I first met Jill aka Thrill Racer during the summer of 1999, I seem to recall when another friend of mine, Jen Dan also from the United States taped me some of her songs and also sent me a couple of copies of her fanzine.
Interested, I had a look at her website which was listed on the fanzine, dropped her a line and it all started from there.
For those who don't know Jill, quoting a recent review in Angry Left Wing Mofo (Thanks Conor!):
" She is a young singer-songwriter who fuses simply melody with intelligent lyrics. Her voice has been described as having similarities with that of Nico, which I can't comment on myself, but I do know a Fiona Apple similarity when I hear it, and Thrill's voice has one.... "
When I first interviewed her for Rising Sun during the summer of 2000, the interview had a focus of the five-piece band she was fronting at the time. This new interview, conducted some four years later shows her development since when now she performs generally by herself.
To date, she has recorded a number of self-financed (mostly by herself) recordings and is currently on the look out for other musicians to work with on future projects.
Setting Sun: How's things and what's happening at the moment?
Thrill Racer:
- Hey Andy! Not much has been happening for me. I've been sick and tired literally. I've been sick every month since December (and it's May right now) because of my job where I am exposed to too many viruses. Plus, I moved and no longer have my piano, but I'm still working on some new thrill racer demos and will hopefully record them soon!
Setting Sun: Now I know I've known you for quite some time now, but clearly there are a few people out there who don't, so can you give us the general bio, what got you started and who fired the starting pistol etc?
Thrill Racer -
Whelp, back in the late '90s I got inspired to write songs (probably because of Morrissey who reawakened my interest in music in the early '90s and sang "Sing Your Life"), but I wasn't a musician so I decided to be a lyricist and look for musicians to give me tunes to put lyrics to. After enough of that I got around to learning to do the music myself. So that's where I am now. I still have a long way to go as far as learning skills, but never-the-less writing songs is something I seem compelled to do.
Setting Sun: Can you also tell us a little about your own fanzine, "The Easy way" and how this relates to your own website and your music in general?
Thrill Racer -
It's _The Easy Way_ and I call it a music/personal zine so I write about music and personal stories and the combination of the two. I do the zine because it's a creative outlet and I love writing. I usually document what goes on with my own music as well as other bands I see. My web page, www.thrillracer.com, has a page describing the zine with ordering information (order my zine, support independent publications!) documented how I started bands and how they fell apart and all the crazy behaviours I've seen in musicians.
Setting Sun: Why Thrill Racer as a handle?
Thrill Racer-
Seems better to use something fun sounding than my real name. "Thrill" just rhymes with my name and "Racer" I tacked on after the Morrissey song "Boy Racer" (though I am woman.) I usually don't capitalize it, though, 'cos it's not supposed to be taken seriously like it's my real name. Some people put the two words together so I do that too sometimes.
Setting Sun: What music are you listening to at the moment and who are your general major influences?
Thrill Racer -
Whelp, you already know who inspired me, but anything can influence a song. I rarely even get inspired to write a song, but it's usually just my emotions and thoughts yet anything can trigger it. Recently I read a line in someone's biography and it gave me ideas and I wrote a song. I've had lots of fave artists, but currently I'm not listening to anyone in particular, I just collect songs because I usually find that artists only have one or two good songs on their albums. Since I don't buy music I collect songs via the Internet, library, and from stuff people send to my zine or give to me. I'm going to make you a mix CD of lots of those songs so I can clear them off my hard drive. I also made you an Anton Barbeau CD filled with tons of songs he gave out on the Internet. Cool.
Setting Sun - When I last interviewed you, you were in the process of fronting a four or five piece band (circa 1999/2000). How does it feel and compare to nowadays when you are generally writing and recording by yourself?
Thrill Racer -
I've never really even had a band because both times I started one they ended before we even got to the stage, which was a shame. In both cases after the first practice everyone was like, "Yeah! This is cool! We wanna be in your band," and I even got an unexpected charge from it. Then, of course, they'd flake out. Usually to pursue more mediocre bands. Maybe they thought I sucked and didn't want to tell me, but the point of the practices was that I needed practice to learn how to sing in a band because I'd never done it before. And since I'd made demos of lots of cool songs I figured that was a good start.
I see lots of bands where everyone has great musical skills and they sound good, but the songs are boring. So to me it's just loud noise and not even worth listening to. Maybe people prefer to be in those types of bands because they know no one will hog the spotlight. There are a lot of egos in music and I think that holds people down. Writing and recording by myself is comfortable because it's my own personal project so there's no point dragging people into it, but I actually hate recording and mixing and I know if I delegated tasks to better musicians, producers, and engineers I could get a much better sound. Maybe someday my demos will be taken farther that way when I get the chance.
Setting Sun - How does this also compare to you doing gigs by yourself (I know you have been doing by yourself)?
Thrill Racer -
I've done a handful of open mics by myself, which was a big leap for me and very nerve wracking, but I have a long way to go before that will get comfortable. Sometimes I did ok, and other times I screwed up and sucked (due to nervousness), but some people actually told me they liked my songs, which was very encouraging! I wanted to keep doing open mics for the practice, but with the getting sick all the time I rarely do them (recently I lost my voice from the flu so you see how it is.)
Setting Sun - What's the local music scene like up round your area? Have you been to any good gigs recently?
Thrill Racer -
I wouldn't know too much about the scenes, but I think there's a big punk rock/hardcore scene because all the local free music magazines are punk/hardcore based which I find a tad boring. I'm thinking people are making money in that business. Right now as I type this interview someone is booming hip-hop real loud from their car. I hate that because it's like they're trying to prove to everyone how impressive their favourite music is when if they really enjoyed it they'd just turn the volume down and savour it to themselves instead of trying to force it upon everyone else. The most recent gig I went to was They Might Be Giants because I won the tix on the radio (I can't afford concert tickets!) They were a little bit too obscure for me, but the opening act, Amy Miles, had a spark. She sang this one song, "Kill to Know" which sounded real cool.
Setting Sun - What plans have you got for the future? Could you see yourself doing music say in 15 years time or could you see yourself doing other stuff outside of the musical pie?
Thrill Racer -
Well, I'm always gonna have to earn a living and that's my biggest concern, but music will always be a hobby for me. I think people need to overthrow the ruling class because I'm personally sick of being oppressed, exploited, ripped off and discriminated against (like, for being a woman and for not kissing ass.) I think the oppression of the working class carries over to the music scene because it seems that musicians are all about competing with each other (sure, they pretend to be supportive, but I see a lot of jealousy and insecurity.) And with competition comes backstabbing, lying, using, and fraudulence and that kind of defeats the whole purpose of making music in the first place. People want to strike it rich. I, on the other hand, want my fair share of the wealth for the work that I do.
Setting Sun - Lastly something a bit lighter to finish off with... Imagine you are shipwrecked on a desert Island and could have (clearly second sight here - lol) the choice of having 5 records or CDs with you with a stereo of course. What would be your Desert Island discs?
Thrill Racer
I guess I would make five 80 minute mix CDs of lots of great songs. I could just name off 5 of my favourite albums, but the truth is I've heard them plenty and would get sick of listening to the same stuff forever.
