Another Mindless Rip Off: A Conversation With Little Jimmy Urine
by Erin Broadley for SuicideGirls (http://suicidegirls.com/)

Mindless Self Indulgence frontman Little Jimmy Urine has eight profiles on Myspace, none of which are really him. It’s not a split personality type of thing, it’s a geeky fan-boy type of thing—one that Jimmy understands because who wouldn’t want to play dress up and emulate the tour de force vocalist and electronic composer extraordinaire. Jimmy describes Mindless Self Indulgence’s music as “industrial jungle pussy punk.” One could also describe it as bastardized pop music that makes it okay to enjoy getting sweaty and rowdy in the pit again—smeared makeup, the sting of glitter in your eyes, torn stockings and all. The band (completed by guitarist Steve, Righ?, drummer Kitty, and bassist Lyn Z) is currently working on its follow up to 2005’s You’ll Rebel To Anything (Metropolis Records). Little Jimmy Urine set aside some time to give SuicideGirls the scoop.

Erin Broadley: So what’s new with Mindless Self Indulgence? I was told you guys have been holed up in an LA recording studio.

Little Jimmy Urine: Yes, I’m writing a new record, a full length. And then there’s the EP that we just put out called Another Mindless Rip Off. It’s out exclusively in all Hot Topic stores. Lots of our fans are also fans of Hot Topic so…

EB: Did you knock out Another Mindless Rip Off during the same recording sessions as the full length?

LJU: Actually, I didn’t need to really go into the studio for the EP. I just knocked that out on my laptop. Welcome to the future! You can do it on your phone. Everything has been going good in the studio. I’m always writing, wherever I am. The phone’s got a Dictaphone on it so you can just pick it up and [sing whatever you want] and leave yourself little messages or email it to yourself. That’s the future. Everything is MP3s on the phone or your laptop. I pretty much sold any recording equipment in a rack I had from a couple years ago—except my Atari. I sleep with my Atari at night. I do most of my stuff on it.

EB: So, your last album came out in early 2005…

LJU: Yeah, a while ago now. We’re still running on it, which is kind off crazy. It came out in April 2005 but the singles came out after the record. “Straight to Video” went on the charts, and then we released “Shut Me Up” and that went on the charts. It’s ass-backwards but it works for us because we have a very dedicated fan base and an odd way of doing it. We know how to make that ass-backwards way work. So hey, if it ain’t broke and it’s paying rent then I’m all for it.

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EB: Let’s talk some more about the EP.

LJU: It came out December 5th. We did it literally in two weeks. At first it seemed like we had plenty of time and then, like, overnight it turned into two weeks. So the artwork and all the songs were done in two weeks. And we threw on five or six remixes from different people. The best thing about MSI is that it’s not really a “band.” Nothing we do is very traditional. I hate musicians. I fucking can’t stand musicians. I’m making shit up as I go along anyway. I don’t know how to read or write music. I don’t think a lot of people do. I found my friends that could play instruments so when we’re on tour it’s great because it’s like hanging out with my friends. Usually for a month after tour, nobody’s called anybody unless it’s for business or a photo shoot or something. But then when we’re on tour, it’s like, forget about it! We’re all in the back playing videogames, we have all these inside jokes. It’s not just some guitarist that I met like, “Oooh he can wail!” I fucking hate that shit.

EB: Is the writing process pretty much collaborative?

LJU: No. It is and it isn’t. I’ll usually write the whole song and then when I’ve got it pretty much down with samples and programming, I’ll run it past Steve and he’ll give me some input. Then, if there’s anything that needs to be changed, as a band we sit down and see what we’re going to add or get rid of, what’s going to be looped, what’s going to be live, what’s going to stay synthesized and shit like that. Then we go into the studio and record it. We’ve just been on this last record forever and I’m surprised it’s still chugging along.

EB: Yeah, people are still talking about it like it’s brand new.

LJU: Some people are still talking about the record before it like it’s brand new. It’s nice in a way because we’re very non-conventional in the way we work but our records consistently sell. They just sit there and sell. We’re like the little engine that could. We’re just kind of chugging along and its great. I mean, I’m writing new stuff all the time. But now, I don’t think people realize the scope has changed dramatically in the music business. And not even just bands but retail. There’s not going to be CDs in a couple of years. Everything is closing; Tower Records went out of business. The only place you can get CDs now is either mom-and-pop stores (which are all getting killed by those Wal-Mart things) or a Wal-Mart-type store. That landscape is going to be changing soon and it might all be empty for a reason.

EB: Everyone is buying off iTunes, Amazon, or other online stores.

LJU: Well shit, I’m not even buying on iTunes! I’m an artist and I don’t even give a shit about that. I get all my shit on Limewire. It’s not even about caring about the artist. It’s about what the artist’s giving you. The artist hopefully is giving you an extra track or different artwork a DVD or something extra with the package when you commit to buying it. A lot of people are looking for new stuff. It’s not just about stealing.

EB: Let's talk about your audience. I saw an MSI show earlier this year at the Henry Fonda Theater in Hollywood and the crowd was pretty esoteric. There was even a guy in a banana costume who went crowd surfing.

LJU: I love that. That’s the crowd entertaining me, which I like because I’m bored just standing up there. That’s why I do the things I do on stage. I want to entertain people. I want to entertain my own band. When we’re on stage we all try to give each other the middle finger at inopportune times just to piss off the other person. I’ll bring people on stage. We do whatever’s clever that night. As a band, we’ll try to pull little pranks on each other during the show, even if it fucks up the show. I love the fact that the fans are into it like it’s Rocky Horror or it’s a convention. I love seeing kids in masked outfits or kids dressed up. They understand the whole thing. It’s entertainment. I’m more in the business of entertainment than I am in the business of bands. If you want to see a band, then go see Coldplay or somebody who’s gonna play instruments. If you want to be entertained, then come see us. I like that idea. I don’t even listen to [band] music anymore. People are like, “Who’s your favorite band?” and I’m like, “I don’t know.” All I do is rent movies. I don’t find any inspiration in other music…just movies. If somebody gave me $100, I wouldn’t buy one CD. I’d go spend it all on DVDs.

EB: How involved are you with your fans?

LJU: Very involved. And not just with signing autographs. When we’re done with a show, not only do we sit behind the barricade and sign autographs all night, but we will stay until they kick every kid out. Sometimes we’ll go out to the parking lot and hang out with them in the parking lot. We’re also very active online and we love it. The Internet is just great for that. We can reach just about anybody. It’s just another tool. Even before we met up tonight I was checking my emails. I keep it easy and have always had the same email address. And it doesn’t take me that much time to write one little thing back to fans. I don’t have to sit there and get super involved…just enough to get them up and say hi. But that’s the connection we have. I mean, we are kind of acquaintances. They’ve come to shows, I’ve been at the shows…we’ve all been at the same shows.

EB: You’ve sweated on each other.

LJU: Of course. They spit on me, I spit on them. [Whispers] Sorry for all the gonorrhea…

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EB: How has the press treated you? The critics? Is there anything you would change, if you could, about MSI’s relationship with the press?

LJU: I think a lot of people get it, others don’t. It’s really fun for us because people absolutely fuckin’ love us or absolutely fuckin’ hate us. Which is really helpful. I like that. I’d rather have someone absolutely detest it and think it’s crap and have someone think it’s absolutely wonderful than just be boring. The boring stuff is just boring. Even if you hate something, if you hear a jingle or see something on TV that you hate, you still talk about it forever. The industry is the same as the kids, they’re either sitting there with our sticker in their cubicle or not. I don’t give a shit about picking up a guitar and being a rock god. Why would I want to be in a “band”? I don’t even really like rock and roll. I just like entertaining people. When it comes to writing music, I want to put in everything that I like. I like video games, I like movies, I like this person’s beats or that person's rhymes. I just want to stick it all in one little bubblegum machine and put in a quarter and see what happens.

Generally I think everyone in the industry—whether you’re the guy programming the radio, whether you’re a musician, whether you’re at a magazine or at a record label—everything has been set up so that square pegs fit in square holes. We’re a fucking hexagon. So what the fuck do you do with us? We know what to do with us but nobody else does. So it's very hard and you have to teach them what to do. The nice thing is that we just did it anyway. We didn’t wait around really for too many people to get a clue. We decided that if no one else would, then we’d put the record out ourselves. We’re oddballs but we’re also very comfortable in our own skin. We’re not like, “Oh, woe is me. Nobody gets us cuz we’re this hexagon and it’s their fault.” We do what we need to do and we get it done.

Photos By: Jersey

web address: http://suicidegirls.com/interviews/Another+Mindless+Rip+Off%3A+A+Conversation+With+Little+Jimmy+Urine/