YYYs go electro

The New York trio talk about re-tooling their sound for It's Blitz

08 April 2009 - Yeah Yeah Yeahs have argued that they deliberately decided to go for a more electro feel on their new albumIt's Blitz. 

Singer Karen O said it felt like the "next step along the path" for the New York trio following the release of their last EPIs Is."I guess an electronic and more synthesised sound felt right this time," she told 6 Music.

"We moved away from the raw rock that we recently did and freed up the direction for something new."

"It just sort of came in the course of writing and recording the record," guitarist Nick Zinner continued."It's really what seemed to work the best for us."

Another reason for their new polished direction was largely down to the record's co-producer, TV On The Radio's Dave Sitek, who worked on their previous two albums.

"Dave possesses this radical quality that transforms songs," explains drummer Brian Chase. 

"We took what we did with our main producer Nick (Launey) to Dave and he was like, 'You have to try new ideas and experiment.""It knocked the wind out of our sails a little bit at first."Karen O on Yeah Yeah Yeahs' album leaking 

It's Blitz,which is out this week, was leaked ahead of its official physical release on February 23, forcing the band to push the album digitally soon after.

Karen admitted that she was initially disappointed when she heard the album slipped through the net.

"We were really excited about building this excitement around the new record," she sighed."So it knocked the wind out of our sails a little bit at first.

"But at the same time we were lucky because there was a pretty positive reception with the leak."

During their three years out of the spotlight the band have been keeping busy on various side projects most notably the soundtrack to Spike Jonze's new movie 'Where The Wild Things Are'.

Karen roped in her fellow band members, Arcade Fire, The Raconteurs and Deerhunter for the score, which is based on a childhood book.

"My favourite things are music and film and the marriage between the two of them so I was really excited about putting this together," she enthused.

The trio are set to headline this year's Camden Crawl on 24 April and Zinner said their songs are likely to take on a different form live.

"We've had to re-interpret the songs live so it won't sound the same as the studio album," he added.

"I think Nick has about 30 pedals now,"Karen joked. "They’re like bunnies they multiply."