C laire Boucher a.k.a. Grimes exploded onto the music scene in 2012 with Visions, which followed earlier albums Geidi Primes and Halfaxa, but for the most part, has been relatively quiet for the past three years. After discarding much of music she’d been working on, she is finally back with new album Art Angels, both her most poppy and punchy to date.
It’s been a few years since your last album and you’ve scrapped quite a bit of music in the process. How would you describe the new sound and what can new and old fans expect?
It’s difficult to explain, but each song is me trying to make something I’ve never made before. Every song is a completely different sound; it’s pretty much a completely different record [to Visions ] in every possible way. The sounds are completely different, the way I recorded it was completely different, with a different set of tools. I think, as a songwriter – I don’t think I would even consider myself a songwriter on Visions , it was all sound design and on this record sound design is definitely very key, but also a lot of the songs you could probably play on a guitar. They’re more records than they are songs.
You’ve spoken quite a bit about the process of recording Visions and the extended isolation and blacked out windows. Was your approach different this time?
Er, yes and no. I think there’s a place you have to be, mentally, to work and it’s definitely hard to get there so sometimes you’ll go to extremes to get in your zone, as it were. With this record I definitely didn’t want to force myself. With Visions, my manager had set a release date before I’d even started so I had very limited time within which I could record, whereas this time I pretty much had a year to work on it. I let myself have time and let the songs breathe, I’ve been able to make a lot more songs for this record. Like for Visions, it’s kind of, ‘oh I never got to finish this but it sounds good so let’s throw it on the record’. Now I can look back, four months on and be like ‘yeah I still like that’.
Reportedly there are a number of diss tracks on the new album. Who or what are those songs targeted at?
It’s not really the case, I think a lot of the press just got really out of hand. There is one track which is playfully aimed at like me being pissed off about not being able to properly work in the studio as a producer and then turned into, “Grimes wrote an album of diss tracks aimed at male producers!” (laughs) I can’t control the media.
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"Press are amazing, there are some great publications out there, but there's definitely enough of them that don’t give a fuck."
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Do you feel that sexism in the industry is still a huge problem or has that been taken out of context and made into something bigger for you than it actually is?
I think it’s a bit of both. With this record, it was really important for me to become a producer, like a good producer, on par with my peers, which is almost impossible as a woman because when I try to go into the studio and talk to people. They don’t want to tell me how to do things. You know, it’s like a boys club and there’s a long legacy of knowledge and wisdoms that I don’t have access to so it does feel like it takes a bit longer as a female producer but at the same time I don’t feel like I need that to be my job. I mean there are certain advantages to doing it myself but I’m not sitting here, being like ‘wah I’m so sad about it’ I just wish it wasn’t the case. I think it’s more difficult for a woman to do this job but life could be worse.
Speaking of powerful women in music, you toured recently with Lana Del Rey, how was that?
That was amazing. Being able to see her show up close and see how it all works, watching her night after night. She is very, very impressive, I really couldn’t have more respect for her. She’ll be like, ‘oh let’s just play this song today’ and it’ll be a song they haven’t rehearsed or that they never play. It was definitely really cool to watch that.
Since your career first began, how do you feel the industry has evolved for the better or the worse?
It’s definitely changed a lot, [though] it’s hard for me to say because I’m in such a different place in the industry now. When I started there was this wild-wild West on the internet where anything was possible and if you were good you would get noticed. Now I don’t know if that’s the case. I used to go through Myspace and think ‘oh that’s good!’ and people actually read blogs and took it seriously and blogs didn’t write about bands without a publicist. Like I got press before I had a publicist you know? Whereas now people don’t really write about bands that aren’t already on a label.
There was a period when you were touring intensely, and pretty overworked. Have you been able to change the way you operate since you signed to Roc Nation?
Signing to Roc Nation allowed me to chill out a lot because previous to that all my stuff just felt like this house of cards – if a strong enough gust of wind had come it would have just blown over. Just having a solid stable crew that can take care of things, so I’m not coordinating. I don’t have to pick up the phone and call everyone and do everything. Now I can focus on the art and the quality of everything can be better; it means I can do my job better. There’s this idea in people’s heads about me trying to be a pop star, which has been annoying. I don’t think people understand that management is different from being on a label. But it’s been really helpful, on the management side. Having good management makes a world of difference in the music industry.
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"It’s like a boys club and there’s a long legacy of knowledge and wisdom that I don’t have access to, so it does feel like it takes longer as a female producer."
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You’ve been courted by the fashion industry and adored by both Chanel and Dior, but you’ve expressed different opinions on fashion. What’s your current stance on it, your self image now and how you present yourself?
I think style and fashion are actually different ideas. I think fashion is more commodified, this happens here and you have to be there and there will be top designers and all those worlds that fashion interfaces with – it’s just quite a broad concept. For me, I really love style and I definitely interface with style. It’s amazing. Something I really engage in is a great photoshoot, with a great stylist and a great photographer, great hair and make-up, but I think someone on the street could have better style than something from a top fashion house, depending on what that is.
Your Tumblr has been a platform for you to vocalise things you're enthusiastic and excited about as well as concerns and complaints but you don't use it as much now. Are you frustrated by having to censor yourself and constantly being misinterpreted?
Yeah, I barely use Tumblr anymore. I think there is a definite issue in the media wherein it’s basically impossible to vocalise a subtle idea because a lot of websites’ money is based on advertising, so they’re not reporting accurately. They’re reporting based on what’s going to get the most hits and I think it’s really disgusting and I think it’s really hurting journalism and the music industry. It’s basically impossible to make an intelligent or complex point because you’re pretty much relegated – like I don’t say political things anymore… I do, but I would never write it on Tumblr or I would never try to express my opinion beyond surface level at this point because the press – I mean some press are amazing, there are some great publications out there, but there’s definitely enough of them that don’t give a fuck.
There are a lot of vapid pop stars out there who have little to say or couldn’t articulate themselves so it is a shame when interesting or eloquent people feel silenced because they’re scared of how they will be interpreted...
I think that possibly lot of pop stars aren’t vapid, but they understand that they’ll get fucked… It’s to avoid all the shit that I go through all the time. I completely empathise and understand why that is the way now because my career has definitely been hurt by people misunderstanding what I saying, or even using it to say something else.
So what's been the biggest lesson you’ve learnt about yourself both personally and musically in the last seven years that's brought you to where you are now with Art Angels?
Nothing really matters. It’s important to be chill and not worry about it.
Vinyl, CD and limited edition cassette formats of Art Angels will be released worldwide on December 11.
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