Interview /// Concrete Playground Talks to Lightspeed Champion
CP talks to Devonté Hynes, the trapper-hatted troubadour behind Lightspeed Champion.
Devonté Hynes was once a member of short-lived punk trio Test Icicles; a band with a titular that -apparently- meant no allusion to the crown jewels whose pronunciation is suspiciously similar. As a band the art-thrashers gained huge success with Circle, Square Triangle a track from their first and last LP 'For Screening Purposes Only'. Ironic then that after the disbanding the members admitted to never never 'really [being] into the music' that seemingly made so many others so happy. Today Hynes is solo effort Lightspeed Champion, the trapper hat wielding musician whose recent 'Life is Sweet! Nice to Meet You' straddles the line between Queen-size 70s rock and grandiose orchestral Neo-classic.
Jasmine Phull catches up with Lighspeed Champion, the Russian hat and oversized frames, while he ponders a life divided by chinese food and chicken sandwiches.
Jasmine Phull: If things had been different I ...
Lightspeed Champion: ...wouldn't be sitting in my bedroom right now contemplating chinese food or a chicken sandwich.
J: Favourite thing about getting up in the morning?
LC: I actually find this a pretty difficult question to answer, everything I think of either sounds sickeningly sweet or just sickening. So let's go with putting on clothes?
J: Most expensive thing you ever bid on on eBay?
LC: I've actually never used eBay in my life. I used Amazon for the first time ever two weeks ago. I'm surprisingly not Internet savvy when it comes to things like that I'm not even on Facebook; my room mate does the Lightspeed one for me and I tell him what to write.
J: Craziest thing a fan has ever done?
LC: Paid for one of my cd's!
J: One thing that scares you?
LC: People paying for my CD's!
J: Straw or no straw?
LC: Straw, always.
J: What's something that you didn't used to have?
LC: Hmm.. I mean. I didn't have an electric piano a few years ago, now I have one and I can't even imagine a life without it.
J: Favourite thing to collect?
LC: Peanuts memorabilia.
J: At what age did you get your first guitar?
LC: 13.
J: Who's your biggest fan?
LC: I have no idea actually, I would say my family, but that's more by default. So who knows who it is?!
J: What type of car do you have?
LC: I don't drive.
J: Your current favourite song?
LC: The dB's - From A Window
J: Your love after music?
LC: Comics.
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