1995-02-14 Time Off
The Giants in the luxury vehicle
By Simon McKenzie, Time Off, February 14, 1995
Friends and lovers of They Might Be Giants (and there are many) are in for a surprise. What was formerly John Linnell, John Flansburgh and whatever whizzing and popping synthesised backing pals they could find is now a full-blown Rock Band. It's ironic that what is the norm for other bands - guitars, bass, drums, keyboards and musicians to play them - is seen as a radical departure for the Giants.
"I think that we definitely are projecting a sort of rock band identity that didn't exist before," says John Linnell, the accordion-playing and slightly shorter half (or is that fifth?) of the Giants. "The funny thing is that John and I started this project as a duo, but I don't think we ever felt that there were any duos that we wanted to be like. The bands that we liked were more like, normal rock bands like the Beatles, or any other band that had drums and bass."
Linnell is approaching his mid-thirties, but most bouncers would still ask him for ID. That perennial youth also inhabits the Giants' music, and the adoption of a Real Band is in no way a symptom middle-age conservatism. It was just an accident, really.
"Yeah, it seemed sort of accidental to me," Linnell says. "It seemed like we very much stumbled into it. After spending many years as a duo, we were completely settled into a format playing as a two-piece with tapes and we were unlikely to ever change. And then very abruptly in the middle of our Apollo 18 tour, John and I decided - without warning - to start hiring other musicians for the tour. And once we started playing with them it worked out well enough that we decided to make a record with the band. And that kind of made it official."
The record in question is the Giants new LP, John Henry. Recorded with the band and a horn section, it's unquestionably different to the They Might Be Giants of yore. It rocks more, that's for sure. But it's still abundantly wacky and rather clever... the same two twisted brains are still behind it.
"When we first started playing as They Might Be Giants, we thought that our credibility might be in jeopardy if we actually listened to anybody else besides the voices in our own heads," Linnell explains. "And also, we were kind of afraid of hiring other musicians, because we didn't want to be in a position of being told that our ideas were stupid or naive or something, but we also didn't want to be pushing other people around who we couldn't really afford to pay very much money. So we were kind of in a willful state of isolation for the first nine years that we were doing this, and I think we finally got the nerve up to hire other people."
So how often do these guys tell you that your ideas are naive - or how often do you push them around?
"Well, we don't really feel as though we're pushing anyone around, now. Part of it is that it's pretty much recognised that John and I established this project and it became a kind of moneymaking institution long ago, so the musicians that we're hiring are kind of riding in our luxury vehicle, so to speak... and they don't really consider our ideas ridiculous - or if they do, they shut up about it."
They Might Be Giants re-wrote the rulebook on eclecticism in music. Schizoid polkas, classic geek-pop, psychotic nursery rhymes, twanging tangos all this and more goes into the Giants' recipe. But, as Linnell explains, it's not a case of anything goes.
"No. I mean... we have a strict sensibility, there are things that we do and things that we don't do. It's not always easy to define those things, but there are definitely things that John and I have shied away from. And some of those things you could name specifically; like we don't really have extended guitar solos, or extended anything solos in our music. We're basically a songwriter's band, we're not really about instrumental art-rock or anything."
If live reports of They Might Be Giants extended-format shows in the States are anything to go by, Australia is in for a treat in April/May. Their two-man shows here in 1990 are still recalled with awe, and Linnell says the plans are underway to return.
"One thing that's been really fun that we dreamed of doing a long time ago is that we've got to travel around the world doing this," he says. "That's great. It seemed doubtful that we were going to get to go very many places before the band actually started taking off."