Interesting Answers From Tegan & Sara’s AMA on Reddit
Ah, it’s hard to believe that Tegan and Sara, everyone’s favorite Canadian lesbian indie rockers, have been around for seventeen years now. It’s even harder to believe that their critically-acclaimed album, Heartthrob, was released a whole two years ago (seriously, where does the time go? I could have sworn I heard someone introducing “Closer” on the radio as a new single, um, last week. Just look at how much they’ve packed in during the intervening months — touring with fun. on their Most Nights tour, confirming their supporting slot for Katy Perry in the fall of this year and most excitingly, launching their own highly anticipated tour, Let’s Make Things Physical. It kicked off in May and will continue throughout the summer and across America, with a bunch of bands like The Courtneys and My Midnight Heart turning up along the way. The pair recently did a Reddit AMA, and we’ve compiled some of the most interesting answers about the world’s favorite sister act.
On Homophobia: The pair were one of the first openly gay female musicians around when they first hit the stage in 1997, and since then they’ve been outspoken about supporting LGBT youths in their It Gets Better videos.
Question: I watched your “It gets better” video on youtube yesterday and there was this homophobic person who wrote stuff like “gays aren’t normal, you disgust me, blah blah blah”. When I come across people like this person, I have no idea what to do or say, I just get so angry. Did it ever happen to you in real life, and how did you handle it? Do comments like these hurt you?
Answer: We are human, so of course that stuff upsets us. But I don’t believe it to be true, so mostly I am horrified by the human condition and how hateful human beings can be. On the other hand, I think hateful people are generally people who have been hurt in their life and don’t understand what it feels like to be loved or cared for. I have that in my life and I try and be mindful of that!
On Old Music: When you’ve been around for seventeen years and have seven albums, as well as countless collaborations (The Lego Movie’s “Everything is Awesome” with The Lonely Island, anyone?), under your belt, the worry that you’re going to get stale must be a constant fear. Tegan and Sara didn’t skirt the issue.
Question: Most of the artists I know are embarrassed or uncomfortable with their earlier work, but, when you’re a painter, you don’t have to regularly re-create your old work for your fans on stage. When you look back at your work from your early music careers, how do you feel about it? How do you feel about performing your older songs?
Answer: Great question! Sometimes we feel that our older music needs to be freshened up! Its less about feeling embarrassed and more about feeling inspired or challenged by the arrangements and melodies. As we’ve become better musicians it can feel strange to play less accomplished work from our earlier records. In some cases the songs are just as wonderful to play now as they were back when they were written! It just depends!
On Bringing Album Tracks to Life: As there oeuvre moved towards more production-heavy numbers, Tegan and Sara have come up against a quandary with their live shows. That they effortlessly navigated, as usual.
Question: How do you balance between wanting the live versions of your more production-heavy music to sound similar to how they sound on the record while still preserving the authenticity that comes with playing the instruments live?
It’s a fine balance to keep the production of the records live. But we are trying. We want to perform as organically as possible, but also embrace the digital age! ha. We have a 6 person band for a reason. We play as much live/organic stuff as we can but we love having track playing. There are things on our record no human could play live. And I’m glad we can include those parts live now!!!! Welcome to the T+S Club!
On haters: Whatever you do as an artist, when you’ve been around for nigh-on two decades, someone is going to object to whatever it is you’re doing/doing now/doing differently. As stalwarts of the genre, Tegan and Sara are no exception.
Question: Ok, on to the question: I know you’ve received a lot of criticism for “selling out” and your current commercial success. Listening to your albums chronologically, I agree with your statements that it was just a part of the evolution of your tastes and styles – and a damn good one at that. But as a huge fan of “Divided,” “Freedom,” and “Hype,” how will I get to enjoy these songs, except on the record?
Thanks for sticking with us! Don’t worry about the complainers! We don’t! If we were making the same record over and over again those people would complain about that too! Sara could save 1000 kittens from a burning building and they would go online and complain! They are the worst! And we don’t care! We’re happy and inspired and making good music. We are lucky and humbled by our careers and success! We care zero percent about those people! YAY! -TRQ