robbers on high streetinterview mit ben

hello, how do you feel and where are you at the moment?
hi, i feel kind of dehydrated but otherwise good. right now i'm at home watching a met's game.

you and steve know each other a long time. how was growing up in a city called poughkeepsie and when did you meet the first time?
i met steve at the age of twelve on the playground. my family had moved to poughkeepsie about a year prior and his family had just moved there when i met him. he was the new kid. both our families had moved up from new york so we had that in common, and an intense love of led zeppelin. growing up in poughkeepsie was probably the best thing for me. to you germans it probably looks just like the stereotype of white bread suburbia. i can't imagine if my family had stayed in manhattan and i had gone through junior high and high school with the four of us in our two-bedroom apartment. poughkeepsie is in the hudson valley and is a beautiful place but culturally a little stale. a friend of mine said it's a great place to be from and i agree, but i could see myself back up in the sticks at some point in my life.

when and why did you begin to write music? can you please describe how this first songs sounded?
the first instrument i started playing was the drums. i've been playing since i was about eight. i probably first starting writing songs before i even knew how to play guitar or piano. i'd write them in my head while playing the drums. i still do that. the first song i wrote sounded a lot like the violent femmes. i was very into them in junior high. why do i write songs? who the hell knows. fear of death probably.

you move to new york and …
i went to college.

was there a moment in your life you wanted to stop writing music? and what means music to you?
no i can't recall one. sometimes i wish there was something else that i did as well. a band can slowly take over your life, which means you're probably doing pretty good but because it's your life when you need a break from it it's harder to escape. being a dude in a band seems like such a cliché thing to me sometimes, especially living in brooklyn so should i need a break i try to convince myself that it's not all i've got, but really it is, and in the end i love it.

when you wake up in the morning, the radio plays the same over and over again, what do you feel?
i learned from a young age not to rely on commercial radio. if i listen to the radio it's npr or q104, the classic rock station. there used to be a legendary oldies station in new york but it got reformatted into something called jack fm. the west coast has a lot of great commercial stations that have popped up over the last few years. they actually play great current music. i hope the idea spreads east.

tell us please something about the process of recording "tree city"?
well we recorded most of it at peter katis's house. he has an enormous place in connecticut with an incredible studio on the third floor. it's very relaxing. we'd wake up have some cereal and go upstairs and record all day. then come downstairs and make dinner. we also recorded some in new york with britt myers. it was during those sessions that we got tom malone to come play horns on the song spanish teeth. that was an awing afternoon especially because he was in the blues brothers, which has been one of my favorite movies since i was a kid.

what plans do you have for future? will "robbers on high street" come to germany to play concerts?
we're going to start recording our next record in august with a guy named daniele luppi. i know tree city just came out a couple months ago in germany but it's been out here since last february. we are twitching with excitement to get into the studio again. i'm hoping we come over to germany soon. the plan is to come there at the end of the summer.

could you please betray the german readers some unknown and good american bands, which should be known in germany?
our friends the king of france are one my favourites. i know a guy named luke temple who put out a great record last year called light a match for a gasoline world. there's so many - famous letters, sonny oaks.

what do you think about coffee? is it important for you?
i am a coffee snob. i used to drink a lot more of it then i do now. on tour i will make everyone go out of the way if i know i can get a decent cup.

in a few days in germany starts the soccer world champion chip. are the americans interested in this?
americans are only interested in this because america is in it this year and actually has a slight chance. with the amount of advertising recently plastered up all over town you would think it's the debut of the world cup. we play italy this weekend which should be an exciting time considering the amount of italian-americans in new york. thanks for answering this question, good luck to you and your band. hope to see us in germany soon.