I interviewed Youth recently about working with you. When did this collaboration start to take off for your first solo album?
The first time we met and properly talked, he was with Vivien Goldman. He was making a record [Next is Now] with her. She and I were going to be playing some songs for Idler magazine. It's a particularly English magazine about how not to put all your effort into working for the man. It's an interesting philosophy. We met at [an] Idler party, and I was doing some songs on my own with some parts I'd recorded playing my guitar and singing. Youth was very taken with it. At that particular time, I had tracks with my electronic parts on them, but I think he was much more aware of me playing guitar, singing, and emoting. He said it was one of the best live gigs he'd seen. He invited me to his [Space Mountain] Festival in Spain that summer. The thing with Third Man Records when they were opening the London shop and label, David Buick [of Third Man, Tape Op #127] had asked The Raincoats if we'd like to make a 7-inch. Ana said, "No." I said I would, because I'd had "Feminist Song" for about 10 or 15 years, and I wanted to record it. I'd recorded it at home. Ana was playing her [Korg] Monotron [Synthesizer] on it. I put some more tracks on it, sent it to Youth with the parts, and he did a dub mix for the B-side and put a bit of drums and parts on. That was fruitful. He was in Spain, and I was in London. Then, David Buick came over for the opening of the shop. We had dinner, and we got on well. We decided it would be nice to try and make an album. We thought, "Well, we'll do a few tracks with Youth and see what it's like." I went down to see Youth three or four times. I took my guitar, and he was like, "Wow, you brought your guitar!" I thought we might play. We just talked three or four times about everything but music. I always had my little electronic songs from over the years. He said, "Well, I don't really want to do your electronic songs. I want to make a record with you, and your guitar and the emotion." I said, "I want to do these electronic songs." I don't know if you know The Hangovers record [Slow Dirty Tears] that I made?
No, I haven't heard that yet.
In a way, that was my first solo project, but I got lots of other musicians in. When you get a band with lots of musicians, it's weird to use your own name. I called it The Hangovers. In fact, when I was rehearsing the other day with two people, they said, "What's the name of the band?" I thought, "It's Gina Birch, actually." It feels weird!
Yeah, I know what you mean.
So, I went down to Youth's, and we decided we'd give it a crack. It was great. Right from the start, we flew. Youth is very inspiring, and he's quite mellow. I'm a bit more, "Ahhhh! Why aren't we starting on time?" He's like, "Mmm, [makes toking sound]," smoking over there. We complemented each other, in a way. Eventually, he said, "Yes, I do like your electronic songs. Let's do them." I think he knew I wasn't going to give up on that! In the meantime, I had written "I Am Rage." I'd written a middle eight, because I knew he liked a middle eight. Then he asked, "Which is the chorus?" I said, "Oh, I don't know!" He put a little pre-chorus in and said, "Have you got some words?" I said, "Oh, I've got this bit. 'Please don't ask me to be reasonable! I'm not listening.'" Then we just did it that morning. The first vocal I did whilst we were structuring the song is what's on the record. I was standing in the middle of the room; it wasn't like a control room and glass. It was just us, all in a room. I liked that, actually. In typical recording, I can see them in the control room behind the glass, and they're all [making laughing faces].
Yeah, they're always laughing, and I feel like, "They're laughing at my vocal take, right?"
Yeah, they're laughing at me, or something! It's nice being in the room. Always being part of the conversation is important to me. There were a few where it was more guitar, and then a lot of the electronic ones, like "I Play My Bass Loud," "I Will Never Wear Stilettos," "Digging Down." Those ones were quite formed when I went in. We put some more bits of guitar on and such.
What are you using at home to record?
I have an ancient, big old [Apple] Mac tower. It's probably about 20 years old. I have [Apple's] Final Cut Pro 7 and Logic 9. I use Logic Pro 9. I've got a microphone and I put it in front of a funny little practice amp. It's a bit of a mess! I use loops from Logic; I filter and distort them. I use the different vocal effects to make my voice go weird. I just like playing around, having fun, and amusing myself. I have phases where I'm a bit addicted to it. Then I go off to my painting studio and I get addicted to that, then I come back. Some of the songs have been there for a while, but I'll switch on the machine and think, "Oh, I'll have a look at this song." I start talking to the song. I'll put in another phrase; or I've been calling it a "Greek chorus," recently. I don't know if that's really true, but it's like I'm commenting on the song, [or] what's happening in the song. I'll suddenly comment on it. Or I'll find a little sound somewhere, and I'll think, "Ooh, I wonder if this sound will be good in that song?" I have a little tiny keyboard, and I play some of the bass lines on the keyboard. I love the thing that changes the pitch.
Oh, the pitch wheel?
The pitch bender. I love playing with all that, and I have fun. I thought the songs would probably stay in the cupboard. I never thought I'd make an album. It's been such a pleasure that they've turned into this. I've got a load more that are still in there. The ones that are on this record work together. I did a lot of "moment-specific" ones, like when someone got murdered or when the banking crisis happened. I did a great epic about Occupy and the banking crisis. I've got one about lockdown, obviously, but I didn't want to put that on. I figured everybody's going to have a bloody lockdown song. At some point I'll make a "moments in time" album.
This album feels like a reaction to the world, with your views on feminism and explaining how you feel about being in this world.
Yeah, there is that. It's a theme, in fact, but not specifically. Just moments. At one point in "…Rage," I'd had lyrics about Afghanistan, and Youth was like, "Look, let's make it more broad." I thought, "Well, that's probably true because live, if I want to, I can rant about anything!" On the record, it is what it is.
There's always going to be something to rage about, right?
Yeah. So that's good.
When you were making records in The Raincoats and other projects, were you paying a lot of attention to the studio process?
When we made our first records, the desks weren't automated. We'd all be "hands on the faders." That was a bit of a crazy time. All we knew was, "This fader makes it go louder," or, "Less reverb," or, "More reverb." That was a straightforward thing. With bands, you have enough to worry about getting on with the rest of them and what you're going to have for lunch!
