The Anti-Social Questionnaire
Interviewed: Alexander Leonard Donat
Of: Vlimmer, ASSASSUN
Q. What toppings make up the best burger?
A. Barbecue sauce, goat cheese, pickled red onions
Q. Favourite coping mechanism for touring NOT involving liquor or other intoxicating influences?
A. Touring with someone you would kill for, someone who shares your sense of humor.
Q. If you could be any animal in the world, which would you be, and why?
A. I’d be a dog and love all the people cuddling my furry head and belly. Or I would be one of those fancy-ass neon colored exotic spiders with a dozen eyes my wife finds on Twitter. They look like miniature Marvel comic monsters and I would scare the shit out of animals and people.
Q. Most unusual piece of merch you’ve seen/bought/produced?
A. I once bought “Travel mints” from British Sea Power, one of my absolutely favorite bands. I don’t even like licorice, but it came in a can, and that looked intriguing. HEALTH now sell “Dark Enough” coffee. To someone who’s relatively new to the coffee game, I’d love to try a cuppa. The most unusual piece of merch I sold was a CD with a song (“Erdgeruch”) that included the name of the person who purchase the CD. I sang the name in the chorus and added a couple of fitting rhymes.
Q. What lyric has had the most profound influence on your life?
A. “Lately I’ve Been Feeling Like I Don’t Belong” by Bright Eyes. Yes, I was a teenager/young adult back then.
Q. The internet: Best thing to happen to music in the last 25 year, or the worst?
A.Best thing! It gave artists the chance to do their own shit, no label needed. Also: Bandcamp!
Q. If you weren’t in music, what career would you have instead?
A. I do both at the same time. I’m an elementary school teacher in Berlin Neukölln and I love it.
Q. What cartoon characters would you be?
A. I’d be Leonardo from the Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles. Beating up the bad guys and eating pizza, yeah!
Q. What era of music or musical movement influences you the most currently?
A. I’m always influenced by contemporary music. Black Country, New Road (that’s ONE band name), Black Midi and Squid from the UK most recently baffled me with their version of jazzy, noisy, dissonant version of post-rock/post-punk, but I don’t think it made me copy their style.
Q. What is the best restaurant in your hometown and what would you recommend to order from there?
A. Clearly my favorite restaurant ever is “Madhu” from Königs Wusterhausen just outside Berlin. It offers T.H.E. best dishes. Try their Paneer Chooza or Chili Paneer. It’s paradise for vegetarians.
Q. Favourite takeout/restaurant on the road?
A. Surprise me! I prefer local takeout instead of the usual food chains.
Q. Favourite pro wrestling move?
A. Phew, I have no idea. As a kid I liked Bret “The Hitman” Hart without ever really seeing him in action either on TV or live. Sorry, I don’t know about any moves.
Q. Diamond Dogs or Alladin Sane?
A. Admittedly, I don’t know either album good enough to make a decision.
Q. Do you consider moshing and crowd surfing more intrusive and offensive than fans filming with a phone for most of the show?
A. Attending a bunch of hardcore shows as a young adult I had a love/hate relationship towards heavy moshing. One the one hand it’s some kind of ultimate catharsis to just scream the lyrics and throw your body into other people feeling the same. On the other hand a bleeding lip wasn’t so much fun. I still prefer it compared to phones, I guess. Take a photo or two, I get it; filming full songs, why?
Q. What music video blew your mind the first time you saw it?
A. “Paranoid Android” by Radiohead
Q. If you mainly do vocal tunes, what instrumental song would you cover?
A. Anything by Godspeed You! Black Emperor. Woah, I would fail soooo hard.
Q. Who is your greatest role model, and why?
A. Really, I thought about this hard, and I didn’t come up with a name. It’s more like I admire certain characteristic features of different people.
Q. Favourite film, TV or video game score (you can only pick one)?
A. Tough one, the “Monsters” OST by Jon Hopkins maybe?
Q. What song is an immediate skip to you, and why?
A. I’m an album listener, and I never skip. Every song on a release is there for a reason.
Q. What song from any (other) artist would you pick to be your theme song?
A. Ha, I love that question! I’d go for “Race For The Prize” by The Flaming Lips. It would be my wrestling entrance song, and my pro wrestling move would be called “The Prizeracer”. Now I just need to figure out what it looks like.
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