Inspired by the 1988 Bill Murray movie of the same name, we bring you the twelfth in a series of interviews called Scrooged.
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Past
One Thirty BPM: Were you a music child from an early age?
Diamond Rings (John O’Regan): Like, playing music?
Yeah, or just enjoying music. Some kids just have a gravitation towards it. Like, my nephew has had all sorts of small instruments since he was, like, one.
My parents put me in piano lessons and I did all that stuff that a lot of kids probably end up doing, when I was, like, six up until I was old enough to start being cool and quit to play sports. I got out of it for pretty much my entire teen years, or at least to the extent that a lot of my friends now were. I wasn’t sneaking out of my house to go to punk shows, that really wasn’t part of my scene. I was going to bed early and getting up to go to basketball tournaments and stuff like that. – laughter-
Even then, though, music was a part of it; as simple as listening to stuff during warmups. Using music to get pumped up for games. I feel like music can be a part of people’s lives in such different ways.
Totally. In high school, I was the player manager for the baseball team, and I got to do the intro music for the games. It was totally fun.
I would do the same thing. I could remember before CD-Rs, even, putting together mix cassettes for the warmup of my volleyball team or basketball team, and that would be what I would do. Like, bring the boombox out. So I guess I’ve always understood music’s potential to shape an environment or situation.
And it is still self-expression. Even though it is not your words…
Yeah, so it wasn’t until I went away to art school that I started seeing music as something that I could do. I had some friends in high school that were in a cover band and I got jealous of them and taught myself how to play guitar. That was when I realized it could be something I could actually do, and not just covering Weezer songs, but actually making music of my own.
When you look back at the first songs you wrote as your own music, is it something you can even identify with now?
Maybe lyrically. Certainly not sonically. I was pretty sheltered in that regard. I grew up in the suburbs, and there weren’t really a lot of people setting an example. Like I said, there were punk shows, but I never identified with that scene, or anything really. There wasn’t anyone making electronic dance music in their home studio where I grew up.
It’s near Toronto, right?
Yeah, it’s a little suburb. It would almost be like being from New Jersey compared to Brooklyn or New York.
I met Paul from PS I Love You. Is that the same town he is from?
Kingston is a little further out. Their place is more like its own thing, which is almost better in a way because there is some sort of a stable identity, whereas I am from more from this amorphous nether-region that is neither a city nor an actual community. But, in hindsight I wouldn’t trade that for anything. It allows me to appreciate being in Toronto more and the fact that there is shit to do. But, also, it lends me a different perspective as a songwriter. I don’t take anything for-granted because I know what it is like to not have inspiration.
Was there a specific time from when you started writing your own songs to when you started to seriously consider that it was something you wanted to make a career out of?
Probably really recently, when I moved to the city. Then again, I think part of that comes from where I grew up and my upbringing. I know a lot of people who have lived in Toronto their whole lives or lived in places like New York their whole lives – not that they take it for granted, but like I said, until you’ve grown up somewhere where there really isn’t anything to do at all, it’s really hard to appreciate choosing between five different shows or listening to whatever kind of music you want, whenever you want.
For me, moving to Toronto was really the point of realizing, because my art school was really tucked away in a college community. There was stuff going on but it was really self-contained. It was a good place to learn how to write songs and paint pictures and build sculptures and make mistakes and fuck around, because their weren’t really any consequences for anything. It’s very much a bubble, so I was able to develop a lot of my ideas that are being expressed in Diamond Rings while I was there, but I needed the support of of a bigger music community to realize them. Had I done what I am doing now in art school, maybe, like, ten of my friends would have gotten it.
So, you are a solo project but you go by a band name in Diamond Rings. Was there a reasoning behind that, to go by a moniker?
Oh, for sure, partly because my own name is kind of boring. John. It’s not exciting. Even the other famous John’s, like John Mellencamp, changed their last name when they were breaking out, right? – laughter – To some extent I had been playing in other bands, and I wasn’t, like, an unknown as an artist, so the idea of changing my name entirely, well, I didn’t think I could do it. But, I wanted something that would be more exciting, and also protect me as a person from the sort of identity I was forging. Not to say that it is not a part of me, but it is not all of me. It’s a part of who I am, blown up and amplified, an oversized version of a part of myself. So, I needed something that would allow for that to happen.
Yeah, that came across when I saw the live show. It was more than just a solo performance, there was a whole “show” to it.
Yeah, exactly. I think there are enough people doing that in the world, and there are enough people doing it better than I could do it. So, I wanted to do something bigger than that. It’s very, I think, un-Canadian. I think a part of it was just a reaction to what was going on in the city. I moved there expecting this crazy and wild stuff, and it turns out that most of the artists in my mind weren’t doing anything that was very interesting. It was very safe. So, I wanted to break that mold, I guess. Challenge people a little, and challenge myself.
As far as Diamond Rings goes, my knowledge of the project is Special Affections and the split 7″ with PS I Love You. Does it go back farther than that as far as recorded material?
No, that was it.
So, you got a pretty good amount of attention in America, at least media-wise, from the get-go.
Yeah, that was unexpected. I mean, I’m not going to lie, you don’t really put out your own 7″ and make a handy-cam video expecting that Pitchfork is going to write about it. It wasn’t like I wasn’t hoping for that or that I didn’t think that it was good enough, it just wasn’t really part of the gameplan. I had met PS while touring with my other band and I loved their music and put out the 7″ as a way to have something of theirs on vinyl. I was like ‘shit, I wanna hear your band on a record, so I’m gonna put it out and if I’m going to put it out, I might as well put myself on it, too.’ Why not? So, it just became this thing that we literally just did as friends, more to have this memento for ourselves. I was expecting to have this thing sitting around the house for years. Fortunately, that wasn’t what ended up happening. Since then, it has given me encouragement to keep going.
Present
You are reissuing Special Affections on Astralwerks. And, this is something that always trips me out; I write about music, I listen to a lot of music, so when an artist I know reissues an album that just came out, I’m like ‘who hasn’t heard this?’ But then, other writers I know haven’t even heard it. So, is it as weird for you, whereas on one hand, as an artist, you are probably ready to move on to the next project, but on the other hand, in reissuing this, you are starting all over with Special Affections?
Yeah, I feel the same way. I think of music very much still in local terms. I have a hard time getting into some band that all the blogs are freaking out about, if I don’t kind of know them in some way. There is a connection to the music that I like, whether it is geographical or just friends of friends. I think a lot of musicians operate that way. So, it is a shift in my own mind to think that there are people out there who would want to hear this that haven’t already, which I think is great. Music doesn’t have to be the main thing is everyone’s life. There are very few people, whether it is performers or journalists or fans, who really live and die by it. So, I guess this is enabling me to reach beyond that, beyond the circle of fanatics, and hopefully tap into something new.
And you toured with Robyn, which was another opportunity to reach a new audience that probably wouldn’t normally come across your music. You were playing these big venues with professional lighting and sound. How was the response to that? Did you find it rough?
I found it overwhelmingly positive, really. It definitely changed the way that I approach performing. When I started, I was doing this over-the-top, flamboyant thing, but relative to the environment that I grew up in, which is very indie, very self-deprecating; Canadian, but even beyond that. Like, to act as if you cared or gave a shit…
I picture Broken Social Scene.
Yeah, and it’s true! They were the band and the scene that, for lack of a better term, put the city on the map. They allowed Canada to be cool, as an independent community. But, the aesthetic is very much ‘we’re just whoever, we’re the dudes from down the street.’ And I think, even with that band, and not that I know a lot of them very well, but it feels like there is a self-internalized guilt for getting as big as they are, whereas on the level of someone like Robyn, people don’t care. They want pop stars to be confident and out-going and over-the-top. So, that was the biggest trip of anything was realizing that I can still push it further. The stuff I do at home for the indie kids, at first seemed really crazy, but you put it in front of high-schoolers at a Robyn concert and its almost not enough. – laughter-
Were you able to get to know her at all and get any advice as a person?
For sure, yeah. That said, if I’ve learned anything, it is that she is very guarded. With reason, given her history as a pop singer and having that history in this industry that can do that to a performer who dares to express themselves honestly. You know, it’s tough, it’s tricky to do that. So, I think for a lot of reasons she is fairly wary of a lot of situations. The person that you see on-stage as Robyn is very different than the person also named Robyn who hangs out for the other 22-hours of the day. You give so much and you get so much in return, that a lot of times, you just end up being really quiet. I’ve adopted some of those strategies myself. I don’t go out as much to party the same way that I used to. It’s just exhausting. If I go out in Toronto, people kind of know who I am and expect this sort of character. Like, if I go to a dance club and don’t totally feel like losing my shit, it’s like I’m letting people down. -laughter- ‘Well, I saw Diamond Rings and he was just standing there and talking to people. That’s lame.’ Sometimes it’s easier to just not make myself available, to just not be around, than to just half-ass it.
And, I’m busy, too. So, if anything, that is what I learned from seeing her interact in this crazy situation. Looking back, I think it is going to be a really interesting time in my life. Her star is definitely rising, it was kind of like watching someone ascend, where she is now opening for Katy Perry. Getting to be a part of that and see that, I tried to soak up as much of it as I could.
With the music that you do – and the music someone like Robyn does – I think one of the most interesting aspects is how to maintain this indie-cred idea, this thing where you are still considered an artistic artist while you are making pop music. It seems very arbitrary, but everyone also seems to be in agreement. Like, Justin Timberlake and Kanye West are cool.
Yeah, it’s hard to say how that happens. I don’t think that anyone can ever set out to be like ‘well, I wanna be cool and really popular.’ That’s asking a lot. I think it is just about making the kind of music that you really want to make. As long as I feel like I am checking in with myself, and surrounding myself with people who know me, if they like what I’m doing and I like what I’m doing, then I am confident that is enough. As much as I want to appeal to this really wide range of people, because I think that is the beauty of music, that is what it can do, it can connect this really wide range of people. But, at the same time, I can’t really make music for them, because I don’t know them. All I can really do is satisfy myself by making music that I want to hear and not being afraid to go for it on stage. So, if anything, I’m learning that is what the key to it is: staying honest and checking in with yourself.
So, your other way to express yourself, beyond original music, is these remixes; the Remix Rainbow.
Oh, you’ve heard some of them?
I’ve heard the Austra one, and I really like Austra.
Yeah, Katie’s awesome.
I did one of these interviews with her, she was really cool. And, I saw you posted the Handsome Furs one yesterday.
Yeah, their new record is sick.
When you approach doing a remix, do you have a set goal in mind or a general aesthetic you want to do? I mean, when I’ve heard these two, you can hear Diamond Rings in it.
For me, doing this whole series was a way to figure out what my approach to a remix is. I think a lot of times I just hear a song and imagine it in a different way. If anything, that is the kind of attitude that I bring to it. It is not about putting my own personal stamp on it as much as it about making a song a little more like I would want it to be if I had written it. I’m not into the kind of remixes that seem to be kind of trendy right now, where it’s like ‘okay, I’m going to chop up all the vocals and give it this synth sound…’
And pick one line from a verse and base a whole song around it.
Yeah, yeah. I’m more into when I listen to remixes and 12″s by, like, Fine Young Cannibals, there will be a remix that is maybe 30 seconds or a minute longer than the original and it will change up the beat a little, but will keep a lot of what is intrinsically important about the song. It will keep a lot of the lyrics and chord progression in tact. Just sort of fine-tune and tweak everything a little. I’m more into making the song, uh, better. Not that they were originally bad. I want to work with songs that were already great and try to take them to this next level.
Your level of quality. -laughter-
Yeah, yeah. Or just kind of weird them out and tap into what I think that the artist is trying to convey emotionally.
Are all the artists on board before you do it?
Yeah, with this project it has been all about reaching out to people that I know personally or whose music has inspired me. A big part of it is that I got back from tour and was so burned out on hearing my own voice, night after night, and being in my own headspace, that the prospect of jumping into writing another record and going back into that shell, that self-examination, it made me kind of exhausted. So, I wanted to stay busy without having to torture myself. This allows me to do that. All the ingredients are already there. It’s like making food on the cooking channel. Everything is already put out, you just have to follow this recipe, throw it all together, and put it in the oven. It’s allowing me to stay busy without totally destroying my brain.
The flip side to that is now that I am nearing the end of it, I want more to do and now all I want to do is start writing my own songs.
Future
Does the rerelease of Special Affections prolong the time available to start planning new material?
Yes and no. There is still a lot of time in the day. If anything, the rerelease has allowed me the opportunity to pursue this. The same people that oversee Kylie Minogue’s business are now handling my shit. It’s nice to know that there is a big team out there, reaching beyond my management and a handful of people at Secret City, who are all great, but knowing that there is this big group that wants to push me out and take me to that next level, that’s kind of inspiring. It’s all I’m thinking about. But, I like to think that there is time to balance both.
What do the next few months hold for you?
I’ll be touring again in the fall.
Headlining?
I can’t really say yet. It will be good, though. I’m excited about what it is. (editor’s note: Word came out after this interview was conducted that Diamond Rings will be touring with Twin Shadow in the fall.) Of course there is going to be wanting to prepare for that, and I’m going to be playing a lot of Special Affections still. I still love the songs and a lot of people haven’t heard it. Kind of try to re-imagine those, make the show a bit bigger. Working on some new stuff, for sure. And, I’m doing a handful of shows, mostly in Canada, over the summer.
Yeah, I saw a couple festivals lined-up.
Yeah, I’m not doing anything crazy at this point and I’m almost thankful for it. In a lot of ways, I feel like there is still a long way to go with my act, for me to be ready for that big stage. Right now, I’m more playing with the idea of being a pop star. It is not fully there. It’s like a half-baked muffin that’s rising in the oven. Like, ‘I bet if I come back in 20 minutes that will be totally delicious.’ – laughter- It’s kind of like I am figuring it out in front of everyone. I don’t really know any other way to do it.
When I saw you at The Satellite a couple months back, you did a song with PS I Love You. Are there any more plans for future collaborations beyond that song?
With that band, no. I wouldn’t rule anything out, but that tour, in and of itself, was really special because we both knew that would be the last time that the two of us would be able to perform together in the foreseeable future. We are very much musically drifting into these completely polar opposite realms. We always joke that they are becoming more like Nirvana and I’m becoming more like Black Box or something. Like Dance Mix ’93. – laughter- Which I think is really cool. It might be hard for people to understand, but I can connect with their music and what they do than I can with a lot of other artists that might be more similar to me sonically. Because, I think in the way that Nirvana can have a hit album in the early 90s, Culture Beat also had hit tracks then. I like that idea of there being these two really opposed styles existing and thriving at the same time. I think there are enough people in the world to support what we both do. I also feel, though, that there aren’t enough people who can really understand how both of those can share a stage together.
So, immediately, no, although doing that song was super fun. I love those guys, and that is what they do and they do it well. Who knows what we will be up to in like four years or something. Maybe we will come right around and meet in the middle again.
When you think of what you are doing now, and your goals, and being successful, what would you define as success for yourself?
I think for me, I’m probably never going to get there, that’s what I’m starting to realize. I think back to where my mind was a year ago, or not even a year ago because the album came out in October, I think I’ve sort of done everything that I expected I would do by now. And, obviously, I am still doing it. I am not stopping. Like, I never anticipated being on Astralwerks or that people would ever give a shit about what I was doing. My dream was always to be on K Records or something, but I quickly realized that maybe that was not where I want to end up. Seeing a world beyond the one that I live in has been sort of inspiring.
I just want to keep making good music, I guess, that people can relate to. For me, starting to perform as Diamond Rings was really terrifying, in a good way. I think that being scared is awesome. There is this John Cale song, or whole album, called Fear. But, the refrain or chorus goes “fear is a man’s best friend.” And, I can relate to that. If I ever get to the point where I find myself writing a song, recording a song, remixing something, stepping up on a stage – if I’m not feeling even the slightest bit that I might want to wet my pants, then I think that is gonna be when it is time to stop. I always want that.
So, to answer your question: I hope to live the rest of my life in fear, never at all satisfied with my current status as a musician or an artist. – laughter-
