Just out., November 19, 2004, Page 25, Image 25

november 19.2004 • J l I S t O U t 25
been happy never writing a song.... But there
was sort of a tacit assumption seven years ago
that the next record would have to be all
original.
FS: Assumption? By you? The band mem­
bers? [Pink Martini manager) John [Brodie]?
T L : Yeah...I don’t agree with it necessarily,
but for us to get any sort of attention by Rolling
FS: Was there one track that particularly
vexed you?
T L : All of them. All of them were so con­
fusing... [but] I would say that at the height of
it, “U Plavu Zoru,” the song in Croatian, was
definitely the most vexing. At one point we
had like four trombones coming in_1 literally
had no idea what I was doing. I was so con­
fused and so lost and had no idea how I was
the rest of the song....
[Then] it was days and days of
different combinations, and
eventually it came down to a
new piano introduction, a full
string section, a harp, brand new
percussion and eventually a cho­
rus of 75. It was frankly torturous.
FS: What’s the story
behind the album title and
Lauderdale considered running for mayor last year
cover picture?
T L : [The title is] based on an
ad for Hunt’s Ketchup. The cover photograph
is my father.
FS: Is that you he’s throwing up in the air?
T L : It is.
FS: How old were you?
T L : It was just last year. [He laughs.] I must
have been 1 or less than 1, like 6 months
maybe. I found it going through old family
photographs. I had no idea what to use for the
cover. Here’s the original ad. [He opens an old
Life magazine to an advertisement depicting a
tomato dangling from a vine.] It’s really sort of
sinister, don’t you think?
Lauderdale rehearses with Pink Martini lead vocalist China Forbes in his downtown loft
Stone or the pop audience, we couldn’t be a
cover band. It certainly wasn’t my instinct, so
I can’t even defend it.... At times it was lots of
fun. It was fun to have all of these drags queens
from New York City in town for a week scan­
dalizing the West Hills matrons, and then
simultaneously working on a sting during the
daytime on the deck of Bluehour.... It was
really about building a community through
stingwriting.
F S : So many of these songs are about
love....
T L : Isn’t that the only thing there is in the
end? I think we all want love, we all want to
feel understood, we all want to feel like wv
understand. We all hope for love, realize that
there’s so much of it that’s fleeting, so much of
it that’s accidental.... And it’s the thing which
continually makes us get up in the morning. Is
there anything besides love?
F S: That would make sense if you were
writing an album of traditional love songs,
but so many of them are about love lost.
T L : Really?
Pink Martini's independent label, Heinz Records, is
F S: Yes, somebody leaving or the great
love of my life who left me.
T L : I think it’s not really about love going
had as this constant negotiation of the ongoing
optimism and hope despite sad experiences,
which I think everybody can relate to. Love is a
constant series o f negotiations, don’t you think?
going to get out of it. The challenge is to
always approach it innocently, hut the thing is
that at a certain point I was far from inmxent,
and I was thinking way too much and not lis­
tening to my gut. I had lost sight of my gut
instinct.
F S: Yes, I do.
T L : I started working on the record when
I started going out with a hoy named Larry.
I paid so much attention to the record, and
I didn’t pay nearly enough attention to Larry.
What I learned, I think, in the process of this
record in a really sort of unpleasant and painful
way— and sad way— is that when you have
love, it is imperative that you take such gtxxl,
amazing, incredible care of it, because if you
don’t, you’re sunk. And it’s disrespectful.
I think I did not take gtxxl care of the love
that he gave. As a result, at the end t)f the
record I wasn’t with him.
FS: Take us through the creative process.
T L : Well, with “Una Notte a Napoli,” it
started with a melody that [lead vixalist]
China [Forbes] had kind of hummed in an air­
port one day. It starred with this. [He plays a
recording of the introductum.] We sent it to Alba
Clemente, who was married to Francesco
Clemente, the great painter. And so she and a
friend came up with a chorus. She then came
exit to Portland for a crazy week of debauchery
down at Dante’s, which included [New York
drag queen) Joey Arias giving blow jobs on the
stage. It was absolutely mania. But during the
day, on the deck of Bluehour, we sat and wrote
mdhm
Pink Martini’s second album soars
p i n k f m
a
r
t
i
n
i
T T ' - ; ■
FS: [Reading the ad copy] “ Die to become
the tomato that people will never forget.”
Eww.
In the music business, seven years is a life-
I time; an act can come and go. And yet, Pink
Martini’s Hang on Little Tc/mato is so gtxxl that
the seven-year wait between albums is forgot­
ten— and certainly forgiven.
With an infectious blend of international
musical styles and lyrics in English, Italian,
Spanish, French, Japanese and Croatian, Toma-
] to far surpasses 1997’s Sympathique, a witty con­
fection of cover tunes that set up the band as an
I international sensation, with its music appear­
ing in films, television shows and commercials.
O f the 14 songs on the sophomore releak,
nine were written by bandleader Thomas Laud­
erdale with an international cast o f collabora-
] tors, including friends as well as strangers he
approached who became friends. For instance,
“Una Notte a Napoli” was written with Alba
Clemente, an Italian stage and television star
in the 1970s, and Johnny Dynell, one of the
! founders of New York’s underground nightclub
Jackie 60. And in a reworking of the haunting
Japanese “Kikuchiyo to Mohshimasu,” Laud­
named after Lauderdale's attention-hungry dog
erdale collaborated with Hiroshi Wada, the
slide guitarist whose group originally recorded
and released the song 40 years ago.
T L : The melody [for the title track] came
Supplying the lead vocals is China Forbes,
first and then the lyrics came second [“Hang
whose
sultry, lyrical voice is perfect for these
on, hang on to the vine/Stay on, soon you’ll he
torch songs of unrequited love and life passed
divine”] and it was sort of a series of negotia­
by. (Incidentally, she is working on her own
tions.... It literally took a year.... In terms of
song set now and certainly has the talent and
songwriting, instead of just churning something
range to exceed Norah Jones.)
out, we really tried to he as deliberate as possi­
There’s a sprightly optimism to this album
ble and craft things, which really takes time
that comes through in the lyrics (the opening
and is difficult.... I think that all the future
number is “Let’s Never Stop Falling in Love” )
records are not going to take as much time.
and certainly in the melodies, which get your
Anything would be easier than this second
body
swaying and your feet moving. It’s as if
record. Whether it’s creating more records or
Lauderdale is saying yes, life is bittersweet, but
running for office, or whatever it is, it’s just
that’s no reason not to enjoy it.
| going to be much easier.
Hang on Little Tomato marks Lauderdale’s
debut
as a songwriter and his coming of age as
F S: Let’s talk about things other than the
an artist. It represents a clear vision and a tri­
band. Ten years ago, you wrote a gossip col­
umph over his creative struggles. While my
umn for Ju st Out under the pseudonym o f....
own
greed calls for more, more, more, I’d hap­
I
T L : Miss Betsy Hunt.
pily wait another seven years for another out­
standing
album like this one.
Continued on Page 26
— FS