Introducing: Pincers

Every now and then, a record shows up in your inbox/promo pile/Spotify recommendations (delete as appropriate) that completely knocks you for six. It could be that this particular artist is doing something so frighteningly unique that it warrants no easy classification, it might be that it’s just impeccably well-written and really justifies the repeat listens, or perhaps that the mind behind it is so off-kilter that you just have to take a look inside. In the case of acidic alt-pop maelstrom, Pincers, it’s all three.

With his debut EP, Molt, the unsurprisingly anonymous musician – who refers to himself as a ‘sophisticated spambot’ and ‘Siri’s mutant nephew’ – cooks up an outlandish concoction of trashcan percussion, soundscapes dripping with LSD and, as the man himself puts it, diplodocus orgasms. Okay, we’ll quit trying to pigeonhole him; in all honesty – outside of an allusion to mid-noughties Animal Collective, perhaps – you just can’t place Pincers. That’s probably the point, though.

PlanetPrime Planet: How are you on this rather bleak Monday?
Pincers: Well, as I type this a spindly kid trundling a pink suitcase has just been wrestled onto the road by a police officer directly outside from where I’m working. The boy is screaming ‘I can’t calm down if you’re crushing me’ and ‘I just want to be left alone’. Now, there are three ambulances and three police vans here, so I’m feeling very safe.

PP: Firstly, you recently unveiled a rather brilliant video for new track, ‘A Sociopath to Fame’. It’s a series of distorted visual elements touching on world issues, including Australian politics and Facebook to name a few – how did that come about and what inspired you to use the selected footage?
P: At the time I made it, Julia Gillard was still the Australian PM and was copping loads of flak especially from Tony Abbott and his team of twats so I just thought it would be brilliant to have Julia buggering Tony with a strap-on. I scoured YouTube for the right footage of two kangaroos mating and just superimposed Julia and Tony’s heads on the kangaroos to avoid the hassle of having to film a porno. At the time, Oz was in the news for its 21 consecutive years of economic growth so I then superimposed that clip of Julia and Tony mating onto footage of the World Economic Forum to imply it being demonstrated as the winning formula for economic growth. Miraculously the footage I ripped of Julia looks like she’s mouthing the words to the song at that moment : ‘prayers are sold on to Omnicom.’ This was six months before the NSA scandal and I was actually irritated and paranoid about Facebook hijacking data and targeting ads at me, so I made some stop-motion animations using the liquify tool in Photoshop to distort Facebook profiles as a challenge to make something beautiful out of something vile.

PP: Lyrically, can you explain the story behind the song?
P: I’ve been gutted seeing a former lover with someone else and I enjoy stalking. I’ve killed some animals and plants so why not combine all this first-hand experience of pain and death into the basis of a song? The verses and bridge are actually a fictional linear story set in the offline world, in which a religious man murders his ex’s new lover. He uses social media to locate him near Rich Mix and at some point during the murder/sacrifice he photographs himself with the victim, and on another Friday in the future – we don’t know which Friday because he got away with it – he posts that photo onto his ex’s Facebook profile. Dissect the story with choruses regarding the online world, which are based on facts from real events and the idea that the internet is a modern Garden of Eden, and your thoughts in the garden are the apples and they belong to the Apple corporation.

PP: For anyone who’s not had the pleasure, how would you best describe your music?
P: A fine distraction from impending doom

PP: What’s the concept between your rather dark and somewhat bizarre, yet engaging/unique sound?
P: Well, it’s only dark compared to commercially viable fast food music about receiving attention in a club from living froth; most of my other songs are funny and there is no concept. Here’s a rhyming mantra of words ending in -ise though: advertise, accessorise, categorise, lobotomise, surprise, circumcise.

PP: With comparisons rife to Nick Cave and none other than Bowie – in terms of inspiration who/what do you cite, both musically and lyrically?
P: Being compared to those figures is very frightening. They have monumental careers and are geniuses. I’ve got no ideas left and might pass away any day now. I very much respect, admire and am inspired by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, David Bowie, Nick Launay and Tony Visconti. But, I actually derive most inspiration reacting to absurd things in life – like American gun ownership statistics – and attempting to figure out what is actually going on.

PP: You release your debut EP Molt on November 18. What can we expect and how does it feel to be getting your music out there?
P: You can expect my attempt to create the sound of a diplodocus having an orgasm or a bee waxing a man’s back. Expect timeless lyrics like ‘his recipes were lovely – he’s potato, you’re gravy’. It would be utterly terrifying getting my music out there if I had feelings. Luckily nobody knows who I am – a sophisticated spambot: Siri’s mutant nephew.

PP: What’s behind the name Molt?
P: Well, the figure floating next to me on the EP cover was made from a photograph of a pile of bin bags. I began to regard this collage of unwanted waste as my exoskeleton, if I ever molted as arthropods do, and instead of rotting it would haunt and protect me and it’s perfect if anyone wants to call the EP rubbish. It’s very trendy to have single word EP titles at the moment.

PP: Aesthetics have become increasingly important in recent times, with many new bands emerging with their signature look already in place – can we expect your later works to follow in the footsteps of ‘A Sociopath To Fame’?
P: I’ll avoid a signature look at all costs. At the moment, it’s an amateur, homemade video collage aesthetic because I have barely any money. If I could afford it, I’d hire a 3D camera and film melting duct tape pteradactyls or scan writhing worms on a drum scanner and print the pictures A0 size with a lenticular printer or pay some recognisable actors to wear my inflatable beard and pump it up on a crowded bus via a hidden straw.

PP: A little birdie informed me you obtain samples via iPhone and the sound of bicycle spokes grating against a toothbrush can be heard throughout the upcoming EP. Is that rather DIY artistic feel an important aspect?
P: You have to DIY. You’ll wind up a kite if somebody else does it for you.

– Interview by Hannah Daisy

Molt is available from November 18 on Voltspark Records.