Uh Huh Her dish about aliens, Eminem, and early influences

Uh Huh Her made a stop at DC's 9:30 Club on Wednesday, May 14. BOTheads Granola and Taquito caught up with Camila Grey and Leisha Hailey before the show to chat about their new album, the Marfa Lights, and...Eminem?

Read all about it after the jump

Picture this: tiny room, two chairs and an unstoppable Texas connection. Our interview with Leisha Haley and Camila Grey of the electro-indie group Uh Huh Her felt like talking with two old college friends.

BoT: Uh Huh Her is named after a PJ Harvey album...is PJ Harvey your most significant influence?

LH: We love her to death, but it wasn't because of that. We had a list of I think almost a hundred names and we were a three-piece at the time, a girl three-piece, so it fit.

BoT: So if that's not your biggest influence, what is?

LH: For me it comes from lots of different places...music....I don't know, you mean like who do we love music-wise?

BoT: Yes...you know, didn't you have that one album when you were a kid that you were blaring out...

Cam: For me it was classical music and Roy Orbison and definitely 80s synth-pop from Britain.

BoT: And I read something about Neil Diamond...

Cam: A little Neil Diamond but more Roy Orbison than Neil Diamond...my dad force-fed me [Neil Diamond].

LH: Back then for me it would be Madonna, Sinead O'Connor, and 10,000 Maniacs; I think they were my girls in those days.

BoT: So how did your interest in music develop?

LH: I think Cam's is much deeper than mine; I was like a musical theater person.

Cam: You were?!? No way. I had no idea.

LH: Oh my god...huge. I was in all the community musicals. You didn't know that?

Cam: No! (laughs)

LH: One of my best roles, to date, was Oliver. I played Oliver. I was incredible.

BoT: How old?

LH: Let's see, I was in 6th grade and the high school was putting it on and they wanted to cast an actual kid and I looked, completely, like a boy and I could sing so I got the part. And I got to play at all of the high school fairs.

Cam: For me it was with my dad. He played new music from in the womb and then I started listening to classical music and loved the piano and I was like, I want to play that and so I started when I was 5 and never really stopped.

BoT: How many instruments do you actually play?

Cam: I play bass, keys, guitar and sing but piano's my main thing for sure.

BoT: So we know the album got set back a little bit from May to August. What's the main reason? We heard it was to make it more 'pop'. That's the word on the street.

LH: No, it wasn't to make it more pop, I think, and this is our guess, by the way, so we don't know the official reason but, I think the label was expecting an album that sounded a lot like the EP which was very homemade, very lo-fi. So we turned in something a lot more pop and a lot more commercial and so maybe they felt like they hadn't prepared enough promotions...[and] they didn't have enough time to do what they wanted to do.

Cam: It's a good thing.

LH: Yeah, it's a good thing.

BoT: We know you've worked with some different pop artists; would you ever consider a remix?

LH: I just want to meet Eminem. I'm always like, Cam, if I can meet Eminem then I can die happy. I love him.

Cam: You know who I really want to work with? I either want Dre to do a remix or Missy Elliot. I really love her and they work together so it's kind of like a tie. But yeah, I'd love to do that.

Leisha and Cam not only want to try out unique remixes, they also record in unique places. Vocals for the last album, I See Red, originated in a bathroom and they pre-recorded parts of the upcoming album, Common Reaction, in a homemade sound booth they refer to as a "teepee". Their 'teepee-sound booth' idea was laughed at and nixed by famed producer Al Clay (Pink, Blur, the Pixies) who got the duo back into a 'proper' studio. Unconventional thinking seems to come naturally for the two...

BoT: Did somebody buy a house in Marfa, Texas?

LH: I didn't buy. I'm building something there.

BoT: So, have you seen the Marfa Lights?

Both: Yeah.

LH: That's what our song Mystery Lights is about.

BoT: What is your hypothesis about the lights?

Both: Hello...aliens.

Cam: They're trying to communicate with us.

LH: Yeah, they know we're in trouble.

Cam: They're pretty weird; we sat there for like half an hour staring at them.

BoT: Cereal saw you in Houston and there was something mentioned about Texas tattoos during that show?

LH: Wow, they listen to everything...we just get very excited about Texas.

BoT: So?? No tattoos?

Cam: We were going to, but we ran out of time.

BoT: There's a tattoo studio right across the street.

LH: Maybe one day.

BoT: Do you guys have a bus or a van? How do you usually travel?

LH: We have a van-bus. We call it a Vus.

Cam: It's like a sprinter, very European. We have a flat-screen and we watch DVDs.

After four years of avid and complete devotion to Showtime's The L Word, we couldn't let the Alice question pass.

BoT: Okay, so of course you're going to get the "Alice" question...Cereal, in Houston, said that everybody was Leisha/Alice crazy. Does that get annoying?

LH: I would never in my wildest dreams call it annoying. It's a huge part of my life and is something I'm really proud of. I just want people to come for the music so, the fact they're here is amazing. We're so flipping lucky that anyone's coming to see us at all and we're playing to these amazing audiences. That was the first battle, having people at the door. Now I just hope they come back because they like what they see and they'll start coming for the band. You know, I can feel that coming. I feel the shift. Our fans are amazing; they're so supportive and energetic.

BoT: Music and beat first or lyrics first?

Both: Music first.

BoT: Who does what?

LH: Cam loves the production stuff so we write things together then she likes to -

Cam: - put it all together.

And, if you're wondering about their favorite breakfast food:

Cam: I'm actually not really much on breakfast but if I'm forced to eat it ummm...I definitely like scrambled eggs with cheese, egg whites actually.

LH: My perfect breakfast would be like – I love breakfast – it'd be whole yogurt, like whole milk yogurt, plain. And I get to put maple syrup on it and maybe some strawberries and then a piece of rice toast with almond butter. That would be awesome.

Common Reaction hits stores August 19th. UHH have a few more dates left in their current North American tour, and they also recently launched a webisode series; check out the details at their official website.

Interview and article by Granola and Taquito.