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Sara did an interview with Guitareste.com , an awesome website about female guitar players.  Here is an excerpt: GUITARESTE: What is your songwriting process like? S.L.:    When our band first got together we planned to work on songs from Kathleen’s first solo record, Julie Ruin, and play them as a live band, then maybe write originals later. I already knew Kathleen from Willie Mae Rock Camp for Girls in Brooklyn where we had band-coached and recorded a teen girl group for a couple years, meeting weekly, helping them write songs, and stay focused. Our first “The Julie Ruin’ rehearsal was at Funkadelic in Manhattan and what I think people don’t realize is how funny Kathleen is, especially when Kenny Mellman and Carmine Covelli are in the mix, who I found out later did actual comedy shows. I swear I just giggled and repeated back their jokes in the mic for the first six weeks. Anyway, we wrote 18 of the new songs on the album together in different ways. Sometimes Kathleen would bring in a loop and we’d make an interpretation of it, play off it, and create a song. Sometimes we’d just start playing along to Carmine’s drumbeats or a guitar riff I’d keep repeating. When Kathi joined on bass several months later, it all came together. Kathleen asked me what I thought during Kathi’s first rehearsal and I said I didn’t remember life without her. Crazy, but maybe thats what a great bass player should be like? I think songwriting is different with every group. I’ve been in bands where I’ll do all the writing and still play drums, or the singer will do it all and I just write guitar leads. It really depends on who you’re with. I feel very fortunate in this case. Its like playing Fantasy Football and I picked my team (they do pick teams in Fantasy Football, I have no idea actually!)- Kathleen, Kathi, Carmine….and who would be my fantasy keyboardist? Uh, that guy from Kiki & Herb of course…and there he is!
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Sara did an interview with Guitareste.com , an awesome website about female guitar players.  Here is an excerpt:

GUITARESTE: What is your songwriting process like?

S.L.:    When our band first got together we planned to work on songs from Kathleen’s first solo record, Julie Ruin, and play them as a live band, then maybe write originals later. I already knew Kathleen from Willie Mae Rock Camp for Girls in Brooklyn where we had band-coached and recorded a teen girl group for a couple years, meeting weekly, helping them write songs, and stay focused. Our first “The Julie Ruin’ rehearsal was at Funkadelic in Manhattan and what I think people don’t realize is how funny Kathleen is, especially when Kenny Mellman and Carmine Covelli are in the mix, who I found out later did actual comedy shows. I swear I just giggled and repeated back their jokes in the mic for the first six weeks. Anyway, we wrote 18 of the new songs on the album together in different ways. Sometimes Kathleen would bring in a loop and we’d make an interpretation of it, play off it, and create a song. Sometimes we’d just start playing along to Carmine’s drumbeats or a guitar riff I’d keep repeating. When Kathi joined on bass several months later, it all came together. Kathleen asked me what I thought during Kathi’s first rehearsal and I said I didn’t remember life without her. Crazy, but maybe thats what a great bass player should be like? I think songwriting is different with every group. I’ve been in bands where I’ll do all the writing and still play drums, or the singer will do it all and I just write guitar leads. It really depends on who you’re with. I feel very fortunate in this case. Its like playing Fantasy Football and I picked my team (they do pick teams in Fantasy Football, I have no idea actually!)- Kathleen, Kathi, Carmine….and who would be my fantasy keyboardist? Uh, that guy from Kiki & Herb of course…and there he is!

So, I’ve been sneaking around with a tiny camera picking up bits of our recording process for ‘Project: Unknown’ — maybe bonus footage to go with our CD/DVD/VINYL dEluxe Extravaganza package?? 

Here’s a little bit of us editing songs at Kathleen’s home studio the other day. All the tracks are sounding really f—king great but there are still many details to sort out. Most of the song titles you see on the board are placeholder/temp titles and the track you hear is a very rough mix of a song we are developing called Going Right Home. It was the very last song we tracked at Oscope and it feels like the sort of song you could listen to while getting a lot of errands done.

There is talk of a 12” Single release sometime in the next few months though. We’ll keep you posted about that. More. Soon. 

— carmine (drum)

Hello, it is kenny, the keyboard player in The Julie Ruin. We have been faithfully recording our first album.  19 songs are mostly done.  Don’t be worried; we aren’t going to be releasing a 3 CD concept album, though personally that wouldn’t bother me.  We figure we will have enough songs to release an album, a 12 inch single, and still have some songs left over for limited edition 7 inches and stuff like that.  

It has been an amazing process. For me this all started when Kathleen emailed me a couple of years ago and asked if I wanted to try and write some country songs together. We got together and worked on a song and then I think we both realized we had no future as Country songwriters unless we moved to Nashville and worked the whole scene

I have known Kathleen for a long time. I once wrote her a fan email and she responded with one back!  I still have it printed out and filed away to make me feel better about life.  I used to do this act called Kiki and Herb.  My performing partner and I played lounge singers in their later later years.  Here is a picture Kathleen drew of us back in the Le Tigre days (fun fact: my former performing partner Justin is name-checked in Hot Topic!)kiki and herb drawn by kathleen

We would do covers of songs like yes, Smells Like Teen Spirit and, for a couple of shows in NYC,  we did a cover of Deceptacon.  You can always YouTube some clips and stuff.  Kathleen had come to see us when she first moved to NY and we once played a show with Le Tigre at the Cat’s Cradle in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.  The line-up was Tami Hart, us, The Butchies and Le Tigre.  

The first time I actually performed with Kathleen was during one of Kiki and Herb’s  New Year’s Eve shows at the old Westbeth theater in the West Village here in NYC.  The conceit was that it was New Year’s Eve 1967.  Kathleen agreed to play Kiki’s daughter who the very next year, in the fictional backstory, would die by falling off a boat whilst Kiki was ‘busy’ down below on the boat. Kathleen sang I Don’t Need Anything But You from the musical Annie with us. (full disclosure: Kathleen is obsessed with the musical Annie).  And then at the end of the show she sang Total Eclipse Of The Heart with us.  It was a magical New Year’s Eve.

Now years later, I am in a band with Kathleen, Kathi, Carmine and Sara and we are furiously recording our first album and it feels great!

Kenny

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the julie ruin