Sean Lennon: Rock Royalty to Indie Film Icon
By Executive Editor Nicole Holland
IFQ recently sat down and spoke with Sean Lennon. Enough said.
IFQ: How did you come on board as the composer for Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Undead?
Sean Lennon: I knew Jordan (Galland) when he was still a ‘Painter,’ with a capital ‘P,’ hustling the streets on weekends with Francesco Clemente, eating one square meal a month, and living off the kindness of (female) strangers. Wherever he went he’d leave a trail of nubile young bodies. It was easy to find him. We became fast friends. It now seems predestined that we’d work together. I never say no to Jordan. You try it, it’s no easy feat.
IFQ: This is your first feature film score that you have composed. Can you discuss why you chose this film? What were the main challenges while scoring it? Did you find the mix of modern day, Shakespeare and vampires a challenge?
SL: Again, I can never say no to Jordan; it’s his eyes. But for whatever reason the stars were aligned. Film music is some of my favorite music. Nino Rota, Ennio Morricone, Alain Goraguer, Bernard Herrmann, John Williams, even Carl Stalling of Bugs Bunny fame, these guys are my heroes and always have been. In retrospect, it seems I’d been waiting my whole life to begin scoring films. Now that I’ve begun there’s no turning back.
There was nothing difficult about the mix of Vampires and Hamlet. It seemed an obvious choice. It was very inspiring to wake up each day to such a haunted and beautiful world of references. There is nothing better than a palette of spook. I wrote and recorded about a song or two a day for two weeks, and then spent another two weeks overdubbing and mixing. Working with Jordan is really easy at this point. We understand each other very well, and I have a lot of love for him, so doing a good job was natural.
IFQ: I’ve watched both trailers and the music effectively capture the film’s ambiance. I especially liked the music at the beginning and end of the second trailer. What or who influenced the music throughout the film? How did you come up with the original score in Rosencrantz? What can we expect?
SL: I felt that there was an unoccupied seat or me in the arena of modern film scoring. I have a particular point of view that sits squarely between traditional film scoring and progressive rock and roll. I think there may be a niche for me.
As for influences, I think I named most of them. I should have mentioned Wendy (Walter) Carlos.
Coming up with the score was like running through a candy store with a grocery basket. There are so many melodies floating around the ether, you just have to close your eyes and grab.
IFQ: Do you plan on releasing the film’s soundtrack on CD and internet download?
SL: Yes I do. Yes I will. Hopefully soon.
IFQ: How did you team up with Jordan? You worked with him on the films Smile for the Camera and Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Undead. Also, I saw in the credits on your Friendly Fire album that Jordan co-wrote “Spectacle” and “Falling Out of Love.” What’s it like working with Jordan? Did you guys help each other out since it was his first directorial feature and your first feature as a composer?
SL: Jordan and I have spent a lot of time formulating the same creative language. With the language in place, all one must do is speak.
IFQ: A few years ago, your short film Smile for the Camera won an award at the New York International Independent Film & Video Festival. You co-wrote the film with Jordan and you created the score. How did the concept of the film evolve? What inspired the film’s theme music?
SL: Jordan had a song called “Smile For the Camera.” I think it started there. He told me about the premise, and we met at a noisy bar on 6th Avenue—the kind that thinks it’s hip because it has a bellbottomed DJ named Feng Shui in it—ordered some martinis, and began torturing an innocent girl in our imaginations.
IFQ: Can you discuss the similarities and differences composing feature length films vs. short films?
SL: I’ll leave out the obvious length discrepancy. I honestly don’t have enough experience to make any conclusions one way or another.
IFQ: What’s your opinion on independent films vs. studio films?
SL: It seems to me that the once gaping chasm that separated indie and studio films has puckered to a kiss, both lips nuzzled closely together in a smirk of mutual bemusement.
IFQ: As a writer and composer for independent films, how important are film festivals?
SL: I think they’re very important for the economies of the towns in which they are hosted. There’s nothing better than an orgy of self-satisfied ego maniacs gorging themselves on attention to make for an enjoyable weekend in the mountains.
IFQ: Which writers influence your style of writing?
SL: I’m influenced by everything I encounter, really. I would list writers but that would be deceptive. Just because I read someone doesn’t mean you’ll find them hiding somewhere in my work. I will say that Nabokov never seems to grow tired of inspiring me. I have to thank him for his efforts some time.
IFQ: When was your first interest in film and music?
SL: The movie Planet Sauvage was a sort of sacred rite for me as a child. When left alone, I’d watch it three to four times in a row. I’m considering getting my skin tinted blue.
IFQ: What’s your single favorite process during a film [conception to completion] and also, while making an album?
SL: I’ll be honest and tell you it’s the beginning and middle that are the most fun. The very end—tweaking subtle threads and nuances, trimming the fringe—is perhaps the most important stage, but is of course the most tedious. I like the cooking more than the setting of the table.
IFQ: Let’s talk about your musical film Friendly Fire. You were the mastermind behind Friendly Fire; you wrote, composed and acted in this project. The film has fantasy elements (“Wait for Me”), animation (“Would I Be the One”), a period drama short (“Dead Meat”), a circus (“Parachute”), modernism/film within a film (“On Again Off Again”) and a wonderful cast (Asia Argento, Lindsay Lohan, Jordana Brewster, Bijou Phillips, Devon Aoki, Carrie Fisher). How did this short film come about? How long did it take to shoot all of the music videos (that connect to form Friendly Fire)? Also, I saw in the DVD booklet that you did the illustrations. Did you contribute to the animation in the film, as well?
SL: I drew most of the principle drawings for the animation, yes. It was my first. Basically, the very talented and handsome team I was working with was not too happy when I said I wanted everything cross hatched and hand drawn. So I said, “Let me do it then.” We spent about two weeks drawing non-stop in a tiny room in Venice. I myself did a few hundred drawings easily. It was really fun.
I had been planning to do a film test with director Michele Civetta for a film I was working on called Coin Locker Babies. Since we had the film, I decided we’d try and use the footage for a video, (that turned out to be “Parachute”). When that video went well, (cost us under $1000), I thought, let’s do nine more!
My record company saw what we were doing, and how cheap it was, and offered to finance the rest of it.
I went to a café and wrote nine treatments in about 30 minutes, (I had already completed the “Parachute” idea, which I thought of simply because I knew a girl who was an acrobat).
At the time it seemed easy: in one video I’ll be on a row boat fishing, in another I’ll be dueling to the death, in another I’ll be in a gravitron. It wasn’t until we began shooting that I realized my ideas would be fairly difficult to execute in real life. The next treatment I write will take place in as few locations as possible, with as few characters as possible—like that French Sci-Fi film La Jetée .
It took us twelve days to shoot the whole thing. I think it was a bit overly ambitious, but we had a lot of fun and I learned a lot about filmmaking. I think the result is fairly interesting. My intention was to make something different than your average MTV video. But then MTV didn’t play it, so I guess that’s what you get. I thought the piece turned out to be bizarre and hilarious. I think some people thought I was taking myself more seriously than I was.
IFQ: You signed with the Beastie Boys’ label Grand Royal when you made your first album Into the Sun. Then, the label folded and later you signed with Capitol on your second album Friendly Fire. What’s your opinion on indie labels vs. the larger labels? Is it important for a band or musician to be signed to a major label? Can you talk about your experience?
SL: I think it’s fairly obvious that the music industry is going through a sea of change. I don’t think there are any rules in terms of what’s best for bands or artists anymore. It’s a time when people can design their careers according to personal taste. Anyone with a laptop can produce and publish in myriad media, from music to film; everyone is a f***cking director now. I think the downside is that everyone and their mom is putting out music, which sort of dilutes the art scene into meaninglessness. The upside is that everyone and their mom can put out music.
IFQ: Do you have a theme (or recurring theme) to your albums or in your music or videos?
SL: Well, there was a story to “Friendly Fire” the album and to the films. It was all based on a few years in which I found myself involved in a self-imploding love triangle. It all seems a bit melodramatic to me now, but that’s where I was at then. I think the work was very good. The truth is I needed to make that stuff in order to process and internalize the events that had occurred. My best friend died tragically, and I think I threw myself into making the films in order not to have a melt down. He was truly like a brother to me. I think a lot of people use art to process their emotions.
IFQ: What goes through your mind when you are writing songs? What inspires you to write?
SL: I don’t really wait for inspiration to strike. Meaning the kind of cathartic subject matter I explored in Friendly Fire, is not the only way that I write songs. I can write a song just as easily based on a keyboard sound, or a drum beat, or the feeling of a guitar. I can get inspired to write based on a drawing, or something someone said. It does have to be intense or autobiographical. I try and play music all the time, whether or not I’m ‘inspired.’
IFQ: Who are your musical influences?
SL: I’m influenced by a lot of music you’d never hear in my work. I’m influenced by so much music and art and film, it’s hard to make a list. I remember I was doing an interview in Germany and this kid asked, “All ze artists you say you like are zupa kool, like the Boredoms and the Beastie Boys, but your music is not cool like zem, why?” I said, “Just because I like someone’s music, and am inspired by them, doesn’t mean I have to sound like them does it?” Then I punched him. No I didn’t.
IFQ: Aside from your solo music career and writing and composing for film, you are involved in the band Dopo Yumé. Can you tell me about your involvement and the band itself?
SL: Back in the day Dopo Yumé were the 15-year-old heart throbs of the downtown gay scene. They would play gigs in Chelsea with their shirts off for free beer and a place to crash. In those days the police were willing to ignore their tender age as long as they didn’t start any real ‘trouble.’ That’s when I first heard their sound. It hit me over the head like a Pterodactyl in heat. I offered Jordan a Kahlua and Cream and some roofies. The rest is history.
*Photo Courtesy of Sean Lennon