Hot Chip: “Neighbours used to throw eggs at the house to complain about our music!”

In 2023, which pop star sang a snippet of Hot Chip’s indie classic ‘Over and Over’ on tour while brandishing the bisexual flag?

“Was it Harry Styles?”

CORRECT.

“I’m a fan of what he does and I’ve taken my daughter to see him multiple times. It was a surreal moment. On one level, it makes complete sense that he’s aware of Hot Chip because he’s got Sarah Jones drumming with him, who used to be our drummer, but you never know with artists who are extremely successful whether they’re aware of a band like ours. It was a big moment of recognition. It was pleasing – which is the right word because that’s his brand! Tears for Fears covering ‘Boy from School’ was another of those moments. And, when NME named ‘Over and Over’ Track of the Year in 2006*, that top ranking meant a lot.”

*Hot Chip beat out the likes of Amy Winehouse’s ‘Rehab’ and Gossip’s ‘Standing in the Way of Control’ to claim the top spot.

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Name the four members of the fictional boyband in your 2010 ‘I Feel Better’ video.

“Erm… I don’t know any of their names. I watched that video only recently and I’m afraid I can’t score. I could make some guesses – Olly? Gareth?”

WRONG. Kyng, Mar’Vaine, Octavian and Popeye.

“Peter Serafinowicz had hundreds of ideas to choose from for the three videos he directed for us. We loved what he did on that video and, on ‘Night & Day’, he cast [supermodel] Lara Stone and Terence Stamp which was amazing.”

Stamp recently passed away. Memorably, in the video, you had the then-septuagenarian actor lip-syncing to its deadpan rap (“I don’t play no Gabba / I like Zapp not Zappa / So please quit your jibba jabba… Do I look like a rapper?”).

“I think it takes Peter’s brain to work out that’s who should be saying those lyrics! I didn’t get to meet Terrence Stamp. It would have been great to, but his bits were filmed before we were due on set. We did hang out with Lara Stone briefly, and I remember Al [Doyle, guitarist/synth player] buying some Ferrero Rochers that were out of date, and he offered some of those to her. Hopefully, he didn’t poison her!”

What number did you reach on the NME Cool List in 2006?

“Was I in it?! How many numbers are on the list?”

50…

“[Laughs] 46?”

WRONG. 35 – you were sandwiched between Lupe Fiasco and Mike Patton.

“I’ve almost been sandwiched between those two people in real life. I met Lupe Fiasco in Australia on the Big Day Out tour. He was keen to work with me on something, and we almost did, but it never quite happened. I had a strange encounter with Mike Patton because I’d watched his band, Fantômas perform film soundtracks. At the backstage afterparty, we got talking about Cape Fear. I told him I hadn’t seen the [1962] original film, only the Robert De Niro-starring [1991] remake. He replied: I’m not really sure I trust you in that case’. A friend of mine wanted to meet him, and I encouraged him to talk to him. What he tried to say was, ‘I’m a big fan and I don’t know how to put into words how much you mean to me’. However, he was so drunk, it came out as, ‘You’re Mike Patton and I haven’t got anything to say to you’. So Mike Patton turned to him and said, ‘When I leave, I’ll never have to see you again – but you’re stuck with you forever. Which was a damning putdown!

“I remember that interaction vividly in a way I won’t remember certain answers to questions that will be coming up in this quiz!”

Mike Patton said: ‘When I leave, I’ll never have to see you again – but you’re stuck with you forever’

Which two American animated TV series have Hot Chip songs appeared in?

“The Simpsons and erm, I wasn’t aware of another one. King of the Hill?”

WRONG. ‘Boy From School’ does indeed soundtrack a montage of Bart’s weekly routine in the opening of the 2012 The Simpsons episode ‘A Totally Fun Thing That Bart Will Never Do Again’. But you missed out ‘Over and Over’ featuring in the 2017 American Dad! episode ‘Bazooka Steve’.

“I’ve seen the Simpsons one a few times. My wife Kerry is a big Simpsons fan and, luckily for me, she’s also a big Hot Chip fan. She’s always excited when she stumbles across that episode. The idea that an aspect of the show has been written around ‘Boy From School’ – which isn’t our best-known track – was touching. We’ve all grown up watching the show.”

An easy one: which pop star did your Jarvis Cocker-featuring 2021 single ‘Straight to the Morning’ begin life as a demo for?

“We were planning to make it for Dua Lipa.”

CORRECT.

“I sat in a tiny dressing room in the Birmingham O2 Academy on my own – one of the least glamourous and most uninspiring environments you could be in – trying to make a song which could end up being sung by Dua Lipa. It wasn’t the best of starts! There was a time pressure because her team were asking us to make something. I’m glad the song came out the way it did with us and Jarvis, but it would still be good to make something with Dua Lipa, who’s a talented and interesting pop star.

“But ‘Straight to the Morning’ took on its own life. It’s amusing that it started out for Dua Lipa, because Jarvis Cocker is very far away from her. It’s not like we tried to ask somebody who is her equivalent. We were getting to know him around that time and he put his own unique spin on it.

“We’ve had some good times with Jarvis. I remember us DJ-ing back-to-back with him in Les Bains-Douches club in Paris. Before we played, we had dinner at the hotel; Jarvis saved all the toothpicks out of the Club Sandwiches. He wrote a different genre or keyword on each toothpick and placed them on the vinyl turntables and spun the wheel. Whenever the toothpick with the genre pointed to you, you’d have to play, say, ‘a punk song with female vocals’ or ‘a French-language cover version’. They were quite specific genres! He created a chaotic game to respond to each other’s tracks.”

In 2008, which ‘landfill indie’ band covered ‘Ready for the Floor’ for Radio 1’s Live Lounge?

“I don’t know much about landfill indie bands… but is there one called The Pigeon… Detectives?”

CORRECT.

“No disrespect to anyone, but I don’t know that band’s music I’m afraid, and didn’t even know they’d covered it. Lissy Trullie did an indie-rock version. Some of our choruses sound like football chants. There’s an angst in the words and if you don’t sing in my understated way, it can come out as a grungy rock song.”

You co-wrote ‘Into Me You See’ for Katy’s Perry’s 2017 album ‘Witness’. What alliterative two-word genre did she coin for that record?

“Reviews of the album referred to it as her woke record, but I’m guessing she didn’t call it ‘woke pop’?”

WRONG. So close! ‘Purposeful pop’.

“Working with Katy Perry was enjoyable. She was really welcoming of our collaborative ideas, funny and put us at ease working with her in the studio. She was very quick at coming up with amazing vocal melodies with her co-writing partner. We’d play her demos and ideas and talk to her about a melody I had in mind, and within minutes, she’d go into a different room and return with a fully formed set of lyrics on the theme we’d been discussing together, with the right kind of hooks that meant it was an amazing pop song.

“We’d happily do more with her – or people like her. It would be nice to work with Adele. She’s got a great voice and authenticity, and I feel like we could something interesting together.

“It’s only been small news, but Oasis have reformed, and I’ve always thought Liam [Gallagher] has a good voice. When we made the [2010] song ‘Hand Me Down Your Love’, although it wasn’t written for him and it was a personal song, once it was finished, I had the crazy notion that he could do a good cover of it and that I wanted to hear his voice with house music production. His sneer and vocal delivery would have sounded really good over that rhythm track. That was an idea [to work with him on that track] some years ago. He’s got an iconic and unique voice.”

Ever encounter Oasis?

“I met them on the day that ‘Definitely Maybe’ came out [in 1994]. I went to the Virgin Megastore and got the album signed by Liam. Then I met Noel Gallagher the year that Prince died in 2016. While I was DJing a tribute set at Glastonbury, Noel was in the booth. Afterwards, he told me he was disappointed that I didn’t play ‘more hits’, whereas I’d played quite a lot of hits [Laughs]. We had a little chat about that.”

Which two acts did Hot Chip perform between at Glastonbury 2010?

“I know Florence [& the Machine] were on before us. I’ve got a photo of her holding our baby – who’s 16 now. After us? The Flaming Lips?”

CORRECT.

Which five tracks comprise Hot Chip’s 2002 ‘Sanfrandisco E-Pee’?

“‘Sanfrandisco’, ‘Fanta’, ‘I Do’, ‘Making Tracks’ and ‘Flaw’.”

CORRECT.

“We only pressed up around 50 of those CDs. The ‘Sanfrandisco’ track was maybe the second thing we’d made that was trying to be dancefloor-friendly. There was one before that which was just the name of our band spelled out ‘H-O-T-C-H-I-P’, and that was a turning point because it sounded like the production was related to American R&B. We were still at [Cambridge] university, and the first place we could play ‘Sanfrandisco’ live was a university ball.

“Like all of Hot Chip’s music in the early days, it was made in Joe [Goddard, fellow Hot Chip member]’s bedroom in his family home where he grew up, sitting on his bed, playing a keyboard on your lap. His window was covered in broken eggs – because his neighbours were throwing them at his windows to complain about the music we were making!”

Hot Chip performed on Friday Night with Jonathan Ross in 2008. Name any other two guests who appeared on the episode alongside you.

“We had David Attenborough, Ringo Starr, and the actor Samantha Womack.”

CORRECT. Almost a clean sweep – you only missed Womack’s EastEnders co-star Rita Simons! Was Sir Dave partial to Hot Chip’s electropop?

“I don’t think David Attenborough had heard of Hot Chip, but we shared a bowl of crisps with him. I remember him offering some crisps and that was a nice moment. Ringo Starr bonded with Felix [Martin], who does the drum machine programming in the band for the live show. I enjoyed watching those two talking about drums and Liverpool. Being on Jonathan Ross was exactly where we wanted to be: making pop music that was deemed to be something mainstream audiences would want to hear, rather than just being on the outside looking in.”

Bonus question! For an extra half-point, your greatest hits is titled ‘Joy In Repetition’, a nod to Prince and ‘Over and Over’. But how many times is the title ‘Over and Over’ repeated in its radio edit?

“In the chorus of that song, it sounds like I sing the phrase five times which is two-and-a-half times the title of the song. In the radio edit, that probably happens twice so….

Alexis does the maths. Cue the Countdown ticking clock. 

“Is it five times?”

WRONG. Nearly – six.

“Well, we were really driving home the point! [Laughs]”

The verdict: 6/10

“I feel I should have done better, but those questions were challenging! No amount of prepping would have helped me . I’ve been proud to win some music quizzes over the years, but maybe I know more about other people’s music than our career!”

Hot Chip release their Best Of compilation ‘Joy In Repetition‘ on September 5.

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