Yeah Yeah Yeahs

They’ve been championed by Albert Hammond and supported The White Stripes. One of the most recent bands to emerge from New Yorks current flourishing scene. We talk to NYC’s finest, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs guitarist Nick Zinner on the new album and other things , while we ponder whether or not he should wear a nappy.....oh bless him!!

Are you recording an album? If so when will it be out?
We'll be doing some recordings in July, and maybe more in October, for a hopefull release of January. We were hoping to get the record out in October, but.....shits is crazy, yo!
Will you be playing the major festivals this year?
Yeah! We'll be doing Reading and Leeds, and some other ones not yet confirmed. Our little booking agent guy is sweating bullets as i write this.
Is it true you've been offered half a million to sign to a record label?
Not to my knowledge- but i read it in NME so it must be true!
New York is the city of cool, and you've been described as one of NY's coolest bands, but what’s the most uncool thing you've ever done?
I peed in my pants once when i was 7-but you know...some people are into that kind of thing... having 3 different collection agencies after you is pretty uncool, aswell. But basically,we like to think that the more uncool you are, the cooler you actually are. Take The Liars, for example- their six-foot-plus singer Angus, wears a sleeveless sweater with a duck embroidered on it. It’s simply hideous, but ever so cool. Answer b: heroin.
You've opened for big name acts like The White Stripes and The Strokes. If you could have any band to support you ,who would it be?
Alice Cooper Band, 1970
What styles of music have been you're main influences?
I know it’s a bit of a cliche, but everything is an influence- bands like The Birthday Party, or Flux Information Sciences to weird minimalist composers like Steve Reich. We went through a big E.S.G. kick recently. Brian is inspired by no-wave stuff and unlistenable modern atonal stuff. Karen likes Free Kitten and Johnny Cash, i think...
Karen's clothes are handmade and designed. Has she ever considered designing her own range?
Actually, Karen's clothes are designed and made by Christian Joy, our pal from NYC. I’ll ask her about the latter.
What’s the best gig you've ever played and been to?
I think when we played recently in Brighton was one of our favorite's. Also Limmerick Ireland, and when we played in NYC with the Blues Explosion a few months ago. The best show I’ve ever been to was Slayer with Motorhead in Boston when i was like, 14?
Do you think the sudden surge and success of artists from NY has excellerated your progress?
Definately- the crazy success of bands like The Strokes really helped to open doors and ears for bands like ours.
What's your main aim as a band?
That’s a hard one- we're still so young as a band and still going on our own intuition, so there isn’t really a final goal, or a chief aim. Obviously we want people to like and get what we're doing, but really, we're hopefully just getting started.