Straitjacket Fits: Splendour In America
by Aidin Vaziri

"There must be 140,000 rock bands in America, and Arista comes all the way to the bottom of the world to get us," gibes Straitjacket Fits' lead singer Shayne Carter, his New Zealand accent sounding genuinely perplexed. "I think that means we're actually accepted on our own terms."

Welcome to the world of Straitjakcet Fits. They write songs that combine equal parts dreamy ambience and quiet vocal mumblings with blatant, eye-opening guitar riffs and bang crash drum beats. The tell-tale tunes on their pivotal second album, Melt, bear such titles as "Melt Against Yourself" and "Down in Splendor." The most descriptive title, however, has to be "Such A Daze."

Like the music, Carter is sounding slightly fazed himself, having just hit ground after what he describes as a "120 hour" plane ride from Australia. This is the band's second visit to America and this time they're on tour with Liverpool's The La's, whom Carter explains he has never, ever heard of. Chances are the La's are mutually knowledgeable of their touring partners. After all, even though Straitjacket Fits is one of New Zealand's more reasonably mainstream bands, their shimmering blister-then-caress guitar romps have taken their time making way northward.

Carter mentions that "Coming from New Zealand, all we see America in is a political sense. It's not like Australia where they are bombarded by American culture. But once we got here, we realized that Americans aren't that bad. At least they have respect for us, whereas the English still tend to think of us as prisoners on one of their colonies-they just assume you're stupid if you're from New Zealand."

So far Straitjacket Fits have not set America on fire. They celebrate their first Los Angeles appearance with a humble get-together at a greasy diner called the Sky's World Restaurant next to the Henry Fonda Theatre, where they are playing with the La's. The place is plastered with posters depicting the album cover, glossy 8x10s of the band strewn everywhere, and their solitary video playing over and over and over from a television propped up behind the bar.

With typical earnestness, Carter explains how Straitjacket Fits' live show is a more seductive experience than the record. "When you lose the contrived situation that you have in a studio," he says, "you have space to go off on tangents, do 30-minute drum solos or even play the Siberian nose flute, if you wish. We make more sense when we play live, so we're coming back in September to do a tour of our own. I mean, after you've existed for four years in New Zealand, you really need the challenge of a fresh audience."

Later, when Straitjacket Fits are well into their devastating set, it becomes apparent that the American audiences have been for too long deprived of this New Zealand rollercoaster ride. It's a bewildering amalgamation of styles: sometimes it's poppy, sometimes sonic, sometimes balladry, but always somewhat curious.

"That's the kind of thing we're going for," pipes Carter. "We want to juxtapose ethereal with power-we want it to be seductive and abrasive. We sing about personalized things, so there's a lot of ambiguity. Therefore, our songs are able to be taken more than one way, which is really good."

Carter later admits, "After two albums, we're still trying to find our identity and we'll probably still be looking for it for our next 12 albums. I just think we need to keep in mind that there are two sides to the band-the dreamy and the fucked up. As long as we keep that variety, I think we'll be alright."