If New York-based electroclash duo Fischerspooner have their way, the video for "Never Young," the probable first single from their next album, will feature girls going wild. Not the usual Fischerspooner campy "wild" -- tribal make-up and body paint -- but actual as-seen-on-TV hoochies.

"It's a sexy party jam inspired by spring breakers," says the group's musical guru, Warren Fischer. "Sad but true. Casey [Spooner] reflects on being a freshman in college and how different he is now. It's about youthful reckless abandon. The video will be like [20th century artist John] Baldessari-meets-Girls Gone Wild, elegant and beautiful, but about debased, trashy stuff."

The two are nearly done recording the music for the follow up to last year's #1, and vocals will be added before year's end. The new wave/electro sound of their debut is still intact, but Fischer said the album will also feature songs like "Downup," which he described as an "anthemic shoegazer" track that mixes influences such as Jesus and Mary Chain and My Bloody Valentine with a dash of the Ronettes. "It's a digital Phil Spector 'Wall of Sound' thing," he says. "It has two dynamics: quiet and reserved and extremely loud and anthemic, which is heightened with orchestration."

With more than twenty-five song "ideas" floating around, Fischer said his original goal was to introduce more organic instruments and make the album sound less digitized. Unfortunately, when he got a real drummer into the studio, things just fell apart and sounded sloppy to him. "I love real musicians who play drum machines," Fischer says. Co-producers Nicolas Vernhes (Black Dice) and Tony Hoffer (Beck) are among those helping craft Fischer's ideal album -- "a digital AOR Seventies record that can exist for a long period of time," he says.

Among the songs expected to make the final cut are tentatively-titled tracks such as "Reverb Funk," "Squirm," "Los Angeles" and "SS Stone." "We don't want an album that goes pop song to pop song," Fischer explains. "This will be an album with themes that flow from one to another. Pink Floyd is a reference, but it's not as down and introspective, though it takes you on a journey. It's the record I always wanted to make as a kid, something that feels substantial."

Even before their debut album, Fischerspooner built their reputation on Kabuki-theater style shows and videos that pair their driving, minimalist tunes with shocking visuals, color and costumes. But now Fischer says they are working on a collaboration that might be their most shocking pop art act yet: Novelist and critic Susan Sontag (The Volcano Lover) is interested in writing lyrics to one of their songs. "We'd love to get her take on what we do and inject her perspective into a pop record," Fischer says. "The ideal would be a super poppy song with critical, difficult lyrics over it. We'd like to take this opportunity to complicate things and make them less expected."

GIL KAUFMAN
(October 17, 2003)