Translated transcript of a
retrospective interview with the
band, originally broadcast on
Norwegian TV's
NRK LYDVERKET,
September 2002.
In English. Transcribed and translated by Gillian, only slightly edited by the Lighthouse Girl.

Bent: ... some "Do-you-remember?" pop – at least two or three of them, anyway ... and an acoustic ballad that we still play in fact [i.e. «Blueberry Daydream», ed.].

Snah: It's not that far removed from what we did later, and even things that we're still doing today. It's a starting point; it's not overdone in any way ... it's not Mötley Crue [giggles can be heard in the background], or something we'd rather sweep under the rug.

Bent: [holds up sleeve] This is what it looks like. Ha-ha, the picture on front was taken from the cover of the American Journal of Zoology. I was working in the university library [giggles], in the science department. That's a quark ... no, sorry, a fractile ... sort of San Francisco psychedelia inspired ... not just a boring cassette. Made on the photocopying machine in the university library ... [looks into camera, smiles] – thanks for letting me do that ...

[Clip from «Grinder» – Motorpsycho's first music video.]

Bent: The song writing and playing are getting slightly more ambitious. [holds up cover] ... very nice ... psychedelic in the extreme [laughs].

Snah: Things are started to happen with certain songs. They're becoming more extended. A case of going for it when it feels right, and recording and incorporating it.

Bent: ... recorded in January '92, when Geb had been with us for 3 months ... a couple of earlier oddballs – and a cover version: «California Dreamin'».

[Clip from b/w 60s video of The Mamas and the Papas]

Geb: «California Dreamin'» was just done on a whim we had in the studio. I think Bent ran out and got a cassette of the song, then came back ...

Bent: [giggles]

Geb: ... and sat down and wrote out the text, and we recorded it that afternoon. It wasn't something we had rehearsed or planned at all; it was just one of those ideas we got in the studio. Suddenly it was on tape ...

[clip from Motorpsycho video of «California Dreamin'»]

Geb: ... There's always been a pop thing underpinning all the upbeat stuff that we've made. There's always been that interest in good songs. And there was some nice harmonizing on there too, as far as I can remember ... I don't know how it sounds today, though ...

All: [laugh]

Bent: 2-part at least, and almost 3-part ...

Geb: 2-and-a-half part ...

Snah: [rolling a cigarette] Our first attempt at harmonizing ...

All: [laugh]

[Bent hides his face in his hand]

Geb: It was just complete brainstorming ... straight into the studio ... not much had been rehearsed or planned at all.

Bent: Yeah, one of the songs was written only the night before. We were working 12–14 hours a day, then going home for some sleep ... I remember lying with this tune in my head ... [hums] ... sometime during the second week but we didn't have any lyrics. Lars Lien had been in the studio with this dance band that had a song that went: "Face the situation / Life is not so easy / Death and loneliness", and a fourth line that we can't remember. Anyway, that became the text [laughs] [i.e. «Gutwrench», ed.]. «Demon Box» was the result of becoming self-confident ... daring to go for it and doing absolutely everything you wanted to do. Helge Sten, aka Deathprod, was in there acting as a sort of catalyst on a number of things ... but it was also a case where you've become so tough and sure of yourself that it's cool to play acoustic guitars and stuff ...

Geb: I remember when we were rehearsing we sat up listening to lots of records – a lot of acoustic stuff ... Crosby, Stills & Nash songs with lots of difficult grips and 4-part harmony singing. Then after an hour of that we'd go down to our rehearsal space and play as loud as we could ...

All: [laugh]

[clip of «Nothing to Say», live]

Bent: [holding guitar] This is a C major [plays the chord] and this is a C minor [plays the chord]. That semitone under the major gives things quite a different character. There's a lot of C minor on «Timothy's Monster» ...

Bent: ... [unfolds poster] This was painted on Geb's living-room floor ... that's Helge – Deathprod – on the tractor. He was with us for two tours, then discovered that it wasn't so much fun after all ...

Geb: [smiling] I think the record company got a bit of a shock. We'd talked about wanting to release a double LP – it was quite important to us to be allowed to do that – and we'd mentioned that we'd like to include a poster. They probably thought: "O.k., three guys with bare chests and studded belts looking really tough", and then they were given this and told to print it up ...

Bent: It felt good after releasing «Demon Box» and «Timothy's Monster», which are huge mastodons, to just throw in something completely different – just to cause some confusion and to insist on the freedom to do exactly as you please ...

[clip of Bent lying on his back in a hotel room, playing guitar]

... so we were contacted about making the soundtrack for a film that was to be called «The Tussler», an Italian spaghetti western. We sent off the tape but we've yet to see it ...

Geb: They have their own way of doing things in Italy. We sent off the master and cut the record but we're still waiting for the film ...

Bent: Nobody's seen that film ...

Geb: No ...

Bent: [holding album] Motorpsycho and friends – our lighting engineer on drums, Lars Lien singing and playing keyboards and Kjell Karlsen on steel guitar.

Bent: With the other albums it was a case of only playing. Whereas this is a very thoroughly written album, completely different from the previous two ... much more guitar, less keyboard. We have two guitarists instead of Snah and a keyboard player, so it was much more focused. Plus I was so fed up of shouting into the microphone that I wanted to make a record where I'm just singing, so that's what we did. Some people had a problem with the fact that it wasn't as rough and wild as it had been before. But I think it's very good ...

Geb: ... we hadn't really planned to record anything, but we were looking for a studio anyway and we were tipped off about the studio in Halden, so we hired it for five days just to see what would happen. We were on a job in Oslo improvising some music for a film at Cinemateket [surrealist 17min movie classic «Un Chien Andalou», by Buñuel, 1928 – the soundtrack was an early instrumental «Un Chien d'espace», ed.]. Well, in those five days we recorded one-and-a-half hours of music and suddenly we had enough material. And then we mixed it in 12 days, so it took 17 days in all to make the entire record [laughs]... I guess it was a reaction to all the painstaking work we did on «Blissard».

Bent: [holds up cover] That's when our nerd phase began [laughs]. We thought that us in confirmation suits would be good. So here's Hans Magnus as a 15 year old ... Geb ... and me. We bought the suits from Fretex in Halden [giggles].

Bent: «Trust Us» is a sort of one-chord, or two-chord max. per song. One riff and a lot of improvisation around it. We've spent a lot of time in the studio trying to ... or working to produce the sound of us live ... but in a studio ... how do you do that? [looks at Geb] ...

Geb: Although we've always recorded a lot of material live – in order to keep the spontaneity and energy – it is difficult to communicate that energy ...

Bent: When we made this record we hit upon the bright idea of setting up a PA system in the studio, which we sent everything through while at the same time recording everything. That way we sort of achieved the impact of a live band – and all that this implies – on tape.

Bent: Our first attempt at making a focused record. At least since «Blissard» anyway ...

[clip of Motorpsycho in studio playing «Big Surprise» (Kaliber NRK P3)]

Geb: It was funny to be in Germany and hear all the different interpretations of the title.

Bent: [laughing] It's not supposed to be easy.

Bent: ... what was so frustrating with the album ... was that everything took such a long time – so months lapsed between us recording our parts until the next thing was done. The songs were composed in such a way that there was a lot of important information required from other things besides the material we had played ourselves ... so there was a long six-month wait. It was so complicated ... it took such a long time to get it all in place.

Bent: «Love Cult» is recorded more or less live in the studio with all of us playing together ... so you get reactions, and you hear the interaction ...

Geb: There's a bit of an «Angels and Daemons» feeling here too because it wasn't rehearsed at all ... everyone had his own song ideas and then we just met in the studio and started to play ...

Bent: We had 2–3, maybe five unfinished songs, and then we threw in the new songs we had ... and then ... we had ... [pause] ... an album [looks surprised, laughs].