SCOTT HUTCHISON (FRIGHTENED RABBIT)

FRIGHTENED RABBIT  ::  TWITTER

The Verge Q+A: Scott Hutchison of Frightened Rabbit

[Steve Heisler, GQ.com, March 2010]

It's 6pm on a Friday where you are; I'm not calling you at the bar or anything, am I?Oh, no. That would have been terrible. I just wouldn't have answered. [Laughs]

[Winter Of Mixed Drinks] is more fictionalized than your previous albums, right? Yeah, that was purposeful, and partially done out of necessity. There was less of an interesting story to tell—I don't know, I've been quite content and comfortable over the past year, and that does not contribute to writing a great album, you know? It's a lot less selfish, a lot more open as a record. The narrative is much clearer and easier to spot. Reviews of the album, though, seem to be trying to relate the songs to you personally. It's like when you go see a painting and figure out this whole explanation behind every brush stroke, but the artist did things just because they thought it was "cool." Lyrics aren't the first thing that grab me [about a record]. It's more about the sonic quality, or there's something about the rhythm. I don't really interpret lyrics too heavily. When I was in art school, I would see so much bullshit flying around—making things up. Maybe that did train me well for this, because sometimes you have to throw an oblique reference out into the open and people will attach themselves to it. No one really needs to know why I wrote what I did. They just need to know what it means to them. It could be nothing, I guess.

Was there any particular review that stuck out to you?There was a song on the last record, "The Modern Leper," that was essentially about the terrible feeling of breaking up with someone, but people assumed it was a drug addiction song. I've never been addicted to drugs, and it was weird to read someone else assuming that about me.

That sounds like what an addict would say.[Laughs] Oh yeah, you think?

You've been vocal about problems you had with Midnight Organ Fight. What specifically bothered you? There were certain things we just didn't have the time to do. I've come to the understanding there were logical reasons for that: We didn't have money in the budget to add things like strings and horns that I'd always wanted to include. A lot of the detail that went into crafting the sound of this new one didn't go into the last one purely because of time restrictions. Yeah, those are it. This time around, we didn't have any of those.

So was the writing process for this one long and luxurious?With the first album, I still thought of myself as a guitar player, and maybe some day I'd be a proper singer. This time, it happened really quickly. There's a definite linear nature to the tracks; I wrote and demoed them within the space of a month and a half. There were no stragglers. It was the first time lyrics came to me with no song attached to them.

What have you learned about live performing these last few years?A little story goes a long way. If you open up your personality beyond what you're saying in the lyrics, it can draw a crowd in. You can completely turn around a terrible show by making a few crappy jokes. They don't even need to be good because no one is expecting them to be funny. Everyone's like, "Oh shit, I thought he was going to be miserable." Just the simplest, stupidest comment works. Or, it's not even jokes, it's like weird stories. I once had this weird sexy dream that involved me and Jay-Z, I told it one night, and it opened up this whole discussion. Every time I go back to Glasgow, someone remembers the Jay-Z. I won't tell you the details of what we were doing together, but yes, all sorts.

What is it like touring and performing with your brother? It's good to have someone around who I can call terrible names and not feel bad. We basically live in each other's pockets. Obviously growing up you get to know your brother, but not in that "adult friend" way. He's very supportive of my flaws.

Why do people expect you to be sad when you come on stage?Maybe it's the music, or maybe it's because in person I can be this weird, overcast, depressed character. And I'm really not. But most Scottish people are kind of miserable as well. It's a national thing.

Why?We have a natural pessimism, which in the end grants us a lot of joyous moments where we're not expecting things to go well, and they do. It can be quite beneficial. But we're all quite reserved in general, until we get drunk.

Is there an emotion you've tried to write a song about, but just can't get it off the ground?It's still difficult to write about out-and-out joy. There has to be a dark edge to it, even the happiest moments of my life and the band. A true stupid pop hit about feeling extremely happy still evades me. It's tough to write about the lighter side of life and still sound meaningful.

Have you tried to sit down and bang one out?I didn't get that far with it. I start to get in a sweat. I feel horrible. That Barney The Dinosaur song? Don't you think it's sinister that a 45-year-old guy probably wrote that? Imagine him sitting there smoking cigarettes with a big fat sandwich. I'm sure he's the most miserable person on the planet.