Count the number of times you fantasize about getting it on each day. Peaches thinks about it more.
Peaches isn't the latest lap dancer to step off the ferry, and she's not an Internet entrepreneur selling her panties online. She's a 34-year-old Canadian with a tightly curled mullet and highway patrol sunglasses who raps lines like, "Sucking on my titties like you wanted me/Calling me/All the time," and "I like the innocent type...flexing his might/Doing it right/Keeping me tight/Taking a bite out of the peach tonight," over hard hip-grinding beats and block-rocking riffs.
A couple years ago, Peaches?nee Merrill Nisker?left her hometown Toronto for Berlin, where she had the brilliant idea of sticking sex in her music. Those who have worn out the groove on her EP, Red Leather?with rapper/performer Chilly Gonzales?and album Teaches of Peaches (Kitty-Yo), can sing along to choruses like "Fuck the pain away." Her tour hits the Knitting Factory this Friday.
I called Peaches recently in Berlin, waking her out of a disco nap for a little sex talk.
Hi, Peaches?
Yeah, sorry, I was sleeping.
Do you have a performance tonight?
A bunch of us are getting together and we're making a booty night.
What's a booty night?
Just, you know, booty music. We're just gonna stuff our asses really, really big and dance around and act like freaks. Get all the gang together.
Why did you move from Canada to Germany?
Two and a half years ago I bought an MC505 [groovebox] and took off for Europe with Chilly Gonzales. He bought a double CD player and we busted around doing these improv shows wherever anyone would let us. When I came to visit [Berlin] a year later, we played one show and [Berlin-based label] Kitty-Yo came out and signed me the next day. It's much easier to work on stuff when you're in the same city.
It seems like Berlin is really supportive of the arts, both the government and the people who live there.
That's a really good point. In Canada, you can get grants and do a lot of stuff, but it's always very isolated. The underground stays underground and the mainstream stays mainstream. The population is smaller, so people are a little more nervous about new things. In Germany, the mainstream and underground get mixed up and the government really supports freaky shit. We can do crazy performances in these huge, beautiful theaters and people are really into it. It makes it exciting.
I hate art rock because I think music should really be from your gut and not something you have to think too hard about. I love the rawness of your music. It's artistic in that it's a performance, but the energy and the music are really, to use a silly word, accessible.
I don't think accessible is a silly word. It's really important for me to be accessible. I don't want to be on the fringe. I don't want to be "mainstream" in the way somebody else may see mainstream, but it's very important for me to have a beat and make people wanna bust out and rock. If it doesn't rock, then I don't give a shit about anything that I'm doing.
People project a lot of what they want Peaches to be. I'm happy to be accepted by a lot of different groups. I want to be on the side of the girl's riot and I want to let my macho side show. Some people think what I do is art or political or grrrl power, and if it is to them, that's cool, but my first priority is rock 'n' roll.
Where did the idea for Peaches come from?
It came from me wanting to make rock 'n' roll direct and straight up. I wasn't thinking, "I'm gonna shock everybody," or "I'm gonna be different." I was just thinking, "How can I rock and have a good time and not carry a lot of instruments and not rely on anybody else?" The lyrics came from me being horny in my room?masturbating, smoking pot, making beats and hanging out.
I think that sexual energy really works. With so many of the women who rise to the top of the music world, sex is all about being a tease. Look at girls like Britney Spears. There are very few female rockers out there really singing about sex, but there are a lot of women out there who like getting laid.
It's funny. It's true. Both genders like sex. You can't just say one's more aggressive or one's more passive. There's a time and place for teases, but if you look at MTV, every single fucking video is a big tease. People ask me why I'm singing about sex all the time, and it's like, come on, doesn't everyone think about sex all the time? I'm a fan of someone like DJ Assault, but I also think, fuck, chicks can do that too, you know. It's important that I do that.
Critics compare your music to Suicide, but songs like "Sucker" remind me more of early PJ Harvey. Does her work have any kind of influence on you?
I try not to bring up her name because I love her so much and I don't want people to compare us. [laughs] The first time I heard her I was definitely inspired by it. I loved Dry so much, but now, in retrospect, To Bring You My Love is my favorite album. I think it's just amazing.
Are there other performers who have turned you on over the years?
The Runaways. I just look at them and get hot. Even a band like Guitar Wolf is really sexy. It's funny, because sometimes you go see a show and you're like, wow, this is cool, it made me hot. Or wow, this is good music, or this is really touching a new, futuristic thing, or this is really basic. To me, it's good to combine all these elements.
Last time I saw you perform you were solo, but from reading other show reviews it seems like you'll randomly pull people up onstage, mixing it up every time.
That's important for me. I've been touring for a year straight now. I have another really good collaborator named Taylor Savvy and we have a project called Stay in School. It's also full of sex rock-styled stuff, but it's all duets. I'll go on tour with him and Bitch Laplap, or with Mignon for the girls-only show. There are up to nine people that any of us can perform with anywhere in the world. It's really great because it's not about how well we play our instruments or how much pressure we put on each other to learn the lines, it's about what we can bring to it. That's what tonight's booty party is going to be all about. There are so many groups of us that love hanging out with each other and we also love to bust up, so this is our way to do both.
You were once in a hardcore group with Chilly Gonzales called the Shit. Do you miss having a full band?
I have a band now. It's called Feedom. It's me and Taylor Savvy and Chilly Gonzales. It's a really sexy band, too. Chilly plays drums, Taylor Savvy plays a lap steel [guitar] through a Big Muff [distortion pedal] and I play a bass. We play really good rock 'n' roll riffs, but only one [riff] for each song. It's really basic. The songs usually go on for six or seven minutes and get more and more intense. Maybe it doesn't sound like anything, but it's really amazing to be there and hear it. When it comes to rock 'n' roll, I love riffs. I wanna take all those good 70s rock bands and take out the solos and just keep the riffs. In a way, that's like having rock 'n' roll house music, because house music started by just taking the best disco licks. In a way, we're doing a live rock/house thing.
What else should people know about you?
Just let them know that I'm not an 80s new-wave revivalist. I was there the first time. But I do like old electro beats, that's for sure.
Do you have any plans for your show in New York?
Just find some cute people to hang out with.
Peaches plays Fri., May 4, at the Knitting Factory, 74 Leonard St. (betw. Church St. & B'way), 219-3055.