Interview
November 2002
"LA Rocks" pgs. 112, 113 & 121
(Photos: Sheryl Nields. Story: Peter Buck)
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PETE YORN
BY R.E.M.'S PETER BUCK
Power-pop pinup boy Pete Yorn's frank gem
musicforthemorningafter (Columbia) was one of the
pitch-perfect surprises of 2001, but Yorn is already chasing a
new muse, recording his follow-up disc, The Day I Forgot
(due in 2003), in Culver City.
PETER BUCK: You're from New Jersey and you grew up listing to a
lot of English music, so what took you to Los Angeles?
PETE YORN: Growing up in Jersey, I felt like I'd kind of
experienced New York. I had family living in L.A., so it was a
natural progression for me to move out West. I first came here
for the weather, which is pretty lame.
PB: My grandfather moved there in 1919 because he heard it was
warm and there were fruit trees. How do you find working in Los
Angeles? I mean, I don't know a single person there who has what
I would describe a real job. People have these amorphous jobs,
everyone can hang out all the time. [Yorn laughs] Did you
ever notice that? Someone'll be like, "Do you want to meet at
2:00?" "Don't you have a job?" "No."
PY: Yeah, I'll be on tour and people will say about L.A., "It's
all fake people. It's pretentious." And I would think, sure in
any city there are assholes but there'll also be great people to
surround yourself with. There's one section of Los Angeles
that's five square miles and full of the tanned and bronzed
clichéd California people, but you get out of that area and it
becomes just another place. I mean, East L.A. is not that
glamorous. We're working in Culver City, but we did drums over
in Venice, right on the beach, and I'd walk out there on a
break, and I felt like Jim Morrison in '68. In fact, I'd walk
out of the studio we're at, and right across the street was a
giant picture of Jim Morrison's head filling up a whole side of
a building. I was like, "Whoa."
Peter Buck is the guitarist for R.E.M., who are currently at
work on their 14th studio album, due out next year. |
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