Photo: Lucky Number
Hailing from Madrid, the Spanish all-girl garage band HINDS has been taking the music world by storm this year. They’ve played sessions for both BBC Radio 1 and 6 music, major festivals such as Glastonbury and recently toured the US with the likes of THE BLACK LIPS and GLASS ANIMALS. Their anticipated debut album Leave Me Alone will be finally available on the 8th of January via Lucky Number. NOTHING BUT HOPE AND PASSION met the girls for an interview at Berlin’s most infamous club Berghain before they played the Techno floor at this years Pop-Kultur festival premiere.
The German film Victoria follows a Spanish expat on a night out in Berlin. It involves clubbing, hanging with local boys and robbing a bank. What would you be up to on a free night in Berlin?
Ana: My biography.
Carlotta: Cassiopeia. You can smoke inside.
A: And you can play ping pong.
C: Doctor Punk. They give records, you put in two Euros. There’s a huge table, people are running around the table and you only get one shot.
You’re making garage music in English. Would you consider singing in Spanish too?
A: We can do it. But we’re happy about English. At the same time as we write we learn the language.
C: You don’t feel as nude. When we would sing our songs in Spanish I’d feel so ashamed.
A: When you speak Spanish, you can understand every word. I don’t know why , it’s a language you have to speak clearly. Not like English. (They laugh and start to sing)
On YouTube someone commented below the Chili Town video that he wants Spanish people to stop singing in English.
A: Yeah. I like our accent. Indian accent.
Indian?
A: We call it Indian. It’s not English, not Spanish, it’s broken English.
With a lot of creative people moving from Spain to Berlin, would you consider doing the same?
A: No.No. Never. We love Madrid. It’s the most inspiring thing ever. Our friends, family, streets, almost free beer: (laughs)
C: I also love to be there just to create a new thing. If everyone who is creative goes away, who’s creative in Spain? We really like it and we really defend it. With heart.
Amber: We’re Saviors.
Have you kept on being a soap actress, Carlotta?
C: No I don’t have time for that now.
A: Or maybe she’s an actress now.
C: It’s another character. My real name is James.
Your promoting drinking and smoking in your videos and social networks. What gender image do you want to deliver?
A: Kids, smoke. It’s worth it. (laughs) I think other girl bands done it in an extreme way. We just show how girls are. Girls smoke and girls drink. And we’re just doing that in our music videos. We are not puking or destroying, there are punk girls who do that. We’re just how girls are nowadays.
C: We are women. In the 21st century.
How’s the Rock’n’Roll life of the band?
A: I’m so glad you asked me. It’s very tiring and very crazy.
Amber: When the tours are very long, you become very crazy.
C: You don’t know what is good and what is bad. You only live with three other brains that are also crazy. You meet so many people, so many love stories. People are crazy, because musicians are crazy.
A: Our fans are pretty crazy. In a weird way, Not in a fun way. That’s what you notice.
C: It is because You really have new friends in a lot of different places that you only get to see once in a year. And you know you’re only having one night to spend with them, everything is sometimes so crazy, everything becomes a more extreme.
Amber: Vivid.
‘Working hard and doing whatever we want’
What was the weirdest fan incident?
Amber: I think in Denmark. We went so early into our van to Hamburg to Copenhagen.We came out of the van and four super old women were waiting for us.
A: Actually, one was a man. They had books, we thought they wanted to sell them to us. We were like ‘No No No’. And they said ‘Sorry, but we’ve been waiting for you for five hours.’
Amber: They had our pictures printed. And they counted us ‘One, two three- There’s one left’.
A: We also have a guy in London who prints us T-Shirts all the time.
C: And we have a guy on twitter. We know he doesnt exist, he’s not the person who is says he is. He’s like ‘See you tonite, babes’, ‘Miss you, babes’‚ ‘Can’t wait to see you in London’ and then he doesnt come tot he gig. He posts a picture of another person saying ‘Where are you babes’, five tweets everyday.
A: Fiona, our tour manager in America – she was the drummer the VIVIAN GIRLS – told us ‘You have this thing that will make them go crazy. I’ve seen it in people’s eyes how happy you make them. They are really really happy at your gigs, that’s going to get them crazy and you’re crazy, cos they’re going to try to love you even more.’ It’s actually happening. We’re nice with everyone, they just think they’re our family and friends.
Have you ever been pressured to deliver a certain gender image?
A: We don’t feel that pressure of because I think we’re doing good. We’re a good role model for all girls natural, having fun, working hard and doing whatever we want.
Who were your female idols while forming the band?
C: We tried hard. We had this night, it was around Christmas. She and I sat in my room, seriously looking for a feminine role model. It was impossible. We admire so many boys, but we admire many girls too, but we don’t like their music that much. It doesn’t count the same. It’s like ‚We admire your personality or your strength or ethic like FKA TWIGS. You’re a strong woman, but I don’t like your music that much. We admire girls all time, but musically we’re inspired by boys. We keep discovering music by boys that is influencing us. But we only have ourselves.
What does hope and passion mean to you?
C: Passion is easy. You really need to start to love life before loving every smaller thing. And if you love life yourself, it’s going to be easier for you to be passionate. And we all have come to that. We love live and we’re not depressive.
A: The word Hope is changing a bit. Changing it as far as you can. Even for one fan, for another band or listener. Just changing it in your little proportion.
C: To make a better world. Peace.
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