Solex - The Dutch Girl's Cut and Paste

To meet Elizabeth Esselink, aka Solex, I'd want to be ten feet tall. Instead I forgo even my heels and bring her a mini panettone as a gift, which the Dutch artist seems quite pleased with: "A cake, how lovely! Thank you."

I find myself in the company of a very warm, sunny, smiling woman.

“The Laughing Stock Of Indie Rock” is your fourth album. How is it different from the previous ones?

It's different because it sounds like it was played by a band. There are still plenty of samples, but it's more "organic". It also has a lot to do with the fact that, for the other records, I asked a guitarist and a drummer to play on songs that were already finished, whereas for this record I started out working with raw loops, gave them to the musicians and asked them to play along with them. I gave the guitarist some songs that were still unfinished, he took them home and played on them, then I loaded his parts into my computer and dropped them into the song. With the drummer, on the other hand, we went into a recording studio and I asked him to play along with whatever he had in his headphones.

Was this new way of working something you deliberately set out to do?

Yes. I wanted the drums to sound like a real drum kit. We recorded them in a professional studio because I think drums are one of the most important elements in a song. You see, even if you managed to find a good drum break, you'd have to sample it and then pay the rights, so in the end I kept sampling as a fallback option. I really cared about recording the drums entirely on their own. I did the same for "Pick Up" (my second record, from 1999), but that was only for 4 or 5 songs. As for the guitar, I was a bit worried too, because - this is the first tour I'm doing without a guitarist, it's just me and the drummer (Marit de Loos of the Dutch band Caesar) - improvising a lot during shows, I'd notice the guitarist playing certain melodic lines that, unfortunately, weren't on the record, and it bothered me, I didn't want that to happen again, so I asked him to work this new way. Then he became a father and couldn't come on tour. I also had to change drummers because the one I usually worked with found a good job, so he can't do too long a tour, so I asked Marit if she wanted to play with me. She also does a lot of backing vocals. There are new situations happening at these shows...

And what about the title?

“ The Laughing Stock Of Indie Rock” came to me during my tour of the United States. It's quite funny because in America people talk about music by dividing it into "small record labels" and "big record labels". It's a rather "political" view, they think small labels only put out good music, while big labels only put out garbage. If you stop someone on the street and ask them what kind of music they like, they won't be able to name a specific genre, they'll tell you they like indie-rock. By now it's become a genre unto itself. I wanted to poke a bit of fun at this idea because I find it silly: it has absolutely nothing to do with the music. It's probably a joke that lands better in America.

I don't know what the situation is like in Italy, but in Holland it's not a problem if you record for a major or an independent label. What matters is that you work with a good record label and how you sound. It's already hard enough for a band to manage to put out a record, and you can't blame them for recording for a label that you might think isn't cool enough. And with this record you left Matador to start your own label...

There are several reasons. At first I tried to get a distribution license, I no longer wanted an "ordinary" contract, mainly because that way the record company owns the masters and can do whatever they want with them. I wanted to own the masters myself, so, either you have your own label, or you get a distribution license. I managed to get one in America, South America, Taiwan and Hong Kong, but not in Europe, so I decided to start my own personal label.

This is a completely new thing for me, so I asked a friend of mine who's been running a record label for a long time for advice. I like the way he works, so I basically just did what he did (Laughs).

On this record you have a certain Stuart Brown as a guest singer.

He's an Australian guy I've actually never met. A while back Matador put out a compilation that came free with the English magazine Wire, and that's where he found and listened to the Solex song. He thought it was very similar to what he does, so he emailed me asking if he could send me a burned copy of his CD. He'd reworked the entire White Album by the Beatles, and he was right, it was very similar to what I do: he'd put together tons of loops and tons of samples, and then he has this really deep, sensual voice that immediately captivated me. I asked him if he could send it back to me, but this time without the music, and if I could use his voice for the new album. So what you're hearing are actually lines taken from the "White Album", but obviously they're disguised a bit, otherwise we'd have had trouble with Yoko Ono! (We laugh) Your records have always been full of samples. How do you choose them? Do you look for a specific one once you know how a song should sound?

I don't look for them. I've got a handful of CDs, records, tapes... or I record whatever's on TV... It's a bit like channel-surfing, except here you're surfing through sounds. Because if you look for something specific, you'll never find it. It's exactly like going shopping, you just have to go out, and if you find something you like, you buy it. Is it easy to recreate the sounds from your records live?

These shows are closer to the record than the previous ones were. Before, with the guitarist, it was more... noisy, probably... and more "conventional", because pop music with a guitarist is very conventional (she smiles). Now it's a more electronic set, and it's easier to recognize the loops in the song. But you know, so many things happen during a show... Let's say someone who's heard the song at least a couple of times might recognize the loop. When the "Solex" project started, did you already know you'd be playing live?

No, it wasn't like that until I signed with Matador. You know, these are records you make at home with a lot of "copy-and-paste", so Matador actually told me that if I wanted, I didn't have to play live, because they understood it was hard to bring the record into a live setting, but it would definitely help if I did.

And was it easy?

It was easy because I've always been in bands, so I knew for sure I could do it.

Do you ever imagine how a song will sound live while you're writing it?

Umm... Nooo... I try not to. But on this record, yes, I did fantasize about how some songs would be perfect played live.

Actually, I wasn't even thinking about it when I wrote the first record ("Solex vs. the Hitmeister", 1998), but I didn't even have a record deal back then, so I didn't think I'd be playing live at all. Still, I try not to do it, because records and live shows are very different situations.

You've got a rock background. How has that helped you, if at all, become an electronic musician?

It helps you when mixing, when you want to hear the highs and when you want to hear the lows. You know those ingredients are important because if you're playing and the bassist is a beat behind because he got distracted, you notice the whole thing doesn't sound right. It's probably helped me with mixing, but in electronic music you don't necessarily need a bassist to get low end: you can sample a raindrop falling and slow it down enough until it becomes low enough. According to the press, you're supposed to sound like Beck and Björk, but do you really think your music has anything in common with theirs?

Beck uses samples too, but he uses them to "spice up" the song, whereas I use samples - less so on this record - as the "main ingredients", but I can understand how people end up drawing connections between us. As for Björk, though, it's easy to be compared to her along with every other female singer out there: it's because people are lazy. You know, with bands it's different, you don't necessarily have to compare a band with a male voice to another band with a different male voice, it doesn't matter much... Mhhh... Maybe she and I have the same English accent (We laugh) Speaking of the press some more. Everyone, absolutely everyone - men, women, and maybe even a few cats - has been compared to Madonna.

Yes: It's true Has that happened to you too?

Being compared to Madonna?

Yes

(Downcast) No

(we look at each other and laugh again)

Another thing I'm curious about: has anyone ever asked you to compose soundtracks for video games or ringtones for mobile phones?

For video games? Wow! No, never. But maybe that's because if you listen to those sounds, they're all MIDI, which I actually hate. It would be interesting to do, but no one will ever ask me. They probably ask more "commercial" artists.

I've never played them, so I don't know what kind of music they use.

You use computers a lot, what do you think about file sharing?

I think it's a great thing, I don't understand why it should be a bad thing. Why should it be?

Copyright?

I think the concept of copyright is obsolete.

I can understand that certain people, with a certain kind of fame, wouldn't want their song exploited. There's so much terrible music out there, and if you let file sharing worry you, then you're not really living.

Has it ever happened that one of your songs got remixed?

Yes. A few years ago Matador put out a record that included some remixes, one of which was of a song of mine, but it was very electronic. Then there were other occasions... Mount Florida, also on Matador, remixed a song of mine. Damien O'Neil too, who was the guitarist in the Undertones, and... other people.

It's very exciting to hear how other people reinterpret your music.

Well, Elisabeth, I think we're done at this point.

Ok, thanks. And thanks for the dessert too...

(Legnano, Milan – Jail, January 15, 2005)

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