BLACKIEBLUEBIRD interview

Facts:
– Mastermind Nils Lassen is also known under the pseudonyms (((S))), El Lasso and Mr. Sonic.
– Together with Heidi Lindahl, he founded the project BlackieBlueBird, after which the first album was released in 2018.

Formative Music
The Beatles
The world changed from then on, allowing a dreamy guy like me to persist in a musical and artistic career.

Sex Pistols – “Never Mind the Bollocks”
Once a Punk, always a Punk!

(((S)))- “Ghost” [
My own album from 2009. Sorry for the introspective choice, but my view of how my life could practically be changed the night before Christmas 2009 when I felt sooo alone in Austin, Texas. What was I doing there? I missed my children, I missed everything and suddenly an email appeared that the album was voted the best album of the year worldwide. I lost 100 kg in one second and I could fly!

“And the world never looked the same again.”

We talk to Dane Nils Lassen about the third album of the Dream-Pop project BlackieBlueBird, titled “Grace & Gravity”. We also address the incarnation of a walking heartbeat, chat about beautiful flowers, and wonder what you can find in drawers.

Orkus: Let’s start at the very beginning. How did the name come about when you started the BlackieBlueBird project?
Nils Lassen: As always with good names, there must be a double meaning. Black/blue, heavy/light, sad/happy, things like that, and then it has to feel good in your mouth when you pronounce it with all the Bs. And then you have to make sure it’s the only band with that name when you google it. And last but not least, it must fit very well with the style of music. Sometimes a good band name is hard work…. (winks)

O: How did the album title “Grace & Gravity” come about?
NL: Sometimes it’s nice to work within systems, and here the G is the core. The first album was called “Ghost River”, the second “Goodbye in July”, so the third one had to follow these titles, we thought. And again, there is the lightness due to the grounding aspect. At the same time, every time we met in the studio, we experimented with our hands. And one of these images matched the title. So the pieces kind of fell into place.

O: How can we imagine the work on the album and how did the decision to include soft drumming this time come about?
NL: After two well-received albums, we thought it was time to do the same style again, but a bit different. (If it ain’t broke, why fix it!). I think the drumming gave the music more body without losing the poetic level in the sound design. And of course the drummer is one of the best – Tomas Ortved, a veteran in the Danish music scene. A walking heartbeat. (smiles)

O: I like the simple aesthetic of the video for “The Love We Once Knew” with the beautiful flowers. How did the song come about and what were your thoughts on the visualization?
NL: Oh, thank you! All the roses depicted as ex-lovers holding together in the wind suddenly made sense as I passed a park in late summer and the sun was shining. I hope that’s a common feeling when you meet an ex-lover on the street. The gap between the distance in the moment and the time in which one is merged into one. When and how does something like that happen!? It is a kind of loss, isn’t it?

O: I think so! One song that immediately caught my attention is “Mamachild.” What was the inspiration?
NL: It’s an old song that I found in a drawer and re-recorded. The text has a certain dreamy, surreal quality. It was written the night before my oldest daughter was born. The mother couldn’t sleep because of the contractions, and in that limbo of sleep/no sleep, I thought of all those words and wrote them down. At that point, everything was so new and exciting. And the world never looked the same again.

O: The album seems dreamy on the one hand, melancholic on the other. Would you also describe yourself as melancholic? Or rather as dreamy? Or both?
NL: Both, I think. Aren’t we all? I just focus on staging these emotions in music and lyrics. I still have to take the trash down every other day, so do we all contain everything?

Claudia Zinn-Zinnenburg

Check out the clip for “The Love We One Knew” here:

Enjoy BlackieBlueBird in our Spotify playlist “Dark & Silent”: