Interview: The Fashion
Originally published in Verbicide issue #24
Things have been moving at light speed for The Fashion. Jakob Printzlau, lead vocalist of the band, says, “In the last six months, things have been going really, really fast for us. It’s pretty hard to grasp that we are finally on the way to a place where we want to be, [both] musically and professionally.”
This spring, the group was selected as one of MTVU’s “Freshman 5,” a set of five bands headed for major stardom and major airplay. They’ve been on a whirlwind tour of Europe, and now they’ve got their sights set on domination in the USA.
Originally from Denmark, a small country of only five million people, music was their ticket out, their passion, and their salvation.
“We grew up wanting to be somewhere else, and I think that is the best inspiration you can get,” states Printzlau. Printzlau, Anders Find Axelsen (guitar), and Christian Lignell Bækholm (bass) are from a tiny town called Svendborg, and formed their first band together in 1995 out of sheer boredom. After graduating from high school, the trio moved to Copenhagen where they met talented drummer Jacob Ankær, thusly forming the group now known as The Fashion.
“We have been working for a lot of years to get to where we are today,” continues Printzlau. “Nothing has happened overnight. There have been so many times where we wanted to quit, but the music has always kept us together.” Though their rise to fame was slow and laborious, their new self-titled album is set to pump a little nitro into their engines. “Solo Impala (Take the Money and Run)” and “Like Knives” are pop hits on a beeline for the Billboard charts, and the band’s love of playing live is sure to lure in more fans as they tour the US over the next few months.
“We like playing for new people who haven’t heard us before. We can hit people even harder in the face when they don’t expect anything. We sometimes look at our shows as a sporting match where you have to show your opponent that you are not to be fucked with.”
Though The Fashion is signed to a major label, Printzlau says that at heart, they’re DIY all the way: “I am a graphic designer by trade, so I would never be able to let someone handle that on my behalf.” Jakob is the band’s art director — record sleeves, t-shirts, posters, music videos…you name it, he did it.
Despite all of their success, they’re doing their best to remain down to earth. “In our band, we don’t believe in money being the solution to creative issues. That is also reflected in the way we chose to record the album. We recorded it in a really cheap and beat up studio with a fairly unknown producer, because at the time, all that mattered were the songs. We could easily have gone to a huge studio with some hotshot guy, but just because you have that option doesn’t mean you need to take it.”
