Peaches

37:27Huge breakup. Really? Huge breakup. That whole album, The Teachers of Peaches, was a breakup. Also, I had thyroid cancer, and I never really had any physical pain from the thyroid cancer. And I actually didn't even know it was cancer until they took it out. They said, oh, because I had a big lump in my throat. Yeah. Which is also the time I started to develop peaches or develop singing my own, like after doing folk music and rock music and just like coming into my own. So it was pretty bizarre to like, here's something that's going to block you. Because they also said, we're going to do an operation.

38:15And if it's cancer, we're going to take out both sides of your thyroid. And if it's not, we'll just take out one side. And it is possible that it'll change your voice. So that happened. Luckily, it didn't change my voice. I am happy that they did take out both sides. I didn't have any effects. But it psychologically affected me, you know, like with, you know, immortality and instilling things that I wasn't thinking about at all. So that made me want to make music and be creative even with more passion, you know, and also led to a breakup with a very creative person that I was with who taught me a lot about, especially art movements and, you know, that I didn't know about, but just led to the breakup.

39:09and I wanted the album to not have this victim feeling, like breakup victim or also I had cancer. So it was sort of like how can I propel myself forward and encourage myself and like bring the power. So fuck the pain away, you know. It's the most fantastic song and I always listen to it. It's on my, in the shower, I have Teachers of Peaches playlist, and it starts with that, and it's so witty as well, and it's urgent, it has a sense of urgency, much more than aggression. There's that line, something about my Chrissy behind, and I only understood what that was about recently, and it's Chrissy Hynde, who has a great behind.

40:07Yeah, I think. She has an amazing figure. And there's that picture of her in the Vivian Westwood shop set. Was that what you were with her in a pair of knickers looking over her shoulder? You know, Chrissy Hine, I love that first Pretenders album was so important to me. Like, I just, she to me is kind of like this, she's not a rapper, but she's not a singer. She just had her own sort of swagger that was just so cool. And she would sing really fast, like, what's that song? Child, way it's our perfect child, like who now hurts. You know, it's just like tongue twisting and fast, and I loved it. All the songs were just so sexy, and you had to have a little, you know, swagger in your voice.

40:55I remember I was so upset that like the hit song was when it was like, gonna make you, make you notice. I forget the title. Brass in Pocket. Brass in Pocket. I was like, it's so funny because that was my least favorite song on the album at the time. I was like, no, why? I was so angry because I was like, that's not my favorite. Now I love it because I love every song on that. But she was really important to me and also Debbie Harry. And both of them were extra important to me at that time when I wrote Fuck the Pain Away because they had both made it in their career after 30. And I was 33. So I was referencing them like, call me all the time like Blondie, check out my Chrissy behind.

41:47Because I wanted to shout them out as older. And they're not older. like 30 is not old at all, but older women not in their 20s kind of coming into their own. Yeah. I mean, I was looking at, when I was looking around at what all the videos about that song, I found there was one with Miss Piggy singing Fuck the Pain Away, and she even did some of your moves writhing around on the floor in a silver outfit. And was that, did, how did that happen? There was no video for that song because there was absolutely no radio play. There was no real internet platform or anything. It was all by word of mouth.

42:36So I, I, it was funny. I never made a video for that song, but there was this, um, this, uh, student in Miami, me Florida and she was a film student and just used that song and made that clip and sent it to me and I was like this is fantastic this is going to be the official clip now yeah I just thought it was so cool it's so cool it really suits her too she's just got all the attitude for that song it's magnificent I don't know if you know um the recording of Fuck the Pain Away was a live recording of the first time I ever played it. And you never changed it after that, did you? I played it in a small club I was opening for my friend.

43:26There was probably 10 people in the audience. And I sang Fuck the Pain Away. I had my machine, my roll and groove box, and I had the loops ready. And I wasn't really sure, but I knew what I wanted to say. So I thought I'd play it first so that it was fresh in my mind. And then after my gig, the sound woman, Marlon, said, oh, I recorded your set. You know, here's a cassette tape. If you give me five, you know, Canadian dollars, I'll give you the cassette. And I took it, I listened to it, and I put that song in a demo thinking, hmm, maybe I should find a producer for this first album. And then everybody I played it to would not comment on it musically or, you know, what needed to be done.

44:13They were just like, this is cool. So I'm like, it ain't broke. Don't fix. This is it. And so I just decided I will never record that again. And that's the version. So it's not even tracked. It's just like from a cassette. And you can hear my first fan because you hear someone go, woo! And many people have asked me, what is that sample? I'm like, that's my first fan. God, how incredible. I mean, it's just immaculate. It's so perfect. It just gets in your bloodstream. It's fantastic. It's important, though, to me that it wasn't re-recorded. And, I mean, I didn't know that that song would go where it went, that it would be in movies and in TV series like many times.

45:08And that's the recording. That's so cool. That's great. And you spend quite a lot of time naked on stage. And I wondered how are you different when you're naked with the person that you're in love with? And are you ever shy when you're naked? That's such a good question. I've never actually been naked on stage. I've never really been. The only time I've been fully naked on stage is when I did cut piece for Yoko Ono and all my clothes were cut off and I was left naked on the stage. I did that two times for Yoko. But, yeah, I've never actually been naked on stage. I suppose you wear breasts. breasts and things.

45:57Yeah, I do. Right now I'm very into my hairy nipples that I stick on and like hairy panties. But yeah, no, my sexuality with my partner is definitely very, very different and very private and a whole different way of exploring each other. And it's very important not to come at it as peaches on stage. And I'm very grateful that my partner also doesn't want to come at it as that. And it has, you know, really, it's really challenged me in such a beautiful way to be me. Yeah, that's so interesting. Yeah. Because on stage you sometimes have a dildo or a microphone in your hot pants and Art Forum described you as the electro pop princess of porn.

46:57But you're graphic, but would you describe yourself as pornographic? I understand the graphicness. I would say that I'm sort of more of an absurdist. I'm just sort of like all the, as we talked about at the beginning, you know, all the shame that has been instilled in us and all that, Like, and the way that parts of our body are so regimented, like breasts should be augmented, hair on women should be shaved, you know, the shoulds, the shoulds. But what if the breast is in the middle of the forehead? Or what if you have 10 of them? Or what if your penis is, you know, at your hip? That is just as weird as having these roles or rules about what is supposed to be.

47:53So I feel like I'm just sort of in a sort of humoristic trying to reflect back on all these things we impose on ourselves or tell ourselves. well it's very it is very full of humor and wit and it's intelligent you know it thought-provoking and so playful and the whole feeling of optimism around your performance is is one of one of the things i'm really drawn to as well um i think there's a humor and it's such a sort of cliche but it's such a it's a great way to learn more um thank you yeah I feel like I want to disarm people but not as an escape is and disarm and say hey it's okay we are in a crappy place or you may not be feeling good about yourself it's not your fault and I want to bring you in and make you feel good and I want to be inclusive.

49:00Yeah well it's very effective it's very joyous I mean it really and so that feeling is energizing and gives you drive and kind of relax as well. Yeah. You were saying that you feel anxious when you're at home relaxing because you'll say So it's the touring. And are there certain clothes that make you feel better when you're feeling angsty?

49:32It makes me feel better not to, like, wear pajamas. You know, like, I like to, like, even this, what I'm wearing today is literally what I wore on the plane. Like, it's my comfort clothes, but I want them to have a chicness to them. Like, if something would happen, I'd be ready. Like, I came here. And I hope that it, you know, transfers that way. Yeah. So I don't want to be like, I just, I want to feel good in what I'm wearing, but I want to, I don't need to be overdressed or anything like that. Yeah. So like I have specific, you know, sweatpants, but they're like, you know, super wide leg and they make, they're kind of fun because they like drag on the floor.

50:15So they make you feel like you can wear them at home because you're like draggy, but there's some sort of like fun feeling to them yeah yeah i know i'm always on the lookout for too anonymous because it's useful to have comfortable clothes when you're at home working or whatever but if i i feel if i become anonymous even for five minutes yeah it will just take me down like quicksand so yeah my track I've got these gigantic Balenciaga pink track pants and they they make me feel good you know they like I'm not I'm not opting out of how of clothes and what they bring yeah I've often like with sweatpants though I go for these big and then they're just too heavy.

51:09I can't wear them. So I have to find the, you know, the balance. Yeah. Yeah. And if you fancy someone and don't like what they're wearing, does it kill your attraction? It actually doesn't. It makes me rethink of what am I thinking about, you know? So if I'm like, why are you wearing that? Oh, I would never. But it's like, it's not me. You want to wear it. so I feel like there's two two ways about this because one is like oh that's not working for anybody but but also the other one is like this is working for you and actually I need to rethink what I think about that and I'm wrong you know what I mean yeah but it's funny because I was thinking that question obviously if you know you're coming to fashion neurosis you think about that question.

52:01And I just saw this person in the airport and they were wearing like jean shorts rolled up and tights underneath it, like black, really opaque tights underneath it and bright yellow sneakers. And I was like, actually, this might be a moment where I would not be attracted to them. I was like, ooh, this is not good. But also I think it's, yeah, it's a very, very interesting psychological question that I think you can only really answer when you're up against it. Yeah. Yeah. Because it's not a given each time. Sometimes it doesn't matter and it makes you, like you said, think about what you're thinking.

52:50Sometimes it's spectacularly kind of, you know, alienating. But I always have to think there was a time where I really didn't care or I thought I cared and it was so wrong, you know. So I have to give a little grace for that because I know I wasn't born with the fashion gene. Like I didn't come out, you know, being like, ooh, yes. so but your look is so great and what you do with your hair as well as you know you could be wearing anything and your hair is so fantastic and so kind of elegant and with attitude and I I love that about you I would give that also credit to Charlie Lemondue I don't know if you're familiar with Charlie Lemondoo who's an incredible um hair stylist but also a hair fashion designer and I met Charlie when he was uh 16 and he was the first person to dye my hair and he was the first person he he gave me he's given me all my hair looks and I've trusted him with my hair all the time.

54:09And the first time he dyed my hair was during a DJ set. We had this idea. I was DJing and he sat underneath the deck with a bowl of water, dye, some aluminum foil, and a blow dryer. And at some point I played like a 10 minute song and went under the DJ booth and he dyed my hair and I came up and then like half an hour, however long, I went back and people just thought I was angry and having a bad set. And then I came out with blonde hair. Oh my God. And people were drunk and didn't understand like, wait, did you have brown hair at the beginning of the set? So it was, you know, he also is very obsessed with hair and he's made the costume of mine that has like the many, the silicone breasts.

55:03Yeah, yeah. Like five of them that are a bra and the silicone breast panties with hair coming out of them. And he's made all these hair outfits. So we have ongoing discussions about hair and, you know, and we get very inspired by each other. Yeah. Yeah. That's wonderful. Your music is about real issues, but it's not melancholy. and the film director John Waters said about you, I like her attitude. She's tough and her music is funny. Did you learn anything special from John Waters when you toured with him? I learned that he's just John Waters all the time. He's just open to everybody. He walks into a room and he's just going to say what he wants to say.

55:56It's more like, this is me, come on in, you know. And he's just ready to go and ready to show and ready to say what he wants to say. And it's so important. Yeah. God, he's just so great. He's such an incredible speaker, such an incredible thinker. Yeah, I've read some of his books as well. Yes, me too. He's extraordinary. He's so, you know, his intelligence is luminary. And funny. Yeah, very, very funny and prolific. He does so much work. Yeah, he's marvelous. How did he invite you to tour? Because he had a book tour, was that right? Yeah, this was back also like in the early 2000s. And I did a few shows opening for him.

56:53I don't know if it was a specific book then or if he was just, one was a Christmas show. He liked to do Christmas stand-up. Yeah, he just invited me to open. And also they had the 50th anniversary of Pink Flamingos. Oh, wow. And so he celebrated it an Easter at the Madonna Inn, this incredible hotel in San Luis Obispo in California. I've seen that. So there was a weekend planned. And the Friday night was a Peaches concert and Saturday night was an Edith Massey lookalike concert hosted by John and Mink Stoll. And then they also played the movie and went through, you know, like a discussion during the movie talking about it with all the incredible fans coming and staying for the weekend.

57:51Wow. It was really, really fantastic. I can imagine. That sounds incredible. Yeah, that hotel is legendary and such a good place for John Waters and Peaches fans to, you know, come together and take over. I stayed there once with Jim. We went on a road trip when Jimmy was about five, I think. It's so hard to decide what room to choose because they're all so bizarre and different. Did you know what you stayed in? I can't remember. I just remember it was like being in a grotto. Yep. Yeah. You picked one of those rooms. It's amazing. My brother got married there. Really? And so I picked the caveman room.

58:36I remember it had like this shower that was like a log, you know, water would come out. And I remember in the middle of the wedding, because, you know, this is also a time when I was, you know, always obsessed with my camera. I remember I did a whole caveman, like a cave person like thing by myself. I set up a camera and would like mess up my hair and just run around the room. Somewhere I have footage of that too. Oh God, it sounds, it's very perfect. The setting couldn't be better. It was so good. You performed a one woman show of the whole of Jesus Christ Superstar singing every part. Yeah. It was absolutely amazing.

59:18I mean, I only watched it online because I saw the original production when I was 11. You did? I did. I did. And it made a huge impression on me. Wow. My sister and I, we made up this version of Mary Magdalene's song, I Don't Know How to Love You. And we would sing, I Don't Know How to Hate You. Do you ever include any of that in your set? I don't, but I do include, I love to end my show with either, with some emotional ballad. So that, again, just to like bring it to a different place. So you have this high energy, whatever, you know, absurdity and sexual liberation moment. And then at the end, you know, I've been doing, you know, on this tour, I've been doing People, the Barbra Streisand song.

1:00:19Oh, really? And, yeah. And for a while I was doing It's All Coming Back to Me, Celine Dion. Wow. But that one was a 20 minute version where I would insert my own, if you fist me like this, you know, different words. and sort of a take on anti-karaoke. I wouldn't let people sing along if they started. I would stop the song. It was more, it was this, if they would wave along, I would stop. It was, I had a live band then, so I had keyboards and drums on that song. And before that, I would do Private Dancer. Oh, wow. Right, you know, when Tina Turner passed. and also Purple Rain for a while when Prince passed.

1:01:09God, how great. I just remember the whole kind of question of morality when I went to see that, the original performance, and particularly Mary Magdalene, how it was like, oh, wow, she seems to represent the sort of ambiguity of how you might feel like I don't know how to love him but if he loved me I'd be scared and you know I think that's interesting how we were talking about you know how you said with my partner when I'm private and um I feel like that's what Mary Magdalene's doing because she was you know a sex worker yeah so she was with so many people but she's like whoa I think I actually love this person yeah and how do I deal with that yeah because Twigs was talking about how interested she was in her and how she was a herbalist and a kind of healer and all these other things but she was more but that's how she's um remembered I'm not quite sure if she, I mean, obviously, who knows?

1:02:22But it's, I don't know, she just represents questioning and how the nuances of loving someone and how sort of alarming one's own feelings could be. And I went home from that thing at 11 thinking, right, okay, you know, there is more to this. and just I love, I don't love. Yeah, yeah. It's interesting because she's the only female representation in the whole musical. So for me, that was also the point of like, I'm going to do all the parts. So I'm going to be pilot. I'm going to decide where religion is going. I'm going to be Jesus and I'm going to rip my heart out for you all. And, you know, so in that way I wanted to, you know, queer it up.

1:03:20And also for me, Jesus Christ Superstar is something that I did alone in my bedroom. And I feel like so many people did that. You know, whether you could sing or not, you just like act it out. But if you talk to rockers who love Jesus Christ Superstar, they hate musicals. Yeah. But they love this album, right? Because it was a rock album, because, you know, Andrew Lloyd Webber wanted to be a rock star. This is his answer to wanting to be a rock star. So what I wanted to do, and I love good musicals. I love cool musicals. I think there's a place for them. I feel like what I do is a musical, a punk musical every single time.

1:04:05There are musicals I really, really cannot stand and that I am really upset in how vapid they are. Yeah. But I like to take that all in and switch it around as I do. So with Jesus Christ Superstar, I wanted to do it not as ostentatious. You know, like I wanted to bring it to that singular, you're in your bedroom singing it. Yeah. But on stage. So I wanted the rockers to understand how they could enjoy a musical. That's so good because it's got you being alone has got slight Maria Callas kind of drama to it. It's just fantastic. I love doing it. I've been performing it at like, you know, arts festivals or wherever.

1:04:52I can do it probably for the last 13 years. Wow. I'm ready to do it any time. That and Wuthering Heights. Okay, my next birthday, I'm going to start saving up. I like it. I'm there, Belle. I'll do it for you. just have to get my piano player over oh my god I'm yeah I'm I'm I'm almost speechless with the idea of how happy that would make me it's so much fun it's very interesting how different it is in different countries too like when I performed it originally in Germany the audience is like you could hear a pin drop the whole time and it made me so nervous like do they hate this like what and then at the end they give you like eight standing ovations you know but then you go to um america and they're like yes i don't know how to love him woo like they hear three chords and they want to let you know that they know the song and they scream it out like it's you know rocky horror picture show or something and then you go to england and everybody just wants to sing along because they know it's their musical, you know.

1:06:07And then you go to Australia and they're just laughing. They cannot believe. They have such a different relationship with religion. So they're like, oh, my God, that's so funny. And Peaches is saying it. They're just like laughing. That's brilliant. And in the documentary about you, Peaches Goes Bananas, We see you visiting your sister, Suri, who died in 2021 from multiple sclerosis. And you're so kind and loving to her. And did your irreverence cheer her up? I mean, she taught me irreverence. She literally taught me how to be like that. She was the cool older sister that always had time for me.

1:07:02and, you know, things like on Halloween, I remember once I went to go trick-or-treating, I got all dressed up and my friends didn't show up. And she was like, come on, I'll take you, you know. She was always taking me under her wing and, you know, she was also, you know, full of fear in her own things. So like at night she'd come into my room, she'd be like, I'll sleep with you if you tickle my back. because she didn't want to sleep alone. Yeah. But I'd tickle her back and then she'd tell me what it was like to be three years older than her and I learned so much. And it was just, it was really such a gift to have her as a sister.

1:07:46God, I've never heard of anyone saying that to their younger sibling, telling them what it's like. Yeah. That's so, what a remarkable person. She seemed just amazing. She was amazing. So as I started Peaches and I was traveling around the world, that is when she lost her ability to walk. So not only could she not travel around her own home, you know, and then I was traveling around the world. So fortunately, she lived in New York and I spent a lot of time in New York. um so but it was so fun when she would be in her motorized um scooter and we'd go down the street and she would have to say hello to every single person it was just like hello like i'm alive i'm in the world and it was so great to see people's reactions because either they'd just be like oh like can't deal with you and they'd walk away or they'd be like oh hello wow what's up you know and she would make so many friends that way and she had friends that were five years old and friends that were 90.

1:08:57God yeah how wonderful and your shows are incredibly vigorous and animated and I wondered how do you take care of your body, which is such a useful tool. Yeah, that's, you know, I just try, I don't really do much. I got to say, I don't work out much. If I'm like, need a bit of yoga one day, but I'm not very consistent in that. I just don't do a lot. I'm not a drug person, really. I love marijuana, but I won't smoke it on tour because it'll mix up my voice. I enjoy a nice, you know, tequila or a nice whiskey, but I'm just, it's moderation, you know? And, yeah, it's just sleeping a lot and just moderation.

1:10:00Just, like, give it all out on stage, but a lot of massages too. Yeah. Massage I find so important. Yeah. Yeah. Just even just lying there, that's a time where I just feel like I can let my mind be really free. You know how we talked about I get anxious being alone. Yeah. You know, when someone's giving me a massage, somehow I just feel like, okay, now I'm going to think, just let all those thoughts out, but not in a, not in a nervous way, just like, oh, it's fine. Yeah. I find it's almost like it pulls your thoughts down into your body and they don't persecute you. Right. And then you kind of learn some way to balance them or regulate them a little bit to make them more useful.

1:10:51So true. And I've been listening, I've been watching Dan Levy's new show, Big Mistakes. Yeah. Listening to the soundtrack that you wrote for it. And the soundtrack alone is incredibly entertaining. And I wondered, what were you channeling? Channeling, I mean, Dan wanted Peach's music. So how to channel that without using vocals. Yeah. How to like bring the energy of it. And to be honest, a lot of, you know, No Loop So Rude things that we were working on that didn't make it on the album that were great ideas that we could channel into this. Yeah. Yeah. So it was just bringing what I do and fusing with what Dan does and finding that happy marriage.

1:11:53The Canadian kind of, you know, it's like the two fingers in Michelangelo. You just make something so. Canada. and then when the two fingers touch they say sorry

1:12:12Canadian artists I mean you and Dan and David Cronenberg and Leonard Cohen and some great people and uh Katie Lang as well she's Canadian isn't she yeah Joni Mitchell Wow, yeah. I mean, Neil Young, I mean, we can go on and on. But what I think is also really interesting is all the comedians, all the Canadian comedians that are so amazing that make it in America. And I feel like Canadians understand what's going on in America but never really feel American because they're not. So they have this way of looking at America. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, they have this sort of low-key sardonic take, which is also quite generous-hearted, I find.

1:13:12It's not mean. Yeah. I mean, it's clever. Who are the comedians? Well, there's like, I mean, Jim Carrey. Oh, really? And I mean, all the people from Second City, like Catherine O 'Hara. Oh, my God. I didn't know she was Canadian. No, she was part of the Second City, who Dan Levy's father, Eugene Levy, was part of it too. Rick Moranis and John Candy. I mean, I'm not even getting to half of the like ones who are, you know, that you're like, oh, whoa, they're Canadian, they're Canadian. And whoever's watching this right now is yelling out all the really famous comedians. But it is true. There's a huge amount of Canadian comedians.

1:14:05Yeah. And where does the name Peaches come from? The name Peaches comes from a Nina Simone song called Four Women. And as Nina Simone always does with her passion and conviction and her compassion for her culture, she sings about four women's struggle. And I want to say that in no way do I feel like these are my struggles. But I was particularly drawn to the last woman, the way she describes the woman. And at the end of the description, then she gives the name of the woman and she says, and it's the last line of the whole song, they call me peaches. And the way she sings that, I wanted her to be singing it to me.

1:14:55So I called myself Peaches because I knew she wasn't going to be singing, they call me Meryl. and it's so funny because that name has so many implications that I did not think about that actually would relate to the music I did at all like you know fuzzy on the outside juicy and all the like pornographic ways peaches is used or cutesy or the color I didn't think of that at all I was just thinking of the passionate way she said peaches yeah god well it really suits you you're all of those things and and so um yeah just like something to go towards like a mirage of uh of uh everything that your work and embodies and that you you know the teachers of peaches is the perfect title because you you're a great educator and the most subversive and respectful and endearing way and you your your your whole performance and what you do and how you do it just raises the bar in the most lovely way and we really need that now so thank you so much for being on fashion neurosis oh it's absolute pleasure i am obsessed with your show and I it's just I think it's so exciting to be here and I know everybody who's been here is so in love with this work that you're doing and thank you oh god it's amazing to think of getting up and going to find you at two in the morning and uh and here you are again and it's anyway it's wonderful thank you thank you

1:16:54Thank you.