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 very review ever written about Brooklyn-based band Dirty on Purpose makes it a point to emphasize just how gauzy, mellow — even somnambulant — their sound is. Undoubtedly, the title of their acclaimed five-song EP, Sleep Late For A Better Tomorrow, doesn't help their cause much. But this quartet's not to be confused with mope-core or worse, mood music. While their lush and lilting songs draw comparisons to Yo La Tengo and Belle and Sebastian, they're more subtle than sleepy. Their lyrics seduce and arrest, rather than coerce and manipulate, creating freeze frames of relationship scenes. Based on the success of their EP, the guys are hard at work on their full-length. Not that guitarist Joe Jurewicz [above, second from right] couldn't spare some time for dinner and drinks. — Sunny Elle LeeJoe Jurewicz: Just letting you know, they sent me to do this interview because I'm a flirt. I even hit on dudes. Really? It's mostly people I know. It's a nervous-banter thing. It's just that when we play shows, there's always that one person you see out in the audience your first couple of shows and you latch onto them, talk to them, you're nervous as hell, and you end up talking a lot. And for some reason, I end up making silly little homoerotic comments to my friends.
D.J. and Doug have long-term girlfriends. But George is actually my idol — he has no time for women at all, which makes him completely irresistible to them. He doesn't give a shit about anything except what he's doing at the time. Chicks dig that. And when the time comes, he'll make a great mate because he's completely committed to things. He paid me to say all that, by the way. He owes me $300. And what's your status? It's funny you should ask. I'm married. I have a four-year old daughter, Sophie. Are you kidding? No, no. That whole adulthood thing — I'm already there, it's cool. I'm not with my wife and daughter, though I've never gotten divorced. I have this really weird marriage. They live about ten blocks away, and I see them every day, but we're not together. She doesn't like that I'm in a band. Hopefully I'll be able to convince her monetarily that being in a band is a good idea. But that's not the real obstacle. But as she put it, "I'm going to do it anyway." That's got to be tough on you. I think my wife just wants a family guy and everyone I know will argue that I'm a very good father. I know a lot of people who have kids who aren't very good parents, and I consider myself pretty good at it. Sure, I'm a little less of a parent who isn't in a band but I can't really help that. I'm not doing coke off a stripper's ass every night. Maybe just twice a week. You're turning thirty in a week. How are you planning to kick-start your thirties? Nothing special. I didn't do anything last year but I got the best present ever. A vaporizer. Vaporizer? What's that? No carcinogens! It extracts the THC from the weed without burning it so you don't have to breathe the smoke. It's cool because mine kinda looks like a guitar pedal and I've been wanting to mount it on the pedal board for a while. You plug it in, you turn it on, it lights up. Did you out yourself as a pothead just now? I'm a total pothead. Everyone except DJ [Boudreau, bass] is and now everyone's mother is going to read that too. I'm just kidding, that's not true. As long as my mom is going to read this . . . some of my other siblings smoke pot as well. I'm not going to say who but I will say that they do. And I have nine brothers and sisters so have fun figuring that one out. I was raised Russian Orthodox, very religious upbringing. I apologize for this, Dad. Is pot part of your creative process? It's funny because ninety percent of the stuff you write when you're stoned is total shit. It's crap. But it's that ten percent that you read the next morning that you say, hey that's not bad. But even that's iffy. None of us are messed up all the time, though. That's nice rhetoric, but you're going to have to give me a pot-related story now. I've got one from just two days ago. George [Wilson, guitar] locked the keys in the van because he was stoned — ten minutes before we were supposed to play at Soundfix. We're in the van smoking a little pot and I look on the dashboard and I'm like, "Are those the car keys? Maybe I should grab those before I get out of the van. You know what? No, screw it. George is a big boy, I'm going to let him go with this one." I get out and turn to say "George, did you grab the keys?" Then slam! George shuts the door behind him. Luckily, Doug's [Marvin, vocals and drums] girlfriend had an extra set of keys. Tell me about one of your more memorable first shows playing as a band. I'm going to blame all this on Doug, but he entered us into this contest to open for the Suicide Girls when they came into town. It was a contest where if they like your music, they'll let you open for them. And we won this contest but didn't know we won until Doug was like, "Yeah, we're going to open for the Suicide Girls." There was nothing remotely sexual about that show whatsoever. It was silly. They were naked but they were just throwing chocolate on everyone and it was more annoying than anything else. Our amps were all sticky afterward. But they were naked. Isn't that enough? That's true but we're kids anymore, we're not twenty-one. We've seen naked chicks before. It never gets old, but I guess you seek it out less as you get older. How does your songwriting process work? We all write. But we argue a lot. Me and DJ especially. We'll have conflicting views on almost everything. It used to upset the both of us a lot but lately, we've come to terms with the fact that neither one of us is ever going to agree on anything. We've learned how to talk through it without getting mad at each other. Maybe a good manly brawl might help get your frustrations out. Oh my God, I would totally get my ass beat down. We just take a step back. But it's never like, "Oh, telling me how you're feeeeeling right now." It's not like a Metallica movie where we're in therapy. It's a really weird relationship, way more complicated than being married or having a girlfriend. It's really homoerotic. Again with the homoeroticism! I always liken it to being away at sea for a very long time. We're sailors. The love we share is like that of sailors. You're in a van for two weeks at a time with a bunch of smelly guys, and you depend on each other because you're the only people you know in this new town. It's an amazing feeling to be on tour, you can't beat that. It's better when your girlfriend is with you. It completes it. It's a lot like being a pirate or being in the French Foreign Legion. I think you either join the army or a band. And you can't join the army because you guys are afraid of bullets. Exactly. We're a bunch of giant pussies. I'm allowed to swear in this interview? Sweet. This is my first interview where I can swear. Fuck. Shit. Balls. My mother is going to find this somewhere on the internet, someone's going to email this to my mother, you know. She's going to cry. n°
© 2005 Sunny Elle Lee and Nerve.com. |
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