Curiosity Didn’t Kill the Cat: An Interview with PAWS

Chicago – Phillip Taylor has experienced quite a lot of tragedy and hardship throughout his youth. With every pang of emotion, he has documented his feelings, struggles, and realizations in his songs. This Scottish lad’s honest, raw lyrics are just one of the many reasons critics raved about PAWS’ debut albumCokefloat!. Phillip Taylor and the PAWS boys – Josh Swinne and Ryan Drever – recently unleashed more heavy hitting punk infused garage rock with their sophomore album Youth Culture Forever. I had a little Q&A session with Phillip to get the lowdown on YCF. We also talked about his awesome big brother Paul, photography, and the joys of socks.

Sarah Hess: Tell me about Youth Culture Forever. How is it different from Cokefloat!? What inspired your song writing with this album?

Phillip Taylor: Youth Culture was written in a completely different way from Cokefloat! With our first record we picked out a selection of songs from all of the things I had written over the space of that first year and a half, with the exception of songs like “Catherine 1956,” “Bloodline,” “Sore Tummy,” and “Poor Old Christopher Robin,” which all came together a few months before the recording session. We just made a kind of mix tape of the strongest songs that we had at the time.

With YCF I felt far more conscious during the song writing process [with] the themes of the songs and over all undertones. We were playing with a lot more attention to detail on the melodies and song structures. I suppose all of the songs came from emotional experiences that I was having whenCokefloat! was released. There was so much stuff happening back then in my personal life, I wasn’t able to process all of those feelings at that time or something like that. I guess Cokefloat! contained content about loss in my family in parts and I think that’s what people take away from that record the most. But, I was also losing someone else very, very close to me, and it was an awful time that I feel like I can’t even make much of sense of now looking back. So, to me the record is largely, but not entirely, about my experience losing somebody dear to me…during a period of time where I hadn’t even finished grieving the loss of someone else dear to me. It was a double whammy in whirlwind, heat flash, and I think I could’ve dealt with/prevented one of those losses in hindsight. But, when you’re submerged in a bad place like that, everything is doom, gloom and impossible.

SH: Phillip, your mother passed not too long ago. As someone who has lost a parent, I know it changes you profoundly. How did confronting death change you as a person? Did you find music and songwriting to be helpful in the grieving process? And did the experience influence your songwriting on Youth Culture Forever?

PT: That death hit me like a concrete fist in my stomach because it all happened so fast. It affected me profoundly and just got me very riled up, for better and for worse really. There was a mixed wave of uncontrollable positivity and stride to achieve goals that I’d set for myself, but there was also a wave of selfish/destructive behaviour that I wish I’d been strong enough to not embark on. Overall though, I matured so much from that journey and it’s made me much more conscious of the way I act and try to live my life because we are only here for a little bit. We are all going to die, we just don’t know when and where. So I try and be positive, outgoing, and adventurous. I’ve tried to write songs about fictional events or characters in metaphoric styling and things like that, but I find it impossible. It seems that, for now at least, I can only write whole-heartedly and honestly about experiences that I have in life. I’m not very happy about that though, because it probably makes me sound like a fucking narcissistic child. Losing her did have an effect on the new record because it was a giant part in the breakdown of a dear and fragile relationship that I was in at that time. I didn’t handle it well, and I could’ve saved it. Probably one of the biggest life lessons I’ll learn.

SH: I read on facebook that Patti Smith has been an inspiration to you. To quote you: “Her poetry, music, photography, political activism and entire aura has had a profound effect on my life and how I try to live it.” Who else has been an influence in your life?

PT: Patti Smith really has had a big effect on me culturally as I described above. My older brother Paul has been the biggest influence in my life for sure. I wouldn’t be who I am today if he didn’t look after me the way he did when I was growing up. The music he exposed me too and the underground culture that he recognised I’d find my place in. He bought me my first skateboard. He gave me my first guitar. He loaned me money to buy my first camera. He recognised something in me that I don’t think I’d even recognised in my teenage years. I feel like he was a big brother, best friend and secretive father figure guiding me throughout growing up and that’s totally amazing. He, my mother and her mother (my grandmother who I was named after) have all directed my life to where it is now. Musically, Michael Stipe was pretty much my hero from the age of 5 – late teens. People like Graham Coxon, Kurt Cobain and Francoise Hardy too.

SH: You were touring the U.S. with We Are Scientists, who like you guys, are known for their sarcasm and humor. I imagine you were constantly laughing, cracking jokes, and pulling pranks. Is this the case?

PT: It’s like being on a tour with comedians that are fucking incredible musicians. There’s always mischief with those cats. It always seems to start with Keith making margaritas. Damn good margaritas, too.

SH: Have you guys been getting in much skateboarding on this tour? Do you ever hunt down skateparks in some of the cities you stop in?

PT: Yeah for sure, there’s always a board set up in the van incase we scope a spot from the van. Totally down for a park mission too, when there’s time before/after soundcheck. Skateboarding is a big part of my life, and it’s a great way to feel out a city. Just pushing through a new city in any direction looking for an adventure.

SH: As a photographer, I must tell you that I’m in love with your tumblr! Who takes most of the pictures, you guys or your tour photographer? And are you mostly using camera phones, film, or DSLRs?

PT: The majority of photographs on the WHYCF Tumblr are pictures that Josh and I take. 35mm, DSLR, Polaroids, and medium formats. We’re totally obsessed with photo booths in bars too. We archive all the pictures that people take of us out on tour too. On this tour right now we have our close friend and photographer Martin D Barker out on the road with us. He’s shooting everything that we get up to, and I think he’s planning [on] putting a selection of them in a zine about his time on tour with us. Not much time passes without a shutter clicking off with this dude. Super passionate.

SH: Last question is a silly one: Phillip, in a recent interview you said that you prepare for a tour by buying a lot of socks because doing laundry on tour is tough. Do you guys just go for the bulk basic white socks or do you prefer crazy, colorful socks?

PT: I don’t think enough people put enough effort into their socks. Socks are so fun. I love white sports socks and stripy socks. But, I do have my fair share of whacky ones, my personal favourites being a pair with planets and stars on them that a girl from our label bought me. I think they are just as important as the shoes and t-shirts that you choose to wear each day. That’s so lame, but I dunno. Little bit of colour into the day innit.

Not lame at all Phillip! PAWS just finished touring the U.S. with We Are Scientists, but they’ll be back in the States in the fall. They’re kicking off for their YCF UK Tour now. Click here to check out their tour dates. Are you on the fence and curious about what a PAWS show is like? Then click here for a review of their recent show in Chicago. Youth Culture Forever was released on May 6, 2014 in the U.S. and is set for release in the UK in June. You can preorder a limited edition green vinyl through Fat Cat Records.

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Sarah Hess

At the age of six, Sarah Hess discovered True Blue by Madonna. This resulted in her spending hours in front of the bathroom mirror with a hairbrush microphone, belting out "La Isla Bonita" off key. Her love for music only intensified over the years thanks to her parents; her mother exposed Sarah to The Jackson Five and had her hustling to the Bee Gees, while her father would play her albums like 'Pet Sounds' and 'Some Girls' from start to finish, during which he'd lecture on and on about the history of rock & roll. Sarah would eventually stumble upon rap and hip-hop, then punk and alternative, and fall madly in love with Jeff Buckley and film photography.

After attending The School of the Art Institute in Chicago, Sarah went on to study education at Dominican University, earning a degree in history. When not teaching, writing, or taking in a show, she is most likely to be found with a camera to her eye or hanging out in a darkroom.

You can follow Sarah Hess on twitter at @Sarahhasanh and view her music photography on her website: smhimaging.com.