During the time Ive known Eric Victorino and Giovanni Giusti, Ive had some of the best nights of my life. Giovanni is from my hometown a small suburb a stones throw away from the lively, honest and culture rich city of San Francisco, where we attended the same small town high school. I met him while living in Oakland with an old boyfriend of mine. Both of them studied sound engineering at a local college. Giovanni would endlessly pound away on his beat machine, day in and day out. To this day, he hasnt changed a bit; I cant say the same for many people from our small town, which has become seemingly plagued with tragedy and wasted youth, drug addiction, suicide, and reckless destruction in general.
I met Eric, the other essential half of the Limousines at a music video shoot for their song The Future. Instantly he fascinated me with his delicate prose, even during a simple conversation. What struck me most was his kind spirit. Eric and Giovanni have an auteur theory if you will, their medium being words and melody. Unlike so many peers in our society of constraint, boundaries and bullshit, they arent afraid to say what they think, or communicate simple and empirical observations of the natural world.
Right now Eric and Giovanni are touring Europe with The Sounds, so I jumped at the opportunity to pick their brains and hit on them in the most subtle of ways. This is what transpired...
Carrina Suicide: Youre touring all over Europe right now with The Sounds. Hows it going?
Eric Victorino: Yeah, this has really been a dream come true for us, getting to see all these cities, meeting people from all over. The coolest shit is when we have these moments like, "we're 5,000 miles from home and people are singing along with our songs" - We're really lucky to be doing what we do. The nightlife has been an interesting thing to check out - The clubs are fucking weird, in some places they're dancing their asses off to Linkin Park songs from 2003, other places they're already bored of shit we haven't even heard yet.
CS: Do you think youll return to the states with bleached hair, loafers and perhaps even tighter jeans? Cause that might be hot. Ive been told Europeans like to wear really colorful stretchy briefs, too. Oh dear, Im getting off track...
EV: Ha, I dont think my hair could be any more bleached or my pants any tighter!
CS: From the photos Ive seen the venues were packed. Is there any particular place you really loved to play? Ive been to your shows in the US, packed with kids screaming the lyrics to all your songs. I hope the Europeans didnt outdo us.
EV: Some of these shows have been the first time in town for The Sounds so they haven't been as huge as, say Barcelona, Madrid or Munich - But they've got some really passionate fans. The Budapest show was kinda smaller in comparison but we had a lot of kids singing along with us there, we've had fans in every city, but for whatever reason the Hungarians really gave us some love. For a band that started the way we did, on only our third tour ever, just nuts. We've played a bunch of Germany dates on the tour so I've gotten to use some of the German I learned in high school.
CS: You are both northern California natives. What do you think growing up and being young in the SF bay area had to do with your lyrical style and sound?
EV: I think where we're from might be partly responsible for our willingness to specifically mention things like photoshop and the Internet in our lyrics. We love the Bay, we love the support we've gotten from our hometown, it feels really great after having been a part of the local scene for so long, but I don't think that's influenced our sound much - When we started out there weren't really any electronic duos in the Bay. Mostly heavy rock bands. Lots of Hip Hop groups like us I guess, but nobody else really had the guts, or was stupid enough to be like, "fuck it, we don't need a gang of dudes to start a band, let's write songs and book some shows" - Now, a couple years into it the Bay Area is crawling with bands with all types of non-traditional lineups and instruments and a lot of 'electro-pop duos' It could be a big coincidence it happened that way, but I have my doubts.
CS: Speaking of youth, from spending some time with you guys, I can safely say the term isnt necessarily a past tense description. Maybe growing up is a lifelong process. Do you try to incorporate your learning experiences and evolving within your music?
EV: This is the part where I'll throw a bunch of clichs at you like, yeah our next album is gonna be more mature and complex and blah blah blah... But it's true, we started out not writing together much, and some of my favorite songs on Get Sharp were the ones we actually wrote with the two of us in the same room, so I'm looking forward to making a lot more music that way. We've also both gone through some heavy shit in our personal lives since the last album. We've had tons of friends die in random ways, I've been diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder, relationships have fallen apart, just a rough couple of years So while we'll probably always write some fun, catchy stuff, I think that darker side we've hinted at on Get Sharp will be a lot more evident as we go on.
CS: Theres lots of brilliant minds whove been diagnosed as bipolar. Its certainly inhibiting at times... but my thoughts are that it could make your style unique, not in that youll find yourself spiratically purchasing four thousand dollars of taxidermy memorabilia (or who knows, really) but... that it adds a kind of elusive quality to your creativity?
EV: The list of badasses on the Ole Bipolar team is pretty impressive. You know, the logic of like, this mental disorder can be pretty bad sometimes but it makes me who I am and it might be partly to blame for my creativity sounds OK when Im feeling good. Saying that when Im going through the tough parts would be like saying man this stomach cancers gonna kill me someday but I sure do get a lot of writing done when Im stuck in bed! It sucks being like this. I hate it. But Im determined to try my best to live with it and not have to be hospitalized again.
CS: Eric, youve published two books. Coma Therapy first, followed by Trading Shadows for Sunshine. Ive read them both and to say the least I was shocked, touched, and terrified. Youre kinda creepy and lovable at the same time. Doyou think the Limousines lyrics also vary in this same way?
EV: Creepy and lovable at the same time is a tough look to pull off! Limos lyrics definitely have two sides to them. Take a song like The Future, with the lyric "there's nothing we can say that people won't forget someday, there's nothing we can do that matters and that's okay" it's about how temporary we are as people. How unimportant we really are. On a long enough timeline nothing any of us do really matters. Not even presidents or sports heroes or people dropping nukes, nobody matters from a million feet up looking down or a million years later. I think the idea of god or any other intelligent supernatural being manipulating our lives judging our actions or giving a fuck what we do with our bodies is just plain silly.
CS: Its refreshing to hear an artist publicly talk about things that are typically avoided so as not to offend. I was recently very impressed by Greg Graffins (lead singer of Bad Religion) Anarchy Evolution, from which we can conclude that after taking any evolutionary biology course, it may not be so necessary to be sending little Johnny to Sunday school classes.
EV: It's like a story you'd tell your kids to bribe them into being good, like using Santa Claus to make them behave during Christmas time but it's adults doing it to each other all year with Jesus, it's just crazy stuff if you're looking at it from the outside.
CS: People tend to get caught up when theyre faced with fire and brimstone and bullshit. Im not as sure about the south bay as I am the east, but the kids I went to school with all got mad at me on Halloween when I stuffed a 40 in my pillow case. Cause your not afraid to be the way you are, were you sort of an outsider when you were a kid?
EV: I feel like I live in the middle of a weird worldwide theme park but I can't see any of the characters or something. So anyway, I get some of my views out in that song in sort of a condensed way but it's pretty at the same time and it's poppy and catchy. That's always fun, to sing that song and watch people dancing to lyrics about how little our lives matter and we should just try to laugh and love and fuck.
CS: Laughing and loving and fucking. Thats amazing.
EV: Who cares about anything else? I don't.
CS: Giovanni, your background is in sound engineering. I remember when we were young you would be on your beat machine, incessantly going at it every single day. Youve always been very passionate about music. Back then, what did you think would come of it?
Giovanni Giusti: I thought I would end up a hip-hop producer for a crew, doing remixes for hip-hop labels and eventually marrying a black backup singer or something. I really never thought much of it, I was wrapped up in my love for making music and I never cared where it would take me - I was fascinated with the technical aspect of producing and creating new sounds, the rest of life's bullshit would disappear while I was locked in my room making music. I was around a lot of kids doing the same thing, trying to impress each other with what we could make - Trying to make each other jealous with our skills. There were internet forums I'd post my beats on, that kinda started getting me noticed. I never dreamed I'd be sitting in Prague, Czech Republic answering interview questions, no way.
CS: Since Eric previously performed in Strata, and Giovanni composed music on his own under the name Nozebleed, how did you guys get together? Seems kind of like a match made in heaven. Literally, cause Ive seen pictures of you guys kissing. In the most manly fashion, of course. Its pretty adorable.
GG: We were introduced by our mutual friend Sam Pura who runs Panda Studios, we started to collaborate via email while I was in England recording the last Strata album and he was at home in the East Bay making beats for local hip hop artists. I really love Gio a lot. The fact that we got along when we met and have grown so close as friends in the years we've been doing this is really what kept the Limousines going. If we hadn't clicked when we met we wouldn't be doing it at all right now. Those couple songs we did when we were separated by the Atlantic ocean would have just been some random stuff I'd show my friends now, like "hey check out these songs I made with this one dude a while back."And yeah, I like to kiss him on the mouth on stage sometimes, it freaks out the homophobes, weeds out the idiots in the crowd. Sometimes it's even up on the jumbo-screen at festivals 'n stuff...
CS: You have two videos out now, The Future and Internet Killed the Video Star. Some people might call the latter morose or macabre with multiple death scenes and the demise of a Delorean. As for IKTVS, theres blood and guts and zombies. Could you offer a bit of insight to those who might just say youre out of your fucking minds?
EV: We didn't set out to make two violent music videos, but we hate performance videos, so it's on us to come up with a concept that can keep your attention for a few minutes. When I wrote the treatment for the zombie video, Gio thought I was nuts, like there was no way we could pull off something so complicated. Then when he wrote the idea for the Future video I said the same thing to him. How the fuck could we pull that off? I mean, I happened to know a guy who owns a perfect replica of the Delorean from Back To The Future, but how are we gonna do the rest of it? We're both really into movies and video games as much as we're into music, so we just have a high standard - and short attention spans, so if something can't keep us interested it's not gonna get made.
CS: So howd you pull it off?
EV: Both videos were directed by David Dutton of Dutton Films in San Francisco, without his tireless work ethic and patience we'd never have pulled those videos off. He'd been like a third member of the band when it comes to our videos.
CS: Since you guys mentioned it, SG fans are really into video games (theres a group dedicated to it) and obviously music and movies as well. Are you guys secretly Elven characters on some dimension in World of Warcraft or some shit?
EV:Ahem no! No way, ummm that stuffs for nerds? Yeah thats it.
CS: Mhm. Sure thing, Eric! While were on the topic of the future, what would you like for it to hold?
EV: I'd love to see stem cell based medicine make things like cancer and Parkinson's Disease, paralysis and organ failure a thing of the past.
CS: If it becomes a reality, can I have your consent to clone the both of you for my own personal entertainment? And or otherwise?
EV: Ill put it in my will, you can have my zombie clone!
CS: Awesome! Please do so at your earliest convenience.
EV: It'll happen sooner than we think, but I'm scared it's not gonna be Americans doing it, since our country seems to have forgotten all about the separation of church and state, plus people are too lazy to read up about how it all works. Nano-technology is going to draw a line in history the same way we have B.C. and A.D. for years. There will be a point when common technology is indiscernible from magic to the ignorant people in the world. The same way having a functioning iPhone would make you a God if you managed to take it back to the 17th century, there are going to be technologies in everyday use that stupid people refuse to believe in. I'd also like to see batteries you only have to charge like once a month. Driverless cars are going to be fantastic. I'm really excited to be alive right now because I know I'm going to see all these things happen, well, I don't KNOW I'll be alive, but I hope I make it.
CS: I hope you do too. The both of you are a couple of my favorite human beings. On a final note, thanks for taking the time to answer my questions. Eric, youre a great songwriter and Giovanni, you are a fucking mad scientist. It seems inevitable you guys are gonna go far. Youre fulfilling a dream that lots of people might call unrealistic or silly to chase. What would you say in response to that?
EV: I'd say you're a fucking sweetheart, and thank you for being naked in our video!
The Limousines latest album Get Sharp is out now.
I met Eric, the other essential half of the Limousines at a music video shoot for their song The Future. Instantly he fascinated me with his delicate prose, even during a simple conversation. What struck me most was his kind spirit. Eric and Giovanni have an auteur theory if you will, their medium being words and melody. Unlike so many peers in our society of constraint, boundaries and bullshit, they arent afraid to say what they think, or communicate simple and empirical observations of the natural world.
Right now Eric and Giovanni are touring Europe with The Sounds, so I jumped at the opportunity to pick their brains and hit on them in the most subtle of ways. This is what transpired...
Carrina Suicide: Youre touring all over Europe right now with The Sounds. Hows it going?
Eric Victorino: Yeah, this has really been a dream come true for us, getting to see all these cities, meeting people from all over. The coolest shit is when we have these moments like, "we're 5,000 miles from home and people are singing along with our songs" - We're really lucky to be doing what we do. The nightlife has been an interesting thing to check out - The clubs are fucking weird, in some places they're dancing their asses off to Linkin Park songs from 2003, other places they're already bored of shit we haven't even heard yet.
CS: Do you think youll return to the states with bleached hair, loafers and perhaps even tighter jeans? Cause that might be hot. Ive been told Europeans like to wear really colorful stretchy briefs, too. Oh dear, Im getting off track...
EV: Ha, I dont think my hair could be any more bleached or my pants any tighter!
CS: From the photos Ive seen the venues were packed. Is there any particular place you really loved to play? Ive been to your shows in the US, packed with kids screaming the lyrics to all your songs. I hope the Europeans didnt outdo us.
EV: Some of these shows have been the first time in town for The Sounds so they haven't been as huge as, say Barcelona, Madrid or Munich - But they've got some really passionate fans. The Budapest show was kinda smaller in comparison but we had a lot of kids singing along with us there, we've had fans in every city, but for whatever reason the Hungarians really gave us some love. For a band that started the way we did, on only our third tour ever, just nuts. We've played a bunch of Germany dates on the tour so I've gotten to use some of the German I learned in high school.
CS: You are both northern California natives. What do you think growing up and being young in the SF bay area had to do with your lyrical style and sound?
EV: I think where we're from might be partly responsible for our willingness to specifically mention things like photoshop and the Internet in our lyrics. We love the Bay, we love the support we've gotten from our hometown, it feels really great after having been a part of the local scene for so long, but I don't think that's influenced our sound much - When we started out there weren't really any electronic duos in the Bay. Mostly heavy rock bands. Lots of Hip Hop groups like us I guess, but nobody else really had the guts, or was stupid enough to be like, "fuck it, we don't need a gang of dudes to start a band, let's write songs and book some shows" - Now, a couple years into it the Bay Area is crawling with bands with all types of non-traditional lineups and instruments and a lot of 'electro-pop duos' It could be a big coincidence it happened that way, but I have my doubts.
CS: Speaking of youth, from spending some time with you guys, I can safely say the term isnt necessarily a past tense description. Maybe growing up is a lifelong process. Do you try to incorporate your learning experiences and evolving within your music?
EV: This is the part where I'll throw a bunch of clichs at you like, yeah our next album is gonna be more mature and complex and blah blah blah... But it's true, we started out not writing together much, and some of my favorite songs on Get Sharp were the ones we actually wrote with the two of us in the same room, so I'm looking forward to making a lot more music that way. We've also both gone through some heavy shit in our personal lives since the last album. We've had tons of friends die in random ways, I've been diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder, relationships have fallen apart, just a rough couple of years So while we'll probably always write some fun, catchy stuff, I think that darker side we've hinted at on Get Sharp will be a lot more evident as we go on.
CS: Theres lots of brilliant minds whove been diagnosed as bipolar. Its certainly inhibiting at times... but my thoughts are that it could make your style unique, not in that youll find yourself spiratically purchasing four thousand dollars of taxidermy memorabilia (or who knows, really) but... that it adds a kind of elusive quality to your creativity?
EV: The list of badasses on the Ole Bipolar team is pretty impressive. You know, the logic of like, this mental disorder can be pretty bad sometimes but it makes me who I am and it might be partly to blame for my creativity sounds OK when Im feeling good. Saying that when Im going through the tough parts would be like saying man this stomach cancers gonna kill me someday but I sure do get a lot of writing done when Im stuck in bed! It sucks being like this. I hate it. But Im determined to try my best to live with it and not have to be hospitalized again.
CS: Eric, youve published two books. Coma Therapy first, followed by Trading Shadows for Sunshine. Ive read them both and to say the least I was shocked, touched, and terrified. Youre kinda creepy and lovable at the same time. Doyou think the Limousines lyrics also vary in this same way?
EV: Creepy and lovable at the same time is a tough look to pull off! Limos lyrics definitely have two sides to them. Take a song like The Future, with the lyric "there's nothing we can say that people won't forget someday, there's nothing we can do that matters and that's okay" it's about how temporary we are as people. How unimportant we really are. On a long enough timeline nothing any of us do really matters. Not even presidents or sports heroes or people dropping nukes, nobody matters from a million feet up looking down or a million years later. I think the idea of god or any other intelligent supernatural being manipulating our lives judging our actions or giving a fuck what we do with our bodies is just plain silly.
CS: Its refreshing to hear an artist publicly talk about things that are typically avoided so as not to offend. I was recently very impressed by Greg Graffins (lead singer of Bad Religion) Anarchy Evolution, from which we can conclude that after taking any evolutionary biology course, it may not be so necessary to be sending little Johnny to Sunday school classes.
EV: It's like a story you'd tell your kids to bribe them into being good, like using Santa Claus to make them behave during Christmas time but it's adults doing it to each other all year with Jesus, it's just crazy stuff if you're looking at it from the outside.
CS: People tend to get caught up when theyre faced with fire and brimstone and bullshit. Im not as sure about the south bay as I am the east, but the kids I went to school with all got mad at me on Halloween when I stuffed a 40 in my pillow case. Cause your not afraid to be the way you are, were you sort of an outsider when you were a kid?
EV: I feel like I live in the middle of a weird worldwide theme park but I can't see any of the characters or something. So anyway, I get some of my views out in that song in sort of a condensed way but it's pretty at the same time and it's poppy and catchy. That's always fun, to sing that song and watch people dancing to lyrics about how little our lives matter and we should just try to laugh and love and fuck.
CS: Laughing and loving and fucking. Thats amazing.
EV: Who cares about anything else? I don't.
CS: Giovanni, your background is in sound engineering. I remember when we were young you would be on your beat machine, incessantly going at it every single day. Youve always been very passionate about music. Back then, what did you think would come of it?
Giovanni Giusti: I thought I would end up a hip-hop producer for a crew, doing remixes for hip-hop labels and eventually marrying a black backup singer or something. I really never thought much of it, I was wrapped up in my love for making music and I never cared where it would take me - I was fascinated with the technical aspect of producing and creating new sounds, the rest of life's bullshit would disappear while I was locked in my room making music. I was around a lot of kids doing the same thing, trying to impress each other with what we could make - Trying to make each other jealous with our skills. There were internet forums I'd post my beats on, that kinda started getting me noticed. I never dreamed I'd be sitting in Prague, Czech Republic answering interview questions, no way.
CS: Since Eric previously performed in Strata, and Giovanni composed music on his own under the name Nozebleed, how did you guys get together? Seems kind of like a match made in heaven. Literally, cause Ive seen pictures of you guys kissing. In the most manly fashion, of course. Its pretty adorable.
GG: We were introduced by our mutual friend Sam Pura who runs Panda Studios, we started to collaborate via email while I was in England recording the last Strata album and he was at home in the East Bay making beats for local hip hop artists. I really love Gio a lot. The fact that we got along when we met and have grown so close as friends in the years we've been doing this is really what kept the Limousines going. If we hadn't clicked when we met we wouldn't be doing it at all right now. Those couple songs we did when we were separated by the Atlantic ocean would have just been some random stuff I'd show my friends now, like "hey check out these songs I made with this one dude a while back."And yeah, I like to kiss him on the mouth on stage sometimes, it freaks out the homophobes, weeds out the idiots in the crowd. Sometimes it's even up on the jumbo-screen at festivals 'n stuff...
CS: You have two videos out now, The Future and Internet Killed the Video Star. Some people might call the latter morose or macabre with multiple death scenes and the demise of a Delorean. As for IKTVS, theres blood and guts and zombies. Could you offer a bit of insight to those who might just say youre out of your fucking minds?
EV: We didn't set out to make two violent music videos, but we hate performance videos, so it's on us to come up with a concept that can keep your attention for a few minutes. When I wrote the treatment for the zombie video, Gio thought I was nuts, like there was no way we could pull off something so complicated. Then when he wrote the idea for the Future video I said the same thing to him. How the fuck could we pull that off? I mean, I happened to know a guy who owns a perfect replica of the Delorean from Back To The Future, but how are we gonna do the rest of it? We're both really into movies and video games as much as we're into music, so we just have a high standard - and short attention spans, so if something can't keep us interested it's not gonna get made.
CS: So howd you pull it off?
EV: Both videos were directed by David Dutton of Dutton Films in San Francisco, without his tireless work ethic and patience we'd never have pulled those videos off. He'd been like a third member of the band when it comes to our videos.
CS: Since you guys mentioned it, SG fans are really into video games (theres a group dedicated to it) and obviously music and movies as well. Are you guys secretly Elven characters on some dimension in World of Warcraft or some shit?
EV:Ahem no! No way, ummm that stuffs for nerds? Yeah thats it.
CS: Mhm. Sure thing, Eric! While were on the topic of the future, what would you like for it to hold?
EV: I'd love to see stem cell based medicine make things like cancer and Parkinson's Disease, paralysis and organ failure a thing of the past.
CS: If it becomes a reality, can I have your consent to clone the both of you for my own personal entertainment? And or otherwise?
EV: Ill put it in my will, you can have my zombie clone!
CS: Awesome! Please do so at your earliest convenience.
EV: It'll happen sooner than we think, but I'm scared it's not gonna be Americans doing it, since our country seems to have forgotten all about the separation of church and state, plus people are too lazy to read up about how it all works. Nano-technology is going to draw a line in history the same way we have B.C. and A.D. for years. There will be a point when common technology is indiscernible from magic to the ignorant people in the world. The same way having a functioning iPhone would make you a God if you managed to take it back to the 17th century, there are going to be technologies in everyday use that stupid people refuse to believe in. I'd also like to see batteries you only have to charge like once a month. Driverless cars are going to be fantastic. I'm really excited to be alive right now because I know I'm going to see all these things happen, well, I don't KNOW I'll be alive, but I hope I make it.
CS: I hope you do too. The both of you are a couple of my favorite human beings. On a final note, thanks for taking the time to answer my questions. Eric, youre a great songwriter and Giovanni, you are a fucking mad scientist. It seems inevitable you guys are gonna go far. Youre fulfilling a dream that lots of people might call unrealistic or silly to chase. What would you say in response to that?
EV: I'd say you're a fucking sweetheart, and thank you for being naked in our video!
The Limousines latest album Get Sharp is out now.