Sister Act
The Pierces skewer hipsters with "Boring."
May 15, 2007
Born and raised in Alabama, and resident in New York five years, the Pierces — painfully hot sisters Alison (brunette) and Catherine (blonde) — made two albums (2000's The Pierces and 2005's Light of the Moon) to absolutely no notice or acclaim. The new Thirteen Tales of Love and Revenge (Lizard King) changes that decisively. It's one of the strongest singer-songwriter albums of the last few years, full of taut arrangements in a number of styles (the country-ish giddy-up of "Sticks and Stones," the Prince-goes-lounge "Lights On"), unearthly harmonizing ("Go to Heaven"), and smart, sardonic lyrics.
The latter trait is most obvious on the lead single, "Boring," whose black-and-white video, shot for $500, has become a much-forwarded and blog-embedded YouTube item. The deadpan song lampoons the sisters' Lower East Side fashionista milieu ("Marijuana/Co-caine/Heroin — boring"), and serves as a kind of pre-emptive strike against the idea that the Pierces are only blowing up thanks to Alison's recently ended relationship with the Strokes' Albert Hammond Jr. The fact that the clip is sexy as hell doesn't hurt, either.
Hooksexup talked to Catherine while she was browsing new outfits for an upcoming concert: "We have a show next Tuesday and I'm shopping. What's the name of this place? Oh yeah — H&M [laughs]." — Michaelangelo Matos
What does Alabama have that New York doesn't?
Catherine Pierce: Grits. [laughs] Quality grits. And handsome, corn-fed men.
The men aren't handsome in New York ?
They're handsome, but they're not corn-fed. They're corn-liquor fed.
Aside from Alison, is your family musical?
Yeah. My dad has always been in dance — since he was eleven years old. My younger sister has a really nice voice but she really isn't doing anything musical.
Is it just three girls in the family?
It's four girls and one boy.
Did the four girls gang up on the one boy?
No — he's the oldest, ten years older than me. I'm the second-youngest, and Alison is the next one older. Edward, the boy, is a photographer; he actually took a lot of the photos on our MySpace page. Maury, the oldest girl, is just professionally wonderful.
Does that mean she's unemployed?
No. [laughs] She's a secretary. She's one of the funniest people you'll ever meet. Louise, the youngest, dabbles in painting and photography.
Do you remember the first song you ever wrote?
The first song I ever wrote was when I was fifteen, and I wrote it. It was a silly pop song. I wanted to pitch it to Madonna.
That's ambitious for a fifteen-year-old.
Well, I didn't know anything about pitching songs; I just thought it sounded like Madonna. The first song I wrote that I liked I was seventeen or eighteen. It was really simple and pretty. I was actually just singing it other day. We're thinking about recording it.
Did you and Alison always write songs together?
No. We actually don't write together even now. We usually write separately. There are a few songs on the record we wrote together — I'll just have the verse and she'll have the chorus and we'll put it together. For "Sticks and Stones," I wrote the chorus and went to Alison's house, and she had the melody for the verse. There was no fighting, which was a miracle. When we write songs together, we get really possessive.
Have the two of you ever had particularly intense bout of sibling rivalry?
When we were younger, we did, a lot, actually. We liked the same boy at some point; we fought about that.
Who wound up with him?
Neither of us [laughs]. We had our flings with him, but nothing came of it. Alison and I lived together for a long time after we moved out of our parents'. We get along better when we're not living together.
Do you do any kind of writing outside of music?
I'm actually writing a novel. It's about a fifteen-year-old boy and his family who go to. . . I'm not sure I want to tell you about this. He falls in love with his older brother's girlfriend.
Is it based on real life?
No. I've never fallen in love with my older sister's boyfriend.
Describe the first place you lived in New York.
It was actually a very affordable, nice studio that was passed along to me through a friend. It was $900, which is a miracle for New York, on Eighth Street and Sixth Avenue. I ate a lot of hot dogs over there, and became a vegetarian shortly thereafter.
What is the strangest rumor you've heard about yourself or about the two of you?
Have you seen the video for "Boring?" I'm lying in a girl's lap and moving her leg around, and people think it's Alison, so there are incest rumors flying around. It's actually my friend Jackie. She has a great body, so we threw her in the video.
The album is pretty dark, especially toward the end.
The label wanted the more radio-hit songs at the beginning. Alison's songs, like "It Was You," lean that way. Her songs are more emotional and vulnerable and mine have more humor. Hers have real pain; mine are dark comedies.
Is glamour a crutch?
It is. It can be fun and playful, but if you really think about it, glamour is a disguise. I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing.
The "Boring" video is both glamorous and a lampoon of glamour. Do you ever worry about people taking it too seriously and putting you in a box because of it?
Well, the song's a joke. We have been worried that people wouldn't give us a chance, but if you listen to the whole album you can see that there's a lot more going on. The next videos are totally light and completely different — "Sticks and Stones" is animated, and it's a lot like the CD artwork. The Edward Gorey books were a big inspiration [for the CD art], and Tim Burton. Edward Scissorhands is one of my favorite movies — that kind of sugarcoated evil. n°
©2007 Michaelangelo Matos and hooksexup.com