FEATURE - Back To The Future 09/07/2003
By Lyndsey Parker
It's a rare band that can sound utterly of-the-moment, futuristically flash-forward, and vacuum-sealed retro-'80s all at once. But
L.A.'s Ima Robot is a rare band indeed. Featuring the airtight rhythm section of bassist Justin Meldal-Johnson and drummer Joey Waronker (both
formerly of Beck's band), brilliantly named guitar freak Timmy The Terror, mind-blowing multi-intrumentalist Oligee, and whirling-dervish wraith
Alex Ebert (one of the most bizarre and eminently watchable frontmen on the stage today), this electro-rock powerhouse combo have, on their
self-titled debut, somehow synthesized the bloated rock pomposity of Queen, the slick new-wave kinetics of Gary Numan and Sparks, and the perfectly
pristine pop-punk of the Buzzcocks to come up with something sounding not of this decade--and, frankly, not of this world. From the blitzkrieg of
chickenscratch disco guitars and nervous pogo beats on album opener "Dynomite," to the glorious, heavens-parting choruses of hyperspeed love
songs "Alive" and "Scream," to the skin-crawling, heart-stopping, rampant paranoia of "Here Come The Bombs" and the
laugh-out-loud ode to stalker ex-girlfriends entitled "Black Jettas," Ima Robot is a true tour de force of Devo-like deviance.
LAUNCH recently met up with 25-year-old Alex Ebert at Santa Monica's Lazy Daisy health-food cafe, where the boundlessly energetic, rail-skinny
spitfire with the most unique haircut in rock (somewhere between Vanilla Ice's To The Extreme-era pompadour and Billy Ray Cyrus's rat-tailed
mullet) downed a mysterious, algae-green vitamin tonic (his own concoction) and talked a blue streak about Ima Robot's plan to take over the
world. Here's hoping they succeed...
LAUNCH: Your music sounds very late-'70s/early-'80s, but you seem too young to remember the '80s that well! Where does that influence
come from?
ALEX: It's funny...all these guys tell me, "You guys are like this" or "You guys are like that," but I don't know those
bands! I don't have their albums. But that's basically how I've built up my record collection: People saying, "You remind me of
this." So in a way, I guess, those bands influence me because I end up listening to them. Like, someone told me five years ago, "You sound
like T. Rex," so I picked up one of their records and it was really cool. But as far as my mental catalog of music, it was pretty stunted when I
was a kid. I was mainly just into rap and hip-hop, up until I was 18.
LAUNCH: Weren't you an MC once?
ALEX: Oh, yeah! I still love rapping.
LAUNCH: I can hear the rap or spoken-word influence in your vocal style, actually.
ALEX: Yeah, I think so too. But we also get Devo comparisons and what have you...
LAUNCH: So you don't feel like Ima Robot is part of the current '80s-revival trend?
ALEX: No, not really. I mean, I love parts of that revival, but all that sh-t seems very singular: You listen to those records and they're just
one thing. But we're not like that; our horizons are much more expansive. I feel like we're more of a real band, while those other bands
just seem like little art projects. Any band that only does one thing, even if they do it well, is just a "project." I can't imagine
doing that for any sustained amount of time.
LAUNCH: So, how'd you go from rapping to singing for a band like Ima Robot?
ALEX: Well, I got kinda disillusioned with rap because you have to fit so many words into a small amount of space--it decreases the importance and
impact of what you're saying, because you have to fit all these words in. You try to stick with a storyline, but then you have to fit so many
words in that you start falling off-track. So I started messing around with singing because you can let a couple of words carry you through a few
bars, and so you can stick with more of the story and be more succinct. But at first, I couldn't sing! My voice was horrible! I remember this one
time when I was 19 after doing these demos and trying to sing, I was listening to them on the drive home and crying. It was so upsetting and
embarrassing to not be able to sing. But I just kept going for it. We started in L.A. with Timmy and I just playing show to a DAT, and I always look
back on those times and think, "Damn, what the f--k was I thinking? That took balls!" I'd go out there not knowing the songs, just
making up words. But we've always been pretty fearless when it comes to trying new things, and I think it's important to maintain that.
It's not a conscious thing; I'm always surprised a day later that I just did what I did. But I didn't think it was weird while I was
doing it--it just felt like it had to be done.
LAUNCH: Tell me about your early rap days.
ALEX: I had my first rap group when I was 7 years old; we were called "Kabang!," and we were actually very N.W.A.-influenced. It was pretty
funny. I remember the intro to our first song was this guy walking down a hallway--clack clack clack clack clack clack clack--and then we'd yell,
"Freeze, muthaf--ka! KABANG!" And then the beats started. I'd bought this keyboard that you could record and make beats on, and we were
doing this behind the handball court. I still have some of that sh-t, but most of the stuff I have is from when I was 13 to 17. We got some interest
from corporate managers, but this was back before Eminem--when if you were white and wanted to rap it just wasn't possible--so he wanted me to
get a really tight perm and have it cut short so it looked really kinky, so I'd kind of look like an albino black guy. I was like, "F--k
this!" "Maybe I'm taking a major leap by saying what we're doing is anything new, but to me it's new, and I hope people are
ready for it and that they view it as something fresh that they've been waiting for. That's always been my vision."
LAUNCH: How did you get into rap so young?
ALEX: Back then, it was like your only choices were heavy metal or rap. In my high school I was one of three kids who liked rap, and we got so much
sh-t. Everyone hated us because everyone was into metal, and we were entirely hip-hop, wearing the parkas and baggy clothes and tagging--that's
how I met Oligee, because we were both taggers. Before that, I had been so sheltered--the only music I knew was Brahms and Beethoven from my father.
How got into rap was I went over to a parent's friend's house, and I went into their son's bedroom and I saw this big poster that said
"Run-DMC" on it. I was mesmerized by this poster: They looked so fresh, and the photo was taken at this cool low angle so their shell-toes
were all big, and I was like, "Damn!" So I went out and got Tougher Than Leather on tape, and my cousin gave me Huey Lewis & the News on
tape--so those were my first two records, simultaneously. I listened to both of them constantly, memorized all the lyrics.
LAUNCH: So eventually you formed Ima Robot. You've gotten a lot of hype, but for a while the band also had a really bad reputation in the music
industry, or so I've heard. Why is that?
ALEX: That mainly comes from when we played the EAT'M festival in Vegas. We were at the Mirage and couldn't play above 80 decibels because
we couldn't be louder than the ka-ching of the slot machines, and all the A&R people were there talking, none of them paying any attention,
so I cursed or something--and they turned off the power on me. And then I lost it, basically, and I got offstage and stood on top of a table and
started preaching to them, like, "My soccer tournaments are more organized than this!" I basically started this small-scale riot, by
accident. All these people were trying to spit at me and kick me. I have this great picture of me being escorted away by eight security guards with
this huge angry mob behind me. They took me in the basement, just like in a movie, and took my thumbprint, my photo, and told me I'd never enter
a Wynn hotel again.
LAUNCH: Were you humbled by that incident?
ALEX: Oh no, absolutely not! I felt that that was absolutely the right thing to do, and I didn't give a f--k...though my manager was really
worried. Then we were about to get signed again about three years ago, and the label thought we were unreliable and didn't do it. So we kind of
got our act together and realized what was going on and got serious. When we started six years ago, our demo was a 12-song tape with no singles on
it--we had all these wild ideas, which really fueled us and kept us going despite everything--but then we started writing songs that were actually a
little more cohesive and at the end actually referred to a part at the beginning instead of just being these long, ever-expanding songs that had no
choruses and 12 bridges. So we started finding ourselves, and it ended up being an amalgamation of everything that's ever gone well for us.
LAUNCH: Was this around the time Justin and Joey joined?
ALEX: Just before Justin joined, we found ourselves. Then Justin came in and really reshaped our whole bass world. He and Tim connected in this insane
way, and they have insane amounts of gear and use their instruments in a way that's not...regular. Tim uses the guitar like a keyboard; he can
just manipulate the f--k out of it. And things Justin makes come of his bass sometimes are unbelievable. Together with Oligee, who's a total
prodigy, they gel and bring it all together. And Joey's pretty much the most competent and awesome drummer I've ever seen. The beats he
comes up with--well, you couldn't program better beats.
LAUNCH: How did you get Justin and Joey to join in the first place?
ALEX: I have no f--king idea how that happened! The only thing I can say is if you've seen us live and heard our music, that's how it
happened. We're doing something that's exciting that I don't see happening anywhere else. I really feel like we have something
that's very special right now, and I think Justin and Joey know that. I know they know that. Like, when Joey was asked, "Are you going to
join the band?," he answered, "There doesn't seem to be a choice"--and he's been asked to join every band under the moon and
always turned them down before! Justin more so than Joey was really looking for a band to be a part of, so he was a bit easier on the sell. But both
those guys are used to making money--and we don't have any money!
LAUNCH: You're not worried they'll leave for a cushier job? I mean, they've played with artists like R.E.M., Smashing Pumpkins, Tori
Amos--huge, established stars.
ALEX: Oh, no. We rehearse every f--king day, we work really hard, and there's no question regarding their level of commitment.
LAUNCH: Tell me more about Oligee.
ALEX: Oligee is one of those guys who picks up any instrument and is brilliant. He was such a pain in the ass to deal with for the first five
years--he was late and disrespectful and just a nightmare. We've kicked him out before, but the thing about Oligee is, you're shooting
yourself in the foot if you kick out someone like him. He's one of the most tasteful keyboard players on the planet, and I'm sure he'll
be recognized as that in the next few years. He's got four keyboards up there, controlling all the sounds. He's brilliant, and he's at
the heart of the band. Everyone in the band is irreplaceable, really, which is great, but it can be annoying, too, because I've wanted to kick
Oligee out a million times.
LAUNCH: So do you think you have "sellable" songs now?
ALEX: They might be sellable, but not in the sense that they sound like anything else. To me, what's sellable about them is they're exciting
and new and fresh. When I write a song I can never tell if it's a hit or not, just because there's no other songs out there that sound like
that. But that's what's exciting to me about this band.
LAUNCH: Do you think these kinds of songs will find a place on radio and MTV?
ALEX: Oh, MTV and radio are so stuck! They're in the tar. You imagine you can come along and shake things up to a point where you'll change
the face of how everything works, but the thing is, the institution is so deep that you can't f--k with it unless you are so inspiring that you
inspire the people at the top to change their ways. But if I can inspire other artists to be wild and be themselves and create really original,
exciting music, then things could start to change. Maybe I'm taking a major leap by saying what we're doing is anything new, but to me
it's new, and I hope people are ready for it and that they view it as something fresh that they've been waiting for. That's always been
my vision.
LAUNCH: Let's talk about some of your songs. One of the standouts is your album's bonus track, "Black Jettas." Is that song based
on real life?
ALEX: Oh, yeah! Tim, Oligee, Justin, and I all have ex-girlfriends that drive black Jettas. Oh, wait a minute--Tim's ex-girlfriend drives a
silver Jetta now. But essentially, the Jetta family is a frightening thing. It's like an army. If you break up with someone like that,
you're gonna be panicked all the time, every time you keep seeing those cars on the street. Yeah, it's totally based on real events.
LAUNCH: So many car companies use rock songs in their commercials now...I wonder if VW would use "Black Jettas" in one of their ads?
ALEX: I doubt they would, because it's kind of a negative song! [laughs]
LAUNCH: What about "Here Comes The Bombs"? Is that some sort of political statement?
ALEX: That song is a commentary on how I think it's amazing that my conversations are a mix between "Did you hear how many people got killed
in the Congo today?" and "Oh yeah, by the way, what's our setlist tonight?"--and both conversations are carried out with the same
amount of intensity! It's just bizarre to me. It's just a commentary on the fact that a lot of world is going down the tubes...but I'd
still appreciate it if you'd buy my record! |
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