Tegan Quin Talks Against Me! Video, Side Project With AFI's Burgan

Tegan and Sara's Tegan Quin dialed up Rolling Stone's Jenny Eliscu from Los Angeles, where she's prepping to film her appearance in the video for Against Me!'s "Borne on the Waves of FM Radio." Quin shared some info on how she wound up on a punk track and her side project with AFI's Hunter Burgan:

How did you first hook up with Against Me! ?
"When their first record came out, I loved them, and when they put out the next record, I interviewed them for Much Music during the Warped Tour. I gushed about how much I loved them and I think they thought that I was really weird. Then they told me they were making a record with Butch Vig and I was like, 'You should have me on the record! I'll play guitar.' And then a month later they called and said they had a song they wanted me to sing on: It's about a long distance relationship, and it basically summed up everything I was trying to say on The Con."

How was it different from recording with Sara?
"Well, they had been in a really amazing studio and were joking they hadn't seen a girl in months, so they were really nice to me. I'm used to just being in a ghetto studio with Sara going, 'Get away from me!' But I was at Warped Tour in L.A. yesterday, and I saw the Against Me! guys, and they were all sweaty and stinky. So I hope they smell better when I see them to make the video. I ran into my friend Hunter Burgan from AFI — we have a side project together."

What's the deal with this side project?
"We met like three years ago after he e-mailed me when we were on tour with So Jealous. I sent him a lot of B-sides and things and he started redoing the instrumentation and turning it into a dance electro thing. Sometimes it sounds like Kelly Clarkson, actually. I think it could make us both really rich. Sara and I just did a tour with Cyndi Lauper, and she co-writes on every song. That's my retirement plan, to sit and write with really cool artists. It was funny writing with Hunter, though. Like, actually being in the same room. I've never written with anyone, because Sara and I don't write together. He's like, 'Write lyrics,' and I'm like, 'With you watching?' "

Click here for more of this interview and the rest of Jenny Eliscu's Rock 'N' Roll Diary.

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Song Stories

“Smells Like Teen Spirit”

Nirvana | 1991

"Smells Like Teen Spirit," named after a brand of deodorant marketed to girls, was Kurt Cobain's attempt to "write the ultimate pop song," he said, using the soft-loud dynamic of his favorite band, the Pixies. Cobain "had that dichotomy of punk rage and alienation," the song’s producer, Butch Vig, told Rolling Stone, "but also this vulnerable pop sensibility. In 'Teen Spirit,' a lot of that vulnerability is in the tone of his voice." Sadly, by the time of Nirvana's last U.S. tour, in late '93, Cobain was tortured by the obligation to play "Teen Spirit" every night. "There are many other songs that I have written that are as good, if not better," he claimed.

More Song Stories entries »

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