Originally appeared in issue: 13
by: Matthew Hickey
I managed to catch up with The Please a couple of months ago at a performance at the Bottom of the Hill in San Francisco, playing with The Von Bondies. Two of the ex-cast from Mr. Show were in the audience as well as the bassist from Third Eye Blind. We rapped about everything from jolly-old England to The Vines. Since the interview, the band changed their name from The Please to The Pleased. Read-on:
Sponic: So you're a pretty young band still, correct?
Noah: This is our anniversary show, actually. We’ve been together for a year.
Wow, that is pretty cool.
Noah: Yeah, the first place we ever played burnt down. It was called the Herb Shop. It was a coffee shop/record shop and they sold herbs.
Okay, so recently, you’ve received some hype in the British press, specifically The Face. They did a brief interview… er, rather a brief write up about you. Has that affected you at all?
Joanna: A pretend interview...they misquoted us as saying stuff we didn’t say.
Well hopefully nothing too bad. It still sounded pretty flattering.
Joanna: Yeah, we love them anyway.
Noah: It was weird cause none of that happened while we were there, it all came out after we were already gone. Plus it doesn’t necessarily translate to anything over here. Different people. There are probably people there who have seen it, but it hasn’t had a huge impact here. But you know, we can show our parents.
Joanna: Yeah, it was still pretty positive.
Noah: I was making fun of The Vines, but apparently they missed the sarcasm.
Yeah, you opened for the Vines on some shows for their tour didn’t you? What was that like? Is the lead singer as crazy as they have been portraying him?
Noah: Well, backstage it was completely different.
Does that mean it's all show then?
Noah: He was very pleasant actually.
You're getting ready to go back to the UK for a tour. Must be kinda cool touring through the UK. What is that like?
Rich: It is like going home.
Joanna: It doesn’t always feel like going to a different country, bars in England are like bars in America… There are subtle differences, but we get more free drinks over there.
Noah: Some things are completely the same, completely miserable too… like rain. You get treated differently because when a band from America goes there they think they're more serious because they traveled from halfway across the world to be there. But in some ways you are also placed under a microscope. Where, here, we are just a local band. It changes things a little bit.
Lucky: We played at a club with no name in Petersburg. There was a dance club going on while we were playing. The actual dance floor was downstairs, and there were people upstairs to see us.
Noah: That's where we went to that grocery store...
Lucky: Yeah, yeah… we went to a grocery store and the security guards were following us.
Noah: They thought we were stealing chocolate milk.
Ha! That is funny. Do you have any inside jokes as a band?
Noah: Uhm, yeah actually. There are too many to mention. Actually most of our songs, and most of the things we say, are an inside joke of some sort.
Rich: Most of our song titles are inside jokes.
Give me an example… how about the song “Orange Peter?”
Noah: People think it is about Joanna’s brother.
Joanna: I have brother [whose] name’s Pete and he has orange hair, but it is not about him.
Noah: It is just a coincidence. Wasn’t it named after a Grateful Dead song?
Lucky: Yeah, it was named after one of my favorite Grateful Dead songs “Black Peter.”
Noah (laughing): I have a hard time picking my favorite Grateful Dead song…
Lucky: Yeah actually we had named a song “White Peter” and “Blue Peter” as well…
Noah: I wonder if they're throwing our stuff outside yet? I hope the guys from Mr. Show have our guitars… Maybe they’ll use them for their show. We gave them copies of our CD.
I understand you're working on some new material… how is that going?
Lucky: They have one chord. Actually, one of them has one chord. We played that tonight.
I think I noticed that one, the lyrics were something about a White Horse, or One Horse…
Noah, Joanna, and Lucky: One Horse…
Noah: I think there was a Deftones song called "White Pony" or something… The whole thing about recording and releasing stuff is that we do it ourselves, and we think we want to keep doing it for awhile. We may release a collection of stuff but we don’t know yet. (Since the interview they did release a full-length compiling the tracks from their EP with new material.)
Any new, emerging bands that excite you?
Joanna: Highdrivers!
Noah: Yes, the Highdrivers. They are from North Hampton I think… we played with them in England. I’m going to go check on our equipment, I’ll be right back.
Ok.
Lucky: What about you? Have you heard any good new bands? You have a Liars button…
Yes, I like the Liars actually. I just saw them at the Fillmore with the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Jon Spencer. Moving on… what are some of your favorite albums of all time, albums that made you want to start writing music, or that may have had an influence on your music?
The Pleased: No one say anything about Bob Dylan…
Lucky: Grateful Dead.
Rich: For Your Pleasure by Roxy Music…
That is a great album…
Rich: You actually know who Roxy Music is?
Of course… where would modern music be without Brian Eno and Roxy Music? They were great.
Joanna: Marky Mark.
Lucky: Beastie Boys.
Joanna: No, really, anything by the Talking Heads… ever.
Genaro and Joanna: The Pixies.
Noah: Oh yes… the Pixies.
Genaro: We all like different things.
Joanna: I don’t think any of us go home at night and listen to the same things at all.
Genaro: “Baby Got Back” by Sir Mix A Lot.
Joanna: Paula Abdul.
Genaro: When we're writing a song, though, we don’t think about that really.
So has there been a highlight to the Please’s career?
Genaro: Playing in London.
Joanna: We saw Sammy Hagar in the airport when we were flying to England. We saw The Red Rocker. We had a five minute debate over whether he really was The Red Rocker. But he's The Gray Rocker now anyways.
Noah (laughing): My personal favorite was having the bassist from Third Eye Blind here tonight.
Joanna: No, having the people from Mr. Show here tonight was cool.
Noah: Not Bob and Dave, but the tall, crazy looking guy.
Joanna: And also the awesome smaller guy…
Last question. What is your favorite album to knock da boots to?
Noah: We don’t do that sort of thing. We are unisex.
Rich: That song that is like four minutes of silence…
Noah (laughing): It isn’t a huge endorsement of your abilities to say the silence piece.
Joanna: Anything by the Jackson Five…
Photo courtesy of the website we got it from.