Hail to the Chiefs: Buzz Band Returns

The five band members, all from the Northern England town of Leeds, have been together for eight years, but not always as the Kaiser Chiefs. Wilson and Hodgson — the group's creative core — began playing music after a mutual friend introduced them in high school. Until 2003, they called themselves Parva and borrowed heavily from Blur and Oasis, as well as American garage revivalists like the Strokes. But the resulting sound didn't exactly hang together. "We'd sound just mad," says Hodgson. "And I'm not talking about one song — across 10 songs." After releasing three singles that went nowhere, Parva recorded an album that was scotched when their label, Mantra, folded just before it was scheduled to come out. "We kind of reached a bit of a dead end — quite a lot of dead ends, really," says Hodgson. "And one day we just went, 'Fuck that. Fuck all of that rubbish.'"

The band scrapped its old material and chose a new name (taking it from the South African soccer team the Kaizer Chiefs, mostly because the band members thought it sounded cool). Hodgson and Wilson began running an influential local dance party called Pigs. "In Leeds, all they were playing in clubs were the Smiths, Stone Roses and Oasis," says Hodgson. "We love those bands, but we didn't want to dance to them. We invented our own nightclub where everything goes — Michael Jackson, the Strokes, Peaches. Suddenly, everyone switched on to it. We had this high concept of getting dressed up. Boys would wear makeup."

Hodgson had a creative breakthrough after watching the kids partying at Pigs one night. When a bunch of fans took the stage during a local band's set, Hodgson said to a friend, "I predict a riot." Pleased with the phrase, he went home and started writing. "It did influence Nick a lot," says Wilson. "He noticed what made people dance." The resulting song, "I Predict a Riot," became the second single from their debut record, Employment, and the one to make them famous.

After wrapping up at the BBC, Wilson (wearing his too-new jacket), Hodgson and Rix walk bareheaded into the rainy night, declining a ride from their assistant. Stopping at a local gastropub, Wilson and Rix order San Miguel beer, Hodgson a Guinness. They toast Lily Allen, which starts a conversation about British tabloids. Wilson mentions that a paper once reported him snorting cocaine off a woman's hand in a festival tent. "We had a dressing room," says Wilson. "If I was going to be doing it, it would have been in there." The Chiefs, who came from Paris the day before and are preparing to jet to Buenos Aires to begin a two-month tour through the Americas and Asia the next day, trade travel tips. "Getting through customs in Ireland is pretty easy," says Wilson. "Just give 'em a potato." (For the record, he's making a joke at the expense of the band's Irish assistant.)

After downing a couple of pints, the Kaiser Chiefs call it a night before 10 p.m. With the exception of Wilson, who's just out of a two-year relationship, each has a serious girlfriend to see before they ship out. "I used to think I was busy before the band took off," says Hodgson. "I wasn't."

[From Issue 1066 — November 27, 2008]

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