PLACEBO
Monday 9 August, 1999
Tripe j Breakfast Show
Adam Spencer talking to the boys from Placebo

Adam: Triple J Breakfast, Adam Spencer here. Joined by Brian, Stephen and Steve, from Placebo. In the middle of a very very vibrant and up-beat conversation [the guys from placebo laugh] about whether a sandwich that has, and I’ll say them purely in alphabetical order, both cheese and ham as ingredients, will be called ‘cheese and ham’ or ‘ham and cheese’. Now Brian, what’s your position on this?

Brian: It’s ah definitely ham and cheese. I think ah when you get kinda ah a plate of liver and onions, you don’t get onions and liver... you know..

Adam: Awww... And so the liver is the bulk of the meal, and the onion is offsetting it...

Brian: Yeah, you know, its just kinda, there has to be, when it comes to food, and especially sandwiches there has to be some rules. You don’t get sort of like a lettuce, tomato, and bacon sandwich... You get a bacon, lettuce, tomato, don’t you Steph?

Steph: Bolinaise spaghetti you know...

Adam: When you guys are on the road, do you often order the ‘liver and onions’? Is that the standard staple diet -

Steve: Never had that actually.

Brian: Yeah, Steve is the liver and onions fan. Yeah.

Steve: Ah, with double gravy.

Brian: But he doesn’t eat onions and liver. but he has to eat a ham and cheese.

Adam: How do you like your double gravy done but? Do you put.. I mean I like the liver, you put one layer of gravy on, then the onions, then you hit the double gravy and...

Steve: That’s it.

Adam: Yep, excellent. We’ve got so much in common - I like it.

Placebo: *lol*

Adam: Now the last time, the last time you guys were out here we chatted, and we had a similarly inane powerful conversation about enima art and other things.

Placebo: *lol*

Adam: ...what have you been up to since, Stephen just doesn’t want to be part of.., what have you been up to since then?

Steph: Umm, touring around the world, yeah. really. and back again.

Adam: Touring pretty much non-stop?

Steph: Yeah absolutely...

Steve: European festivals.

Steph: Three and a half weeks, European festivals... just been out to South Africa, with Garbage.

Adam: What’s what’s what South Africa with Garbage like?

Steve: Umm umm it was intense.

Steph: Full on.

Adam: Have you toured with them before, spent much time with them before? Or was it your first meeting?

Brian: No, we’ve hung out with them before and umm we’ve played with them about four years ago and seen them at a lot of festivals.

Adam: When you’re doing a big tour like that does does your music go particularly well with Garbage’s? Does it match?

Brian: Think so, I think so. I think it was a really good bill. I think it was sort of.. it was quite historic... I think the South African audience has got a really really good deal there. You know... ha ha ha ha ha ha.

Adam: Because I know you like to walk away thinking you’ve given people a good deal right?

Brian: Yeah -

Adam: You lose sleep overnight.

Brian: Value for money, yeah, ha ha ha ha ha.

Adam: Well what about with silverchair that you’re doing the Australian leg with, compare that with.. Compare and contrast...

Brian: Well its a bit more ‘rock’ I think. And I I think we’re very lucky to sort of to to be touring with silverchair considering how big they are over here and I think its really good for us, because last time when we played here we didn’t umm, we played club tours, so we couldn’t play it to anybody under 18. So its a great, kind of like, part of our audience which we missed out... I think our audience and the silverchair audience sort of overlap quite well.

Adam: Whats whats it like, do you cater for gigs specifically for under 18s, do you perform differently? Or is it just the crowd that’s different or..

Brian: We have to get the bleep machine in... ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ... for the inbetween songs... you know.. its on a two second delay.. it bleeps out anything nasty that we say...

Adam: There’s some guy or girl with the sound.. just hitting the red button all the time... Stephen would you prefer to play to an open audience, ie. under and over 18s at the one time, or speci..specifically under 18 crowd?

Brian: ----- ham and cheese........ is it ham and cheese, or is it cheese and ham Steph?

Steve: Its ham and cheese... (Steph in background says ham and cheese)

Adam: ... as as as they say in court reports Steve, you’re ...

Steve: Fuck off.

Brian: hahahahaha.

Adam: I was I was going to say........... minority judgement.. Steph would you rather do an under 18s only or an [over] 18s and under 18s, does it matter?

Steph: No, ah, I think our music is liked by the people from like ages under 18 to upper 18s... so I don’t see why we should play to an audience of either... exclusively under 18 or over...

Brian: I think a good mix is good...

Adam: Who’s the oldest fan you’ve encountered? - Who’s the oldest Placebo fan you’ve bumped into?

Brian: You know, I think on the mailing list there’s somebody who’s like in their 50s.. and ahh and we’ve met a lot of people with grey hair at gigs.. you know.

Adam: *lol*

Brian: Which is good, you know, because it it it it does have a tendency to sort of like go from you know people who are like in their early teens all the way up to people who remember our influences from the first time round when they were actually there..

Adam: And you’ve got the people out the front in the car of course, just waiting ...

Brian: Yeah...

Adam: I love.. I.. it must be a weird gig being a parent at the rock and roll gig, and while little Sally or Joe’s inside slamming away, you’re just waiting in the car, reading the paper, doing the crossword... but you escort them away. Did you guys when you were young, going out to gigs, have parents on the ready, in the car park?

Steve, Steph: No, no.

Brian: Usually other people’s parents...

Everyone: *lol*

Brian: ...borrow somebody’s parents for a day...

Adam: Yeah, yeah John’s got the coolest looking dad... Sarah’s mum’s pretty sexy, so we’ll get them to pair up for the afternoon...

Everyone: *lol*

Adam: If you don’t mind, lets play the remix of you and David Bowie

Brian: Yeah

Adam: Without you I’m nothing.. Would you like, which one would you like to play?

Brian: uuu ahhh - well, you may as well play the umm, you going to play the new single version?

Adam: Would you like to give us rousing up-beat intro?

Brian: Well um this is a very Placebo mourning style intro.. Its Placebo & David Bowie, Without You I’m Nothing.

Adam: You’re on triple j...

* Without You I’m Nothing *

Adam: It’s Adam here with Placebo - Brian, Stephen, and Steve. You’ve just listened to the remix of them, Without You I’m Nothing... You’ve done a fair bit of work with Bowie now.. been documents, toured with him Brit awards performance, and now the remixes - Who’s idea was it?

Brian: It was kinda a case of ‘great minds think alike’. And umm when ahh he actually when we did the Brit’s he was actually wanting to do ‘Without You I’m Nothing’. But the Brit’s said a 20th century boy kinda song sorta fit better.. And so it planted the seed in our minds for doing more work on this one and one day we kind of call each other up with the intent of asking each other the same question... which we did... you know.

Adam: It was like going out on a date or something but were you fudging around the question ‘hi Dave, how are ya’...

Brian: No, not really. Kinda like you know.. ‘this is what I’m calling you up about, you know, can you send me your tapes, I was thinking exactly the same thing.. like it was just kinda very strange because we were both in the same city at the same time.. It was during an American tour, and we were both going to be in New York...

Adam: How many versions of the David Bowie with Placebo are floating around? How many mixes and takes are there?

Brian: Four. Yeah four different ones.. There’s one by James Laval of Uncle Fame, there’s one by Brothers in Rhythm who did some work with us before, and one by Elli Johnny, by Girls Against Boys..

Adam: When you’ve got two major artists and a remix is being done.. its not like its your first ever hit and you’re like you know if somebody wants to rework it, you’re so desperately happy to let them.. Did you guys have much input - did you just let Laval go off and do their stuff? or...

Steve: Its like you know, you hand somebody a copy of something and its just, go and do your own interpretation of it... and then it comes back and you chuck it out.. and its basically whether you like it or not... and if you don’t like it, you don’t use it..

Brian: We loved it, yeah, I mean we bumped into James Laval at ahh a party in London -

Adam: As you do.

Brian: As you do, as you do... and umm

Adam: Just a few cheese and ham sandwiches..

Brian: Ham and cheese - ham and cheese. And umm, he’d already said yes, and we just sorta said well what are you going to do? And he just said I’m going to take it out there.. And its like yep, cool, go.

Adam: Across the four different mixes going around, do you guys have personal favourites?

Brian: Well the Brothers in Rhythm one is really really like old school techno and its really hold tight, like we like to call it... and so ah we like that one a lot. But the James Laval one is very very funky and very very different, and incredibly imaginative...

Adam: In Australia, Australian radio at the moment, there’s a bit of a crisis going for it, because one radio guy, allegedly ahh, had a bit of a deal going with the banks where he’s getting some money to say nice things about them... I should ask for proprietary, do any of you guys own any of the shares in David Bowie... you know David Bowie floated himself and you can buy shares...

Brian: No..

Adam: Do you guys own any shares there? Paying yourselves off...

Steph: We’re waiting for the Christmas gift you know...

Brian: ‘Have a couple of my shares...’

Adam: Yeah, you could end up being a managing director of David Bowie... Any chances of Placebo floating themselves on the stock-market in the near future?

Brian: I think it’s a bit early for that... I think we’re just floating around in the stratosphere for now...

*lol*

Adam: And any work with Bowie or any other major artists coming up? Any secrets? Any hints you can give us?

Brian: Umm Ourselves really. Massive onanism sessions going out, that’s all...

*lol*

Adam: For those of you that don’t know the word, read your bible and ahh a bit of religious instruction here this morning... Thankyou so much Stephen, Steve, Brian. You’re here on triple j breakfast...

Note: For those that don’t know, ‘onanism’ means ‘masturbation’.

This transcript was typed out by myself, Chay Neal, and may not be used or reproduced on any other web sites, mailing lists, etc, without my permission. Sorry if there's any mistakes! Please email me if you find any.