yeah, we do have the same intentions.
KM: It's the desire to entertain. And to make people—and it's also that it's not just us that dresses, the audience is therefore encouraged to dress, and it brings a sense of occasion. So with the Pipettes, they do the polka-dot thing, that's their thing, and so everyone comes wearing polka-dots. Which is brilliant! I mean, what a fantastic thing to bring back. That sense of occasion. And we find people come and dress up. But that's where the similarity is, completely.
SO: Musically, it's a complete difference. I you know, I definitely tip my hat to them.
KM: The reason is they're bringing fun back to music in the same way that we are.
Right. Yeah, I was just referring to—
KM: To the look.
SO: Oh yeah, absolutely.
And to being a group and putting themselves together.
MP: Oh yeah, exactly. But again, going back to the indie bands, they do that as well—it's just that the look now has become so unified that you don't take it as the look at all.
SO: Skinny tie… white shirt…
MP: Tight jeans…
SO: Drainpipe jeans.
Oh, yes.
KM: Oh, yeah.
Drainpipe jeans, oh my god.
MP: On guys… on guys with chubby legs…
Oh, god. Oh, and especially in the city—
SO: I saw a guy with bigger hair than me the other day.
KM: I quite like that on guys.
SO: But, look, he was like a Russell Grant ripoff. The poor man's version.
MP: I just don't like the skinny jeans that also do the hip-hop thing.
KM: Oh, god.
MP: They look like a penguin.
SO: See, they're not big enough to actually have the illusion of falling down, they're, you know, like—sprayed on. It's like, why are you pretending!
MP: But I do quite like the skinny jeans, actually, just not on chubby legs.
I beg to differ, personally.
MP: Really? You like skinny jeans on guys with chubby legs?
No! No! I don't like skinny jeans at all!
MP: Oh! Oh right, oh, okay!
I just… don't support the look. No.
MP: Well, on the right person they can be fantastic.
KM: See, on the right person—on Kate Moss—
MP: In them she looks amazing.
Well, no, I'm fine with them on girls, I just don't like them on guys.
MP: Again, on Nick Cave—[kiss sound] they look amazing.
SO: They look very uncomfortable.
MP: Well, actually, Nick Cave doesn't do jeans, he does skinny trousers.
SO: Leather—does he do leather pants?
Oh, those seem even more uncomfortable actually.
KM: Oh, I don't know. Leather trousers are just great.
Well, if they're tight…
KM: Yeah…
[laughter]
SO: See, we're learning what you like! You're finding out about us, we're finding out about you!
KM: Yeah!
MP: Oh, yeah.
And I heard it paid for the repairs.
MP: Oh, yeah!
SO: Yeah! Well, not quite.
KM: We got a really heavy discount.
SO: I remember when we saw the boys later, we were like, "Yeah, the car broke down and we got it fixed and we only had to pay like a hundred quid!" and they were like, "What, for all that, you only got it for a hundred quid!?"
KM: "What the hell did you do!?"
SO: And we were like, "Nothing dodgy!"
KM: "We sang out way through that whole album!"
But speaking of the cohesiveness as a group, there's one other group where I always find myself drawing parallels, seeing as they've got harmonies, they've got a cohesive look: the Pipettes.
SO: Yeah.
MP: We're so different, though.
Well, yeah, absolutely, but even with your differences, you both are sort of breaking out a new way for bands to be put together.
MP: Yeah, we do have the same intentions.
KM: It's the desire to entertain. And to make people—and it's also that it's not just us that dresses, the audience is therefore encouraged to dress, and it brings a sense of occasion. So with the Pipettes, they do the polka-dot thing, that's their thing, and so everyone comes wearing polka-dots. Which is brilliant! I mean, what a fantastic thing to bring back. That sense of occasion. And we find people come and dress up. But that's where the similarity is, completely.
SO: Musically, it's a complete difference. I you know, I definitely tip my hat to them.
KM: The reason is they're bringing fun back to music in the same way that we are.
Right. Yeah, I was just referring to—
KM: To the look.
SO: Oh yeah, absolutely.
And to being a group and putting themselves together.
MP: Oh yeah, exactly. But again, going back to the indie bands, they do that as well—it's just that the look now has become so unified that you don't take it as the look at all.
SO: Skinny tie… white shirt…
MP: Tight jeans…
SO: Drainpipe jeans.
Oh, yes.
KM: Oh, yeah.
Drainpipe jeans, oh my god.
MP: On guys… on guys with chubby legs…
Oh, god. Oh, and especially in the city—
SO: I saw a guy with bigger hair than me the other day.
KM: I quite like that on guys.
SO: But, look, he was like a Russell Grant ripoff. The poor man's version.
MP: I just don't like the skinny jeans that also do the hip-hop thing.
KM: Oh, god.
MP: They look like a penguin.
SO: See, they're not big enough to actually have the illusion of falling down, they're, you know, like—sprayed on. It's like, why are you pretending!
MP: But I do quite like the skinny jeans, actually, just not on chubby legs.
I beg to differ, personally.
MP: Really? You like skinny jeans on guys with chubby legs?
No! No! I don't like skinny jeans at all!
MP: Oh! Oh right, oh, okay!
I just… don't support the look. No.
MP: Well, on the right person they can be fantastic.
KM: See, on the right person—on Kate Moss—
MP: In them she looks amazing.
Well, no, I'm fine with them on girls, I just don't like them on guys.
MP: Again, on Nick Cave—[kiss sound] they look amazing.
SO: They look very uncomfortable.
MP: Well, actually, Nick Cave doesn't do jeans, he does skinny trousers.
SO: Leather—does he do leather pants?
Oh, those seem even more uncomfortable actually.
KM: Oh, I don't know. Leather trousers are just great.
Well, if they're tight…
KM: Yeah…
[laughter]
SO: See, we're learning what you like! You're finding out about us, we're finding out about you!
In general, the 40s glamour thing has also been brought back a lot lately. Recently for example Christina Aguilera had a huge hit with her 3rd album, which was almost completely modeled around 40s influences, as was her look.
Marcella Puppini: Well, curiously enough, in her video she's herself as the blonde, the brunette, and the redhead.
Kate Mullins: And we knew this to be in support of the Puppini Sisters!
MP: She was paying regards to a certain group of girls!
KM: She knew about us!
Stephanie O'Brien: She knew!
Christina Aguilera does the Puppini Sisters—all three of them!
[laughter]
MP: Yeah!
KM: Absolutely. She's not just one, she's the two others!
MP: And she did a brilliant, brilliant job of that.
KM: Right, well the thing is it was—
MP: Right, I mean, that was a concept album. And good for her, she likes the forties, obviously.
SO: The only thing we weren't sure about was her video for Ain't No Other Man. And I mean, it was all based on how she loves the movie [Whatever Happened To] Baby Jane. Actually I think it was—
KM: She calls herself Baby Jane.
SO: People in her group, people in her group call her Baby Jane, and she embraces that, but we were actually talking about it and it's not that good a thing to be named—
MP: It's not a compliment. When I used to study fashion I had these ringlets, inspired by John Galliano at the time because he used to have ringlets like that, and I remember going to college and having gay guys saying "Oh, look at Baby Jane!" and it was not a compliment.
KM: Have you seen Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?
SO: Check it out.
I know enough about it, yeah.
MP: Yeah.
KM: It ain't a compliment!
SO: Oh, no!
MP: So, yeah, we're not sure if Christina has seen the movie!
…I don't even remember what my question was.
[laughter]
KM: Christina's third album was based on forties—
SO: On the forties thing.
MP: Oh, no, the look. Yeah, really, the credit should go to the burlesque scene.
Right. Like Dita Von Teese.
MP: Yeah. And all the rockabilly, there's a lot of that; for instance I remember going to the Coney Island freak show. And all the ladies in the show had massive tattoos and were dressed like 1940s sirens. So the alternative underground scene has a lot of that, and that's been going on for quite a while. And then it suddenly got a little bit more mainstream. In ten years, everybody on the high street will be doing that as well.
SO: Well, we have great fun. Like, when we were starting out we were basically playing on burlesque nights a lot, really crazy nights with very different kind of burlesque acts!
KM: The weird and wonderful.
SO: And it was really great to be a part of that scene when it was just, you know, going on in the underground kind of scene, in London, where the fashion was coming to the forefront, and, you know, there needed to be a sound that accompanied that, and I guess that was us.
On top of your music and the way you put yourselves together, you do everything else on top of that to tie yourselves into that image, including your music videos, which are very fun.
SO: Have you seen our most recent one?
For 'Jilted'? I have seen it. I enjoyed it!
SO: Good.
KM: We enjoyed it!
MP: We enjoyed making it!
KM: It was brilliant.
How do you develop those?
MP: Well, that particular one is self-produced, so that is going into more of a filmic direction, which we didn't do before. Before it was very girl-group, kind of—
SO: Performance-based.
Like the video for 'Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy'.
KM: Well, 'Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy' is brilliant because it's also got that animation—it's great. But I'd say that that and 'Spooky' are part of a thing and now we're moving on in a different direction, because we just want to do things with a bit more of a story.
SO: Be a little more extravagant. And I think we've hit that—
KM: We really liked the dresses!
Oh, yes! And I can imagine a story-based video for 'And She Sang'.
MP: Oh, yeah, there'll be a couple murders in that one!
[laughter]
Yeah, violence—
KM: Violence in dresses and corsets!
Of course!
KM: Using probably stilettos.
SO: Yeah!
I'm going to hold you to that, then!
SO: Yeah.
KM: Yeah!
MP: We'll do it!
Just to switch topics on you, your website is also very cool; you've got an Agony Aunt and cooking tips and makeup tips, which is very fun. I've tried to use the cooking tips before but I'm a terrible cook.
KM: Oh really! They're very easygoing, really, they're not too hardcore.
I burn spaghetti.
SO: Oh, no!
MP: How would you do that!?
KM: You're talking to an outraged Italian, there!
Well, okay, I don't actually burn spaghetti, but I come close.
MP: You burn the sauce.
…Yes? I burn anything that can be burnt, and then I overcook or undercook the spaghetti so that it either dissolves or—
KM: D'you get distracted by other things?
Oh, yes.
KM: Ah, see, you've got to dedicate your time entirely—
And dancing to your music!
[cheering]
SO: Well, then you can burn as much as you want!
MP: If you dance to one song, then that's the ideal time to cook your spaghetti.
KM: "I'd like my spaghetti… 'And She Sang'!"
[laughter]
But it seems like you had a lot of fun putting your website together.
SO: Yeah!
KM: Yeah. Yeah, and the memoirs are so funny.
SO: They're very funny.
KM: And there are many more to come, of course.
MP: And I don't know if you've gone on the forums, but they're really fun because we've got the most diverse group of fans, and there's a core that are on it every—
SO: They arrange outings to hang out.
MP: They range in age from 15 to 50, I would say, and they're all pals, and they write to each other, and—
KM: They ask us questions…
MP: Yeah! And it's really quite sweet. It's a little community. And it's very nice, because it's a safe internet community, and that doesn't happen a lot these days. And I sometimes think, "Should these 15-year-olds be talking to these guys who are in their 40s?" but it's totally safe, it's really, really nice.
Also, in terms of the types of places to go online, you can tell by the types of people they attract whether they're more likely to be safe.
KM: Yeah. We meet them first, so—
MP: Exactly, they're all people that we know—if we hadn't met them we might intervene and say, "Don't talk to them."
SO: They're so sweet. They're like, "The Puppini Sisters are playing at Coco [Cocoa?] in Camden; how are we going to save some money to get down there?"
MP: "And what are you wearing?"
SO: "And how are you getting there?"
MP: "Should we meet before? Let's meet before!" And they even went on a forum outing to an ice-skating rink!
KM: It's really nice, and old-fashioned fun. But at the same time they also discuss things that most 15-year-olds wouldn't get exposed to. Like we posted a thing about how the arts council cut funding to 50% of all ventures in England to support the Olympics, so everyone in the forum got involved in that.
Really? 50%!?
MP: Maybe it's not 50%.
KM: No, it is.
SO: It's an outrageous number.
I'm really glad the Olympics aren't coming to NYC, then!
KM: Seriously. That's very lucky. It's not a good thing.
SO: A lot of things are suffering for it.
KM: And no one cares!
SO: And the problems keep escalating, and it's getting ridiculous.
KM: Everyone would rather go to the theatre, I'm sure of it. Sorry, but it's ridiculous.
Well, judging from the sort of audience the Super Bowl attracts, I wouldn't be so quick to say "everybody".
KM: Yeah.
MP: The Olympics is different from the Superbowl. I'm not sure the same people watch—
KM: No, they're definitely not.
Right, but there are so many people who think that sports are just much more worthy than the arts, which I find alarming.
MP: And there are so many people that think the arts are for the middle classes. There's this guy on an online blog who said, "Oh, that's great news, I'm going to enjoy watching those art ponces squirm!" And there were so many people who were going to lose their jobs and this guy was happy about that.
SO: Sick man.
KM: The thing is, it starts in school. I remember my school had four houses, and we had inter-house competitions. One was music, one was drama, and the rest was sport, and the way that the points were weighted was against the arts. If you won the lacrosse tournament you'd get four times more points than you did if you won inter-house drama. And it starts like that, so sport is always pushed further, and you get out of things for sport whereas you wouldn't for music and drama. It's encouragement, and it's just really bad.
Well, here, in public schools arts are always the first to go. But the trouble with that is, in this country, physical activity is not exactly something that should get cut either!
SO: Oh, absolutely. Well, in this country too.
MP: Oh, yeah, and that's why the schools—
SO: They're justifying it.
MP: Yeah, the U.K. is going the exact same way as the U.S. in that respect.
Yeah. We're bad influences, I guess. I apologize for that, by the way!
MP: Well, I think it has nothing to do with that. All the parks are being developed and kids have nowhere to play sports. And they think that having the Olympics suddenly means that London is a sporty city.
KM: Yeah, like it's the savior—
MP: Well, everybody's going to watch it on television!
KM: All they're going to be doing is getting up to get a can of beer!
I'm not particularly a sports fan.
KM: Me neither.
I didn't watch the Super Bowl—I only know the Giants won because everybody was hollering about it afterward.
SO: You can't miss it, really.
KM: We had a fantastic time, though. We watched it.
SO: I couldn't care less about stuff like that. But many people do care. And it's really quite infectious when you see them.
Yeah, it's easy to get drawn into it once you sit down and watch.
MP: We had no idea what the rules were. It's kind of similar to rugby. But we were just sitting there, going, "Uh… YEAH! Hoorah!" And if you don't know the sport then you watch the people watching it, really.
SO: There was this guy who was really into it, and he came over to us. We were right in the front where the big screen was, and he was like, "Ah, so you're going to watch the parade?" And we were like, "Uh—sorry, what?" And he goes, "You gonna see the parade?" And I'm: "Oh, is there a parade!?" And he says, "Oh, you must be European," and he walks out!
KM: Yeah. No idea. We were really enthusiastic, though! Like, "YEAH!"
SO: We got a pitcher of beer, we were right by the big screen!
MP: So yeah.
Um… wow, where were we before all that?
KM: We were on the…
SO: Oh yeah, that whole… cohesive thing.
MP: No, no, it was about music videos.
Wow. That was quite a tangent there.
KM: Oh, that was one hell of a tangent!
MP: Yeah!
[laughter]
KM: Well done, everyone.
Anyway! You've also collaborated with Stephen Coates—
KM: Yeah!
SO: In the video.
On this song and video 'A Part of Me', which was really fun. How did that happen?
MP: Actually, it was my husband. I have been a hardcore fan of his for a while, and my husband kept saying, "You've got to meet him, because he's really cool." So he wrote him an email, saying, "My wife is a big fan of yours, and she wants to meet you." So he wrote back and said, "Ah, great!" So I went for a coffee with him, and me and him and my husband and his wife had a couple of dinners together.
KM: They double-date.
MP: Yes, we do double-dates, yeah! And we were chatting, and we said, "Oh, it would be fun to do something together," and he just said, "Here's a song that I've written, see what you can do with it," and he loved it.
SO: Yeah, it was really fun.
Wait, were you the ones who came up with the music video?
SO: Oh, no, no, no.
MP: No…
KM: Same director as 'Jilted', though. That's how we met her. She was just a bit…
SO: Just a bit warped! And Stephen's very dark as well. Like Marcella was saying, we had done our bit with the song and it was very nice and sweet. But then we wanted something a bit—
KM: We wanted maggots!
Ah, well, a good bit of poison and maggots can be fun!
KM: Had you heard of him before?
Not before seeing the video, but once I had, I did some research…
MP: He has a very sort of cultish following in England, and even as far as Russia we've met some people who were big fans of his.
SO: He's really big in Russia, though. He goes there quite a lot.
KM: Yeah.
SO: He might be doing some remixes for our new album.
Oh, I'm going to keep my eyes out for that, then. That'll be fun. Okay. In the U.S. recently there's been a resurgence in Anglophilia, especially in terms of music.
KM: Exactly. That's good for us.
MP: Well, a lot of people might not even realize that we're English, because the music that inspired us is so inherently American that a lot of people don't catch onto that until they see us live.
Until they come and see your show and they hear Kate say "cretin" a million times.
KM: Cretin, yeah.
SO: Yeah! [laughs]
KM: They are cretins, the boys! They're lazy cretins. Bless 'em.
[laughter]
In the kindest way possible, right?
MP: Oh, yeah.
KM: Of course. We're allowed!
Yeah, when my friends say stupid things I tend to tell them, "You're an idiot. In the kindest way possible."
[laughter]
KM: Should have called them cretins.
Yes, one day I'd done that and I was listening to music later, and one of your songs came on, and I went, "Oh yeah! Why didn't I call him a cretin!?"
[laughter]
MP: Yes! Tell 'em!
SO: "Buffoon" is also a very good word.
KM: Yeah, it's a good word.
Another, absolutely entirely unrelated, word that I like is "chandelier".
[laughter]
SO: That is unrelated!
MP: Chandelier is a brilliant word.
KM: You should try calling someone that! "You chandelier!"
Shakespeare also has some very good insults, if you think about it. "You sun-bottled spider!" …Or something!
[laughter]
MP: That's very good!
I'm not sure if that's actually one, though.
MP: Yeah, it takes too long anyway. You need snappy insults—
SO: Like "cretin" and "buffoon"!
MP: You don't want your opponent to have walked off by the time you've finished insulting them!
KM: "You're a… let me get my thesaurus!"
Okay. Wait, I've lost my place again.
SO: That's okay, it happens to us all the time. Thankfully not when we're singing!
Yes, about that! [laughs]
KM: I've found myself a couple of times in the middle of a song wondering what I'm singing.
MP: Yeah, you do go into a bit of a trance when you're singing.
Have to be on autopilot?
MP: It's not so much that as sometimes—I don't know how it happens, but the experience of being onstage can be quite surreal.
KM: Oh gosh, yes! You can find yourself in the middle of a song going, "What am I saying!?"
SO: Oh, yes!
KM: Or—do you ever have that feeling where you're out in the audience? You're not there, you're in the audience watching yourself. "What the hell am I doing!? I wonder what I'm having for tea!"
Right. And when you're singing 'Tu Vuò Fa L'Americano', you all have implied before that Stephanie and Kate have no idea what they're singing, which makes it worse, I'm sure!
MP: Well, they don't!
KM: But we've been told by Italians that our pronunciation is excellent.
SO: Marcella taught us the song.
KM: Phonetically.
MP: Phonetically, yeah.
KM: All I know of the lyrics is the "whiskey, soda, and baseball".
SO: But we are supposed to say "borsetta", which means "purse", and we end up saying "bruschetta", which doesn't make any sense and besides Marcella has told us it's supposed to be pronounced "brus-ketta". So you've got the typical English mistake in there. It ends up as "From your mother's bruschetta."
[laughter]
I've run out of questions.
[laughter]
Which is a shame, because I've been having so much fun! Is there anything else you wanted to say?
SO: God, is there anything we haven't said?
KM: Just buy the album!
SO: Buy the bloody album. It's good!
KM: It's great!
MP: Yes! It's great!
Marcella Puppini: Well, curiously enough, in her video she's herself as the blonde, the brunette, and the redhead.
Kate Mullins: And we knew this to be in support of the Puppini Sisters!
MP: She was paying regards to a certain group of girls!
KM: She knew about us!
Stephanie O'Brien: She knew!
Christina Aguilera does the Puppini Sisters—all three of them!
[laughter]
MP: Yeah!
KM: Absolutely. She's not just one, she's the two others!
MP: And she did a brilliant, brilliant job of that.
KM: Right, well the thing is it was—
MP: Right, I mean, that was a concept album. And good for her, she likes the forties, obviously.
SO: The only thing we weren't sure about was her video for Ain't No Other Man. And I mean, it was all based on how she loves the movie [Whatever Happened To] Baby Jane. Actually I think it was—
KM: She calls herself Baby Jane.
SO: People in her group, people in her group call her Baby Jane, and she embraces that, but we were actually talking about it and it's not that good a thing to be named—
MP: It's not a compliment. When I used to study fashion I had these ringlets, inspired by John Galliano at the time because he used to have ringlets like that, and I remember going to college and having gay guys saying "Oh, look at Baby Jane!" and it was not a compliment.
KM: Have you seen Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?
SO: Check it out.
I know enough about it, yeah.
MP: Yeah.
KM: It ain't a compliment!
SO: Oh, no!
MP: So, yeah, we're not sure if Christina has seen the movie!
…I don't even remember what my question was.
[laughter]
KM: Christina's third album was based on forties—
SO: On the forties thing.
MP: Oh, no, the look. Yeah, really, the credit should go to the burlesque scene.
Right. Like Dita Von Teese.
MP: Yeah. And all the rockabilly, there's a lot of that; for instance I remember going to the Coney Island freak show. And all the ladies in the show had massive tattoos and were dressed like 1940s sirens. So the alternative underground scene has a lot of that, and that's been going on for quite a while. And then it suddenly got a little bit more mainstream. In ten years, everybody on the high street will be doing that as well.
SO: Well, we have great fun. Like, when we were starting out we were basically playing on burlesque nights a lot, really crazy nights with very different kind of burlesque acts!
KM: The weird and wonderful.
SO: And it was really great to be a part of that scene when it was just, you know, going on in the underground kind of scene, in London, where the fashion was coming to the forefront, and, you know, there needed to be a sound that accompanied that, and I guess that was us.
On top of your music and the way you put yourselves together, you do everything else on top of that to tie yourselves into that image, including your music videos, which are very fun.
SO: Have you seen our most recent one?
For 'Jilted'? I have seen it. I enjoyed it!
SO: Good.
KM: We enjoyed it!
MP: We enjoyed making it!
KM: It was brilliant.
How do you develop those?
MP: Well, that particular one is self-produced, so that is going into more of a filmic direction, which we didn't do before. Before it was very girl-group, kind of—
SO: Performance-based.
Like the video for 'Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy'.
KM: Well, 'Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy' is brilliant because it's also got that animation—it's great. But I'd say that that and 'Spooky' are part of a thing and now we're moving on in a different direction, because we just want to do things with a bit more of a story.
SO: Be a little more extravagant. And I think we've hit that—
KM: We really liked the dresses!
Oh, yes! And I can imagine a story-based video for 'And She Sang'.
MP: Oh, yeah, there'll be a couple murders in that one!
[laughter]
Yeah, violence—
KM: Violence in dresses and corsets!
Of course!
KM: Using probably stilettos.
SO: Yeah!
I'm going to hold you to that, then!
SO: Yeah.
KM: Yeah!
MP: We'll do it!
Just to switch topics on you, your website is also very cool; you've got an Agony Aunt and cooking tips and makeup tips, which is very fun. I've tried to use the cooking tips before but I'm a terrible cook.
KM: Oh really! They're very easygoing, really, they're not too hardcore.
I burn spaghetti.
SO: Oh, no!
MP: How would you do that!?
KM: You're talking to an outraged Italian, there!
Well, okay, I don't actually burn spaghetti, but I come close.
MP: You burn the sauce.
…Yes? I burn anything that can be burnt, and then I overcook or undercook the spaghetti so that it either dissolves or—
KM: D'you get distracted by other things?
Oh, yes.
KM: Ah, see, you've got to dedicate your time entirely—
And dancing to your music!
[cheering]
SO: Well, then you can burn as much as you want!
MP: If you dance to one song, then that's the ideal time to cook your spaghetti.
KM: "I'd like my spaghetti… 'And She Sang'!"
[laughter]
But it seems like you had a lot of fun putting your website together.
SO: Yeah!
KM: Yeah. Yeah, and the memoirs are so funny.
SO: They're very funny.
KM: And there are many more to come, of course.
MP: And I don't know if you've gone on the forums, but they're really fun because we've got the most diverse group of fans, and there's a core that are on it every—
SO: They arrange outings to hang out.
MP: They range in age from 15 to 50, I would say, and they're all pals, and they write to each other, and—
KM: They ask us questions…
MP: Yeah! And it's really quite sweet. It's a little community. And it's very nice, because it's a safe internet community, and that doesn't happen a lot these days. And I sometimes think, "Should these 15-year-olds be talking to these guys who are in their 40s?" but it's totally safe, it's really, really nice.
Also, in terms of the types of places to go online, you can tell by the types of people they attract whether they're more likely to be safe.
KM: Yeah. We meet them first, so—
MP: Exactly, they're all people that we know—if we hadn't met them we might intervene and say, "Don't talk to them."
SO: They're so sweet. They're like, "The Puppini Sisters are playing at Coco [Cocoa?] in Camden; how are we going to save some money to get down there?"
MP: "And what are you wearing?"
SO: "And how are you getting there?"
MP: "Should we meet before? Let's meet before!" And they even went on a forum outing to an ice-skating rink!
KM: It's really nice, and old-fashioned fun. But at the same time they also discuss things that most 15-year-olds wouldn't get exposed to. Like we posted a thing about how the arts council cut funding to 50% of all ventures in England to support the Olympics, so everyone in the forum got involved in that.
Really? 50%!?
MP: Maybe it's not 50%.
KM: No, it is.
SO: It's an outrageous number.
I'm really glad the Olympics aren't coming to NYC, then!
KM: Seriously. That's very lucky. It's not a good thing.
SO: A lot of things are suffering for it.
KM: And no one cares!
SO: And the problems keep escalating, and it's getting ridiculous.
KM: Everyone would rather go to the theatre, I'm sure of it. Sorry, but it's ridiculous.
Well, judging from the sort of audience the Super Bowl attracts, I wouldn't be so quick to say "everybody".
KM: Yeah.
MP: The Olympics is different from the Superbowl. I'm not sure the same people watch—
KM: No, they're definitely not.
Right, but there are so many people who think that sports are just much more worthy than the arts, which I find alarming.
MP: And there are so many people that think the arts are for the middle classes. There's this guy on an online blog who said, "Oh, that's great news, I'm going to enjoy watching those art ponces squirm!" And there were so many people who were going to lose their jobs and this guy was happy about that.
SO: Sick man.
KM: The thing is, it starts in school. I remember my school had four houses, and we had inter-house competitions. One was music, one was drama, and the rest was sport, and the way that the points were weighted was against the arts. If you won the lacrosse tournament you'd get four times more points than you did if you won inter-house drama. And it starts like that, so sport is always pushed further, and you get out of things for sport whereas you wouldn't for music and drama. It's encouragement, and it's just really bad.
Well, here, in public schools arts are always the first to go. But the trouble with that is, in this country, physical activity is not exactly something that should get cut either!
SO: Oh, absolutely. Well, in this country too.
MP: Oh, yeah, and that's why the schools—
SO: They're justifying it.
MP: Yeah, the U.K. is going the exact same way as the U.S. in that respect.
Yeah. We're bad influences, I guess. I apologize for that, by the way!
MP: Well, I think it has nothing to do with that. All the parks are being developed and kids have nowhere to play sports. And they think that having the Olympics suddenly means that London is a sporty city.
KM: Yeah, like it's the savior—
MP: Well, everybody's going to watch it on television!
KM: All they're going to be doing is getting up to get a can of beer!
I'm not particularly a sports fan.
KM: Me neither.
I didn't watch the Super Bowl—I only know the Giants won because everybody was hollering about it afterward.
SO: You can't miss it, really.
KM: We had a fantastic time, though. We watched it.
SO: I couldn't care less about stuff like that. But many people do care. And it's really quite infectious when you see them.
Yeah, it's easy to get drawn into it once you sit down and watch.
MP: We had no idea what the rules were. It's kind of similar to rugby. But we were just sitting there, going, "Uh… YEAH! Hoorah!" And if you don't know the sport then you watch the people watching it, really.
SO: There was this guy who was really into it, and he came over to us. We were right in the front where the big screen was, and he was like, "Ah, so you're going to watch the parade?" And we were like, "Uh—sorry, what?" And he goes, "You gonna see the parade?" And I'm: "Oh, is there a parade!?" And he says, "Oh, you must be European," and he walks out!
KM: Yeah. No idea. We were really enthusiastic, though! Like, "YEAH!"
SO: We got a pitcher of beer, we were right by the big screen!
MP: So yeah.
Um… wow, where were we before all that?
KM: We were on the…
SO: Oh yeah, that whole… cohesive thing.
MP: No, no, it was about music videos.
Wow. That was quite a tangent there.
KM: Oh, that was one hell of a tangent!
MP: Yeah!
[laughter]
KM: Well done, everyone.
Anyway! You've also collaborated with Stephen Coates—
KM: Yeah!
SO: In the video.
On this song and video 'A Part of Me', which was really fun. How did that happen?
MP: Actually, it was my husband. I have been a hardcore fan of his for a while, and my husband kept saying, "You've got to meet him, because he's really cool." So he wrote him an email, saying, "My wife is a big fan of yours, and she wants to meet you." So he wrote back and said, "Ah, great!" So I went for a coffee with him, and me and him and my husband and his wife had a couple of dinners together.
KM: They double-date.
MP: Yes, we do double-dates, yeah! And we were chatting, and we said, "Oh, it would be fun to do something together," and he just said, "Here's a song that I've written, see what you can do with it," and he loved it.
SO: Yeah, it was really fun.
Wait, were you the ones who came up with the music video?
SO: Oh, no, no, no.
MP: No…
KM: Same director as 'Jilted', though. That's how we met her. She was just a bit…
SO: Just a bit warped! And Stephen's very dark as well. Like Marcella was saying, we had done our bit with the song and it was very nice and sweet. But then we wanted something a bit—
KM: We wanted maggots!
Ah, well, a good bit of poison and maggots can be fun!
KM: Had you heard of him before?
Not before seeing the video, but once I had, I did some research…
MP: He has a very sort of cultish following in England, and even as far as Russia we've met some people who were big fans of his.
SO: He's really big in Russia, though. He goes there quite a lot.
KM: Yeah.
SO: He might be doing some remixes for our new album.
Oh, I'm going to keep my eyes out for that, then. That'll be fun. Okay. In the U.S. recently there's been a resurgence in Anglophilia, especially in terms of music.
KM: Exactly. That's good for us.
MP: Well, a lot of people might not even realize that we're English, because the music that inspired us is so inherently American that a lot of people don't catch onto that until they see us live.
Until they come and see your show and they hear Kate say "cretin" a million times.
KM: Cretin, yeah.
SO: Yeah! [laughs]
KM: They are cretins, the boys! They're lazy cretins. Bless 'em.
[laughter]
In the kindest way possible, right?
MP: Oh, yeah.
KM: Of course. We're allowed!
Yeah, when my friends say stupid things I tend to tell them, "You're an idiot. In the kindest way possible."
[laughter]
KM: Should have called them cretins.
Yes, one day I'd done that and I was listening to music later, and one of your songs came on, and I went, "Oh yeah! Why didn't I call him a cretin!?"
[laughter]
MP: Yes! Tell 'em!
SO: "Buffoon" is also a very good word.
KM: Yeah, it's a good word.
Another, absolutely entirely unrelated, word that I like is "chandelier".
[laughter]
SO: That is unrelated!
MP: Chandelier is a brilliant word.
KM: You should try calling someone that! "You chandelier!"
Shakespeare also has some very good insults, if you think about it. "You sun-bottled spider!" …Or something!
[laughter]
MP: That's very good!
I'm not sure if that's actually one, though.
MP: Yeah, it takes too long anyway. You need snappy insults—
SO: Like "cretin" and "buffoon"!
MP: You don't want your opponent to have walked off by the time you've finished insulting them!
KM: "You're a… let me get my thesaurus!"
Okay. Wait, I've lost my place again.
SO: That's okay, it happens to us all the time. Thankfully not when we're singing!
Yes, about that! [laughs]
KM: I've found myself a couple of times in the middle of a song wondering what I'm singing.
MP: Yeah, you do go into a bit of a trance when you're singing.
Have to be on autopilot?
MP: It's not so much that as sometimes—I don't know how it happens, but the experience of being onstage can be quite surreal.
KM: Oh gosh, yes! You can find yourself in the middle of a song going, "What am I saying!?"
SO: Oh, yes!
KM: Or—do you ever have that feeling where you're out in the audience? You're not there, you're in the audience watching yourself. "What the hell am I doing!? I wonder what I'm having for tea!"
Right. And when you're singing 'Tu Vuò Fa L'Americano', you all have implied before that Stephanie and Kate have no idea what they're singing, which makes it worse, I'm sure!
MP: Well, they don't!
KM: But we've been told by Italians that our pronunciation is excellent.
SO: Marcella taught us the song.
KM: Phonetically.
MP: Phonetically, yeah.
KM: All I know of the lyrics is the "whiskey, soda, and baseball".
SO: But we are supposed to say "borsetta", which means "purse", and we end up saying "bruschetta", which doesn't make any sense and besides Marcella has told us it's supposed to be pronounced "brus-ketta". So you've got the typical English mistake in there. It ends up as "From your mother's bruschetta."
[laughter]
I've run out of questions.
[laughter]
Which is a shame, because I've been having so much fun! Is there anything else you wanted to say?
SO: God, is there anything we haven't said?
KM: Just buy the album!
SO: Buy the bloody album. It's good!
KM: It's great!
MP: Yes! It's great!
If you're craving more Puppini Sisters, go check out their killer website... or check out the Good Prattle YouTube channel for a special treat.
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