With one of the most interesting concept albums of the year out and growing with each listen, Italian experimental post punk band, Kill Your Boyfriend, appear to be at a most imaginative point in their journey up to this point. The band discusses their new album Voodoo, their creative intentions, and more in an interview with D//E.
How did Kill Your Boyfriend come to be?
It was a dark and stormy night in the distant winter of 2011 in a sad and gray town in northeastern Italy, Treviso, where the maximum aspirations of every young man was to find a good job in some alienating factory... Kill Your Boyfriend was born out of this frustration.
How would you describe the band's creative intent?
The intent is to tell stories, not only ours or those of some friends, but also about what we are passionate about. The music then reflects what the stories tell. We always try to give a common thread to all our albums, a theme on which the songs will then be based on. All this to give the work its own vibe and soul that is different from the others.
What are some of the recurring themes in your music?
Love, life and... death.
Voodoo has a strong penchant for rock history and culture. What is it about, and how did it come together?
It all comes from reading Michael Ventura's essay Hear that long snake moan where the author compares the live performances of the great rock music artists to a sort of possession, not derived from a spirit but rather from the music itself. Initially we thought of recording an EP, which later became the A-side of the album and has more rock 'n' roll nuances than our usual. Along the compositional path it came natural for us to write a B-side that had more of a ritualistic soul and that was exactly a completion of the imagery that the Voodoo album must have in our mind.
How does the new album stack up against your previous work?
We can say that in Voodoo some stylistic coordinates have changed compared to our previous albums. While maintaining that gloomy spirit that distinguishes us, we have tried to get out of our comfort zone by pushing ourselves into making sounds that are different from our usual, looking for new forms of writing and structure of the songs with the inclusion of instruments as much in line as possible with rock 'n' roll music.
As a live act, how would you describe Kill Your Boyfriend?
The live act is our favorite aspect of this work. On stage we manage to unleash the band's full potential by totally immersing ourselves in the music, a bit like described by Micheal Ventura in his essay, from which we took inspiration for the album Voodoo, and with the audience everything becomes a majestic ritual.
How has touring been after the pandemic?
We have to say that we have really missed live shows during the pandemic and getting back to playing around has been such a breath of fresh air.
All the tours we took went very well. Luckily we also noticed that the public is eager to hear live music again and this repaid us for all the efforts faced during the pandemic period.
What comes next for Kill Your Boyfriend?
We currently have an European tour scheduled for March 2023 and in the meantime some gigs here in Italy, where we live. Of course we are already working on new material and also on KYB side-projects which will see the light next year. In short, we just can't sit around twiddling our thumbs :)
Photo courtesy of Kill Your Boyfriend
ZR