From left to right: Jacket by H&M, shirt by RVCA, and pants by UNIQLO. Blouse and skirt talent’s own and vintage hat and collar.
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The Great Aural Interplay 5
A grip of blind dates betwixt a grip of musicians
\[it seemed like a good idea at the time\]
Shannon And The Clams interviewed _by_ No Joy
Let’s get naked bitches because summer is for Oakland’s _Shannon and the Clams_.
Their new album, _Dreams in the Rat House_ (out now on Hardly Art) is jagged, rough and rooted in grainy guitar ridges, swept clean by a current of raspy, taffy-sweet vocals. It soundtracks gelled and tattooed lovers fighting over a flask of blue ruin, then falling into kisses on the boardwalk-—like a bitter, ash-gray clam that, through constant provocation and despite its own intended nature, produces a pearl.
No Joy: _Where do you prefer to take your shits while on tour?_ Shannon: One of the things that’s cool about typically being the only female human in the band is I rarely have to share a bathroom at clubs. I can get the ladies’ room to myself for the most private of moments. But on the actual open road, there are particular rest stops we know are always clean, and gas station-wise, we know that Loves and Chevron are usually pretty clean
Cody: Into bags or ditches. The last place anyone would look. Oh, but sincerely, in the most anonymous, lonely, out-of-the-way bathroom so that no one else has to experience my stuff. I mean, I like to engage with people and share experiences, but I don’t care to explore anyone else’s turds, so they probably don’t wanna check out mine. Recently we were in Puerto Rico and our drummer Ian stepped in human shit. Twice. Once was in a beautiful crumbling, mossy seaside cemetery. It was probably 500 years old. What a place to dump.
_What band do you rip off the most?_ Shannon: The Cantina Band from Star Wars. SORRY!!!
Cody: Alan-a-Dale. He’s number one. Or, if there had been a band playing in the bar in the original Total Recall, I would want to rip off that band.
_What current indie band would you fistfight and why? Which one of your musical peers do you want to punch in the face?_ Shannon: I have punched too many people in the last 365 days so I actually need a break!
Cody: I wouldn’t fistfight or punch in the face any of the bands I dislike. That’s so straightforward. I think a long weird twisted fairytale revenge fantasy that takes 30 years to complete is more my style. I’ll be the old butler whom they’ve trusted for decades who slowly turns them against one another in a power play and doses them with small amounts of LSD each morning for weeks so that gradually acid tripping becomes their reality and reality becomes unfamiliar to them and they are lost in their own minds.
Beauty Notes: All makeup by M.A.C. COSMETICS.
_Photographer_: Jen Siska at jensiska.com. _Stylist_: Kylea Borges at KyleaBorges.com. _Hair & Makeup_: Gilbert Moran.
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