LA, Style Evolution, and His favorite crowd: We Interviewed George Clanton Post-European Tour

I spoke with george clanton almost the second his european tour was done, just after his last show in Paris. Fresh off the stage AND ON A HIGH FROM THE EXTREMELY RECEPTIVE CROWD AT lE pETIT bAIN, OUR PHOTOGRAPHER SIXTINE CAIL and I talked to him WHILE WE TOOK SOME BACKSTAGE PHOTOS. I had been listening to George’s music on repeat for the past year so this was a huge deal for me. Here’s how it went:

Image by Sixtine Cail

Sixtine: Are you comfortable with everything?

George: More or less. How's my hair?

Noize: It's good.

George: Yeah, that's what everyone says, but they're wrong 100% of the time.

Sixtine: We want it a little bit wild.

George: I wanted it to kind of stick up, just perfectly so. Like it's perfectly tussled with. On accident. Like what did Austin Butler do? What would Austin Butler do?

Noize: That's a question. Hell yeah. Give us a little start action.

George: This one's for Austin Butler, bitch. Austin Butler actually had sex with me.

Noize: Oh. No way! On the record? That actually is on the record. I'm gonna quote you on that. That's the headline.

George: It's not gay, it's like an LA thing.

Noize: How are you feeling on the last day of the tour?

George: Miserable.

Noize: Really? I was watching. It seemed like a lot, like losing luggage and shit, right?

George: (posing for photos) It's just hard for me to not be silly with it. You know what I'm saying?

Noize: Be silly with it, girl. Be silly with it.

George: I have to be a little bit silly.

sixtine: Yeah, you can do whatever you want to.

George: You have to live with it.

Noize: Oh, we will print it, babe.

George: Because if I'm trying to look hot, it's just kind of gross. It's like rapey.

sixtine: No, but I prefer to look natural. That's why I like people to talk when I take pictures.

George: Yeah, me too. I prefer to talk too.

Noize: So are you from LA or did you move there?

George: Oh, you think I'm from LA?

Noize: I thought.

George: Are you from LA?

Noize: Yeah, girl.

george: Oh, then you wouldn't understand. I'm from the Appalachian Mountains. I'm a redneck. I'm a full redneck. But God bless LA.

Noize: So you were a transplant.

George: I am a transplant.

Sixtine: Just look at the camera, it's your face.

George: What am I doing? This won't do.

Noize: Do you love or hate LA?

George: I love it.

Sixtine: Can you make a hangry face?

George: Hangry?

sixtine: Yes.

George: I am hangry.

People from LA don't always understand my sense of humor. I love them but they might not love me. It's a personal thing. it's a one directional feud.

Noize: Everyone loves everyone in LA to their face.

George: But it's not true. It's not, you know. But everyone in LA who chatters about me is a little loser pussy, so.

Noize: Facts. You don't mind existing amongst the fakes?

George: Well, it's just kind of like pretend. Doesn't matter.

Noize: It's a game. Is this your first European tour? How many have you been on?

George: This is my third European tour but Paris always gives me like a 20% deal like, a 20% of the ticket deal. So I always say no on pretense, but my agent has said for three years in a row, just like, do it, do it, do it. And I've said no, no, no. So this year I just did it because I don't care anymore. I'm losing my mind.

Noize: Yeah, well now you know they fucking love you, so you gotta come back now.

George: Well, we'll see if they'll give me a 30% deal next year. Maybe a 40% deal. Maybe a 50%.

Noize: If they were here tonight they would give you that.

George: Maybe they were. Maybe they're gonna read your publication possibly and this is for the gays. 

Noize: Yes this is for the gays. They love you. I think there were a lot of gays tonight, mostly bisexuals. Yeah, mostly bisexuals, mullets, micro bangs. That's how you know that it's good shit. I always follow the people with micro bangs.

George: Those are micro bangs, aren't they? (pointing to sixtine) But they're above the eyebrow.

sixtine: Oh, it's not micro now.

George: Oh, okay, so three quarters of an inch short is micro bangs. So those are just like regular bangs. My bad. No diss, I love micro bangs. And I don't judge people based off of how bisexual they are.

sixtine: But I've got a boyfriend.

George: Yeah, me too. 

sixtine: And he really likes your show, by the way. He was here tonight.

George: My boyfriend and my girlfriend both like the show. They don't know about each other.

Noize: Oh. So you the ho.

George: I wouldn't say that. That’s very Christian and backwards.

Noize: Since when is it being a ho to have a boyfriend and a girlfriend? These look good.

George: Are you sure I don't need to tussle my hair just a bit or? You're satisfied?

Noize: Yeah.

George: Do you have questions for me?

Noize: Yeah I've been asking them, I've been recording like on the microphone, just the gay stuff yeah which I'm putting in there. But what are you gonna do when you get back?

George: What I'm gonna do is when I get back the first thing that I'm gonna do is I'm gonna put on my jeans that I haven't worn in the past two weeks. I'm going to put on a clean t-shirt. I'm going to put on my silk underwear. I have gorgeous silk underwear. Oh, can you imagine?

 You're probably just like, you just can't contain your excitement right now. I'm going to put on all my just like clean clothes that I haven't worn. This is all wet and disgusting. I'm going to put on a set of clean clothes. I can smell doo-doo right now.

Noize: I'm smelling it too, yeah.

George: This is my life backstage. So when I get home, I'm going to watch the new Downton Abbey movie that just came out two days ago. It's about the 1930s. It's about the rich white people in the 1930s, my number one best interest. And I'm gonna watch, I'm gonna see what they were up to, I'm just gonna say what kind of struggles did you go through being so rich? Like what was so hard for you and I just can't wait to see what they went through. It's gonna be amazing.

Noize: Favorite city and least favorite city on the tour?

George: This is a parisian publication right?

My favorite city was Warsaw, my favorite show. I don't get to see the city. So my favorite city is based off of my favorite crowd, which was Warsaw. They were better than maybe any crowd in the USA. They were better than any crowd anywhere in the world. 

Noize: Wow.

George: Second, Dublin was very close. I've been trying to decide who was crazier. Dublin or Warsaw. I think Warsaw was one of the best crowds in the world. Paris was good tonight. Great, great even. Warsaw, maybe the best in the world. And then, um, worse was definitely Leffinge in Belgium. It's just the middle of nowhere.

Noize: Were they not getting it? They just weren't getting it in Belgium?

George: No, there were only eight people who knew who I was. And yeah, they didn't get it. They were like, they really wanted like rock and roll music. They didn't understand. I started the USA, USA (chants). They just didn't understand my, like, I have a kind of a certain type of personality, and as native english speakers you must understand there's a kind of irony and sarcasm.

Noize: Oh they thought you were dead ass when you said that? 

George:  It's, it's weird there, there's like, the irony is totally different language. It's a totally different language. That's all, yeah. It's not their problem, it's my fault. But at the same time, we didn't connect. .

Noize: That's fair.

George: Isn't that kind of woke of me?

Noize: It is.

george: To recognize that? Like, I know exactly where I exist in reality. Is there anything else?

Noize: Thank you so much. How has your style evolved since from when you started and now?

George: I was poor, and now I have really expensive, like, leather jackets and stuff.

Noize: From the thrift?

George: Not from thrift. No. One of them, made in Italy Marni jackets, I have these beautiful jackets that make me look like Billy Idol. So now, you know you look at Billy Idol and you go, oh I could thrift that. You can’t.

Noize: I thought you were Billy Idol.

George: You can't thrift that sis. Billy Idol had a lot of money. It's a dream to imagine that you can, and maybe you can be a genius and you style it, but everyone will know that you're not actually Billy Idol. But when people see me, they go, I actually thought you were Billy. I mean, you just said, you actually thought that I was Billy Idol.

Noize: I thought we were interviewing Billy Idol. Yeah, wait, what? Who is this?

George: Yes, there's certain things, you know, costuming, it's expensive. So in the beginning, I never wanted to wear something I felt was inauthentic. So I just wore like $80 just my regular clothes that I would wear like from top to bottom probably $60, $80. Now I wear really cool Billy Idol jackets around town because I sold a lot of records. So now I'm being true to myself in a totally different way. I think I look a lot cooler like Batman or like an evil gay Batman. The best kind. Like if Batman decided to be evil and also gay. And a stylist. Yes. I'm on Vogue.com, you can Google me, 2022 Marni, Spring/Summer, Milan Fashion Week.

Noize: Do you think you've moved away from the Vaporwave sort of label they put on your music?

George: Yes! Do I think that? I can't believe that you would even bring it up. I couldn't be further from it. Today it’s its own thing.

Noize: In what way? In what way do you think you're moving away from it?

George: Well, I never really, you know, I feel like I moved into Vaporwave and defined it as my own thing.

Noize: You invented it?

George: No, I did not. I'm not even close. But like it was doing its thing. And then I said, how about this? This is vapor wave. And then it was for a little while and then I started getting more popular. And then everybody says, that's not vapor wave, that's not vapor wave. And then that's, I didn't accept that for the longest time. 

But then everyone who was hardcore Vaporwave betrayed me. They betrayed me. And then I say, that's great.

If you don't want me to say that my music is vaporwave anymore, then I won't. And now, vaporwave stock has plummeted. Vaporwave stock is at an all-time low. They've completely capitulated. Whereas daddy has gone sky high. Print that.

 

Noize: Oh we will. You move with the times. You got to move on at some point, you got to try.

George: Well it was just, you know, it was a thing that happened and it was just kind of like, labels are ridiculous. And I don't want to utilize a label like a thing. I was trying, a lot of my friends were making music that was like abstractly vapor wave, so I wanted to lift them up, but all of my friends have now transcended all of this, and now there's these vapor wave little people who are just jacking off 90% of the time. Then the other 10% of the time they're trying to take us down.

And I don't, it's just like, I can't imagine, I'm just too old to understand spending that much time online trying to eliminate someone. I think it's really, I think it's really loser pilled. 

Can I say loser? It's kind of cringe and loser-pilled, yeah. I think loser it's kind of cringe and loser pill, it's like cringe and loser pilled, whereas I'm based in like vibe pills. 

Noize: It's okay I speak brain rot so I don't mind.

George: Yeah. I'm a giga Chad. I have big giga Chad Energy. I just wanna like make music. That's all. (to friend that entered room) We're done. We're done. It's over. Don't worry. 

Interview Transcribed by Mansi Arorav

All images by Sixtine Cail