Today, Bootblacks release Paradise, their aptly-titled fifth LP, on Artoffact Records. While the album has been teased with a series of sensational singles over a span of several months, it’s been five long years since Bootblacks have released a proper full-length follow up to 2020’s excellent Thin Skies, and in that time, the world has evolved several times over. Not just that, but these NYC natives have gone through a complete revamp, including welcoming new guitarist Kalle Fagerberg and producer Xavier Paradis to the fold. In line with these changes, the band has evolved stylistically as well. Bootblacks’ core sound of pulsing electronics, thunderous percussion, and melodious crooning remains intact, but overall, the band has traded in murky doom-and-gloom for a glossier, more pop-oriented style, channeling the mid-80s breakthrough period of Simple Minds as well as flirting with darkwave shades of Huey Lewis and the News, Robert Palmer, and Steve Winwood. There’s still a healthy dose of melancholy underneath the lustrous veneer, and as such, the album adds emotional weight to the party, or some delight to the mire, depending on how you want to look at it.
We had the chance to catch up with vocalist Panther Almqvist and synth player/programmer Barrett Hiatt about the writing and recording of Paradise, injecting some much-needed fun into the post-punk scene, and the sweet, sweet sounds of the saxophone. Feel free to enjoy our interview below, and give Paradise a spin or three (or an order) to celebrate!
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Congrats on a the new album, it’s truly a delight! How have these last five years been treating you?
Barrett Hiatt: Probably about the same as the last five years has been treating everybody, to be honest. We’ve had a lot of obstacles in the way, but we got through a mountain of shit to get to where we are today. I mean, obviously COVID had put a big dent into a lot of things and the last record came out right in the middle of that. In general, it just seems like it’s never good timing these days. There’s always something going on, some global catastrophe out there to work against.
It’s difficult promoting something like this when the world is on fire, but there will always be art and music to help us through. I think we all believe in that, and we believe that no matter what, you always need these things to get you through the difficult times.
Well with that in mind, I’d say that Paradise is a really “fun” record, for lack of a better term. Was that an intentional choice to offset all the awful things happening out there these days?
Panther Almqvist: I don’t know if it’s exactly like that for me. Personally, I think there’s just way too much “dark” music out there in the post-punk sphere. I think that post-punk used to mean a lot of things. Unfortunately, what I think it currently means is something that’s dark from top to bottom, both aesthetically and musically. I think there’s an oversaturation of that stuff. That’s not to say that any of that is bad, either. It’s just that I don’t know what more needs to be done in that aesthetic area. I think there’s plenty of people who do that style quite well and meanwhile there’s plenty of other stuff out there to explore. I wanted to do a record that was a bit different than that, something that’s more creatively satisfying. From top to bottom on this album, even the artwork, I just wanted it to be like other things that I like just as much.
I agree. There’s so many new bands doing this overly sincere, completely pastiche post-punk/darkwave style now that I can’t even keep track, and I’ve grown quite disillusioned with the whole thing. It low key drives me crazy. Thanks for making a record that can live in the same world but also still feel fresh and alive at the same time.
Panther: I want to be clear. This is not a criticism of the scene, per se. I just don’t see anything there that needs to be done these days. I see making music and making records as a personal quest of creativity and I don’t have anything to add in that regard these days. Whatever I’ve done in the past that’s more on the dark side of the spectrum is all I’m able to contribute right now, and I have other interests that I would want to push forward with.
That all said, let’s talk a bit about the lyrics then. Compared to your previous records, there’s some more fancy-free moments on this album. Can you tell us a bit about that?
Panther: I’ll be honest – my mission on this album was to make a simple pop album. I admire pop music and I wanted to have more light, pop lyrics on this album but I think I failed because a lot of the songs are quite depressing and sad and personal. Here’s the thing, I am truly a dark person so unfortunately, some of that introspective mindset is going to slip through the cracks either way. So in the end, I think there’s a lot of really depressing subject matter on the record, but at least there’s a little bit of sugar in the 808 and the synths to balance out all the sad Panther vibes.
That said, it was interesting trying to write out the lyric sheet for this one… I was like “uh ohhhh” when it came time to do that…
I would argue that you struck a solid balance between the brooding and the affable. I mean, not everything can be as intense Ingmar Bergman, nor should it, we’d all jump off a cliff. I know just from being in a car with y’all that the band has a deep love of 80s synth pop, yacht rock, and things like that, so it’s good to have that coming through at this point in all ways. It feels unique in that way. I hear a lot of different sounds here – from classic Depeche Mode to Christopher Cross to Simple Minds.
Barrett: We’ve all talked about this ad nauseam probably, but I think when you go back to the early 80s and think about how much music was coming out, and how all of it, while sharing some obvious similarities, was very diverse and different. It all moved so quickly, so a lot of stylistic choices came in and out of vogue so fast that you can find a lot more under-explored territory and a lot of cool stuff that for whatever reason just fell out of fashion. We all joke about the saxophone and that’s one of those instruments that was oversaturated for a bit. It turned cheesy real quick, but we have a strong place in our heart for all that stuff. We kept saying over and over that we have to get the sax in there…
Come hell or high water!
Panther: I want to mention that I do think a lot of things have been siloed and atomized because of the internet, which I think this is bizarre. Sometimes it feels like if you like a certain style of music, you’re only going to listen to bands that sound like that. Unfortunately it seems like homogeny gets rewarded these days and that’s what people want, but I’m just not interested in that.
I think a lot of the people we commonly like were drawing from a lot of different stuff and I just think I wanted this album to be reflective of that. I think Paradise is a statement piece in that way, not just about me, but about what I think a record should do, which is to challenge the listener a little bit.
I mean, we’re lifelong Bowie fans, all three of us, and that’s something we all hold dear as musicians – to explore different sounds and to combine them in interesting ways. That’s the true secret and the only way to stand out these days, in my opinion. Not only are you doing different styles on this record, but I hear some new and interesting things on this album that you hadn’t done before. Spoken word passages, a lot of double-tracked vocals, and did I hear a female voice in there?
Panther: No, that’s me! My secret weapon is that I actually can do a really good falsetto. Despite singing rather low over the years, I can actually sing quite high…
Oh wow, well yeah you have a really nice Bryan Ferry thing going here then. You could have fooled me otherwise! I do think your voice has really opened up on this record, cool to hear you doing different things with it.
Panther: I mean, for all the aforementioned reasons, I wanted to do a record where I was throwing a little bit of shade. This is who I am as a singer, even if it’s not what the scene of the genre expects, you know? I wanted to put my money where my mouth is and pull from things I admire like Ferry or Bowie. I wanted to take a few risks overall.
But no, that ain’t no lady on there, that’s me. I’m happy that you thought it was somebody else because that was also intentionally the goal, to select another style of voice to mix with my already established voice.
Barrett: I’d also like to bring up the fact that it’s the first time Panther has sung in Swedish…
Can you tell us a little bit about that?
Panther: Over the last five years or so, I’ve learned to speak Swedish. I speak Swedish very poorly, but to sing in it was kind of an homage to the story of my life and my family. So, it was a deeply personal thing to do.
So, let’s talk about recording the album with Xavier (Paradis) and how you all collaborated together throughout the last few years. How did the songs come together?
Barrett: The seeds for this album started pretty much after we finished Thin Skies. We immediately started writing some more songs and demoing some rough ideas. Even then, we had this idea of where we wanted to take the sound of the band, and a lot of it actually stemmed from Xavier. He sparked this creative energy in us when he did a remix of “The Jealous Star” over the pandemic. He just nailed this feeling and this vibe that we were already after. Once Alli and Larry left the band, we quickly decided that we’re going all-in on this. We weren’t going to have live drums anymore, for starters, we decided we were going to program them and move in a more electronic direction overall.
Well, it’s not like you weren’t already dabbling with dance music or electronic music before…
Barrett: Right, we always want to get people moving! So the lineup changes and the remix got us to shift gears a little bit and we ended up reworking a lot of older songs for the live set. This is also when our new guitarist, Kalle, came on board. His guitar playing is very different from Alli’s and we really wanted him to shine on this record. That’s always been the ethos within the band – whoever joins the band has a say and gets to put their own stamp on things.
As for Xavier, we really love Automelodi, and of course, as you know, we all have a long shared history together with him as a friend and a collaborator. He really is just so fun to work with. He’s got a great ear, great ideas, and he truly was the “fifth Beatle” on this thing. We treated him like an actual member of the band for this album, and for that his contributions to this album simply cannot be understated.
So, it sounds like in general everything really happened organically even though you had a firm idea of where you wanted the band to go. So now that you have the “great dark yacht rock record” that you both wanted to make for so long, it’s interesting to consider whether or not you might have gotten here if not for all the changes over the years.
Barrett: I think we’ve always been a forward-looking kind of band. While we don’t usually look back at things this way, a few things recently have made us ponder over things a bit more than usual… For starters, this is the 15th year of the band. It’s an anniversary year, and that alone has made us stop and think about the journey we’ve been on, especially as the band’s journey is longer than my own tenure, even. I’m one of those people that believes everything happens for a reason, so perhaps it was destined to come to this…
Let’s talk about Kalle a little bit and what he brings to the band, whether it be a bit of John McGeoch or Carlos Alomar-esque style here, I’ve noticed he’s quite a diverse guitarist in that regard…
Panther: Barrett kind of already said it perfectly before. If you’re in the band, then the requirement is to use your own voice. That’s his voice. I mean, obviously, just with any band, we all are critics of each other and push each other out there a little further, but it’s more about encouraging his own style than it is forcing him to fit in a box.
Barrett: Having three members in a band is great because it provides checks and balances in that way!
Panther: So, with all that in mind, we pretty much let him do whatever he wanted to do on these tracks. I’m just past the point of having a specific goal for a song and being a stick in the mud about it. I’m really into the idea of everyone weighing in with their own personal tastes and opinions because the whole point of working with someone like Xavier or Kalle is that I don’t have their sensibilities, I don’t have their tastes and that’s what makes them invaluable. They’re going to come up with an idea that I couldn’t even think of, not in a million years. That’s what’s really exciting. I mean, we always glorify Bowie here, but like he did over the years, it’s about inviting people to the fold who are more talented than you and and asking them to do what they do, and I think you get much better results doing it that way.
Despite what people may think, I don’t have a strong vision for what the band needs to be. It’s more exciting to let the band carve things out organically.
Barrett: That’s the beauty of collaboration in general. It’s why I could never in a million years even think about doing anything solo! I think the joy is bouncing the idea off somebody else and having it come back and watching it evolve and change over time.
Panther: I think it helps keep the surprise factor…
Paradise certainly plays like a unified album, but it’s been interesting to see the album trickle out as a series of singles over the last two years. I’d love to hear a little bit about your release schedule and what inspired you to put a lot of key tracks out so far in advance.
Barrett: It wasn’t planned this way at all really. Once we got the ball rolling with the songs, we were all so excited that we just wanted to share what we were doing as we were doing it. We always knew that we were putting out an album called Paradise. It was something that we planned out in advance and were building towards.
Of course, part of the trickle-out release schedule was due to Xavier’s extremely busy schedule. He has his own workload with Automelodi and with producing other artists, so with his heavy involvement in this project, we had to work around his schedule by design. As such, when we started finishing songs, we just wanted to put them out there for everyone to enjoy. The intention was always for it to be an album, not a compilation of singles.
Panther: We’ve also had a discussion about how music is consumed now and how much an album truly matters. I think that’s a question that no one completely knows the answer to yet, but because of the disruption of streaming, there are people who always buy records and there are also people who never buy records. So, I think right now there are a lot of question marks in the music industry. Does the old model of how you put out singles or an album work or matter?
I haven’t quite answered that one myself. Everyone has such a short attention span though, and so it’s worth being present in some form or another. It’s also nice to have short, digestible ways for people to enjoy music while building anticipation for the bigger thing…
Panther: Right! We also figured that it was going to be some time before we could put some stuff out with the new lineup. Since we were exploring a new sound, we just wanted to put things out and see what other people thought of it, and to be clear that it might be a while before you get the whole picture. People really have responded to it, though!
Well, even though it’s not a singles collection by design, the album does have a sense of excitement and a kinetic energy about it. It’s banger after banger after banger, except the last track, which is a phenomenal slow burn, the way an album should end. Were there any tracks left behind?
Panther: Oh definitely, there were a few tracks and ideas that were left on the cutting room floor that I actually would consider picking up again. I think we’re really on a roll lately, this is a great workflow for us. I don’t think we’ll be waiting five years for the next album…
Let’s talk about the guest collaborators on this album. You have three tracks with sax, some guest guitar work from an old friend, and of course, contributions from Chris Vrenna from Nine Inch Nails, Tweaker, etc.
Barrett: The sax was from two different performers. We had Benjamin Harrison, who is this guy from Australia who is in a synthwave band called Max Cruz. He played on “Only You.” It was just kind of this happenstance moment where we were talking about putting saxophone on the record and I think Panther just found him on Instagram or something and was like, “My god, this guy is perfect for what to do.” And that was that.
Panther: We wanted that hot solo. No abstraction. The full deal.
Barrett: We sent him a demo version of the track and let him go for it. He was a really nice guy to work with, it was a truly great exchange. We reached out, and what we got back we did not touch in any way, minus a little production magic. His first take is what’s on the record. I remember when Panther and I were listening to it together, we just looked at each other with wide eyes. It was a cool moment because we both have been talking about having a sax solo forever and we finally got it and it was like exactly what we wanted.
We also got Chris Vrenna involved on the same track and that was a joy for very obvious reasons. We had been in touch over the pandemic. He did the remix of “Parallels” for us on Thin Skies Remixed, and we stayed in touch over the years. I love saying I’m friends with Chris Vrenna. He really is a sweetheart. He actually reached out to us out of the blue a while ago and said, “Hey, I’m bored. are you guys working on new material?” So we shipped him some tracks and we were blown away on this record. The best part about it, I’ll be honest, is if you listen to that track, you probably wouldn’t think of Nine Inch Nails.
Well, Chris has such a diverse body of work now with Tweaker and his remixes. He’s grown past Nine Inch Nails in that sense, and to still sound like the band would be pastiche, I’d argue…
Barrett: Right. Exactly. We explained what the vibe we were going for. We sent him a couple of touchstone tracks to kind of get the idea and he was super excited about it. I mean, we literally sent him a Phil Collins song and told him that’s what we were going for, and he was all in.
We also Oskar Carls from Viagra Boys on a couple of tracks!
He plays sax as well, yeah?
Panther: Yep!
Barrett: Kalle knows him because they’re Swedish. They’re old buddies, so he just invited him to work on a couple tracks and similarly we loved what he did. One of my favorite moments on the whole record is that sax/synth breakdown that happens in the middle of “Leipzig.”
Last, but not least, we also got Nico/Alice Gift from Velvet Condom/Liste Noire. Won’t don’t want to leave him out, of course! Nico is a longtime friend of the band who fills in for Kalle on tours when he can’t make it.
I’ve always loved Nico’s swagger, very Placebo in a way.
Barrett: Absolutely. It was really great, too, because “Fade Away” was actually the very last track that got completed for the record. I was already in the middle of coming up with track listing and piecing the whole album together. At the time, I felt like the album was just missing this one thing. It just happened to be that track that unlocked the whole puzzle. As soon as it was done, I popped it in right where it needed to go and just like that, we had an album!
I love when everything comes together like that! So, much has been said about Bootblacks as a formidable live presence. I know you’ve played a few of these songs live so far, but not all of them. Are you excited to play the rest of these songs on stage? Do you feel like they’ll work in sets with the old material? How are you choosing what material fits in best and plays nicely with the rest of your body of work?
Panther: I mean, the new songs, for me, are the highlight of the set and the crowd seems to love them. That’s really the only direct feedback we have in person at the moment. We just haven’t had the time to get the others up and running yet, but we plan to.
Barrett: I think one of the benefits of the transition of the band from the old lineup to this new lineup was when we got rid of the live drums. We went back to the old songs and kind of reworked them to work with the new setup, which happened in parallel to writing the new record. Xavier helped us with that as well, so were looking at the old songs with this fresh lens that brought them in line with our current sound. To be honest, the old songs fit better now than they ever would have before because of that alone.
I’m pretty sure I know the answer to this already, but are you considering re-recording a few of them, like you did with the Part Time Punks sessions?
Barrett: Nah. I mean, while I do like some of the old songs much better now, every album and everything we put out is a bookmark in time. As much as we all love Star Wars, we’re not gonna pull a George Lucas here…
So, with all this said and done – what are your plans for the next year? Do you have any future tours in the works? What’s next overall?
Panther: We’re having a pool party!
Hell yes! Tell us about it.
Barrett: Well, we’ve been doing a lot of work ramping up to this record. A lot of touring. We’ve been overseas more times than I can count. We’ve done so many festivals. At this point, we’re going to take a break to enjoy the summer. This party is to celebrate the album’s release. We’re just going to float in a pool with some friends and soak it all up and revel in those good summer vibes.
Panther: There’s also a lot of things that we’ve never done in the past because we’ve done so much touring. We want to do some other things like more videos and some other creative projects that are a little more relaxed. We love playing live and we’ll definitely tour again, but right now, I don’t know. We don’t want to plan too far ahead right now.
No one can fault you for taking a well-deserved summer vacation, I’d say! Well, may the album receive the love and acclaim it deserves, gents. It’s a great summer record, and I think its the album we all need right now.
Panther: Yeah, I think it was creatively a very fun album to make and I’m proud of the risk we took and I hope people enjoy it.
Barrett: Yeah, for sure. it’s definitely coming out I think at the right time. It seems that people tend to have a better time in their lives over the summer for the most part.
Panther: Not me. I’m Swedish. I love the winter. I like to sit in the darkness…
Barrett: I hope this is the kind of record people can put on and just hang out with, maybe drive to with the top down, enjoy while barbecuing, beaching, and all that fun stuff.
Panther: It’s a “Boys of Summer” for the post-punk set…
A pina colada toast to y’all then! §
Header image by Rose Callahan
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