🟥 This article is translated from Japanese.

Rock is back! The whole world was electrified like that in 2002. And on a global scale, the main players were not The Strokes, but undoubtedly The Vines. Craig Nicholls, the central figure of the band, was plucked from the Australian countryside and instantly elevated to pop icon of the era. He even earned the nickname "Sex God." But he was originally a reclusive boy suffering from a mental disorder with no connection to the outside world beyond music. Eventually, he collapsed from within and went down a path of destruction. Everything ran aground. However, The Vines have returned. Everything is still unstable. But the spark was not lost.

Craig Nicholls was still Craig Nicholls. Compared to the time when he gradually started losing his balance after the 2nd album, he hadn't changed for better or worse. Of course, this was partly due to his mental disorder, Asperger's syndrome, and his mental state remained consistently unstable. During this encounter, I ended up witnessing him lose his balance twice, at which point the band members and staff immediately backed off. Although they likely understand that this is the most beneficial approach for everyone involved, the sight is still quite painful. For someone like me, it made it clear that accepting such moments as part of daily life is simply impossible.

After The Vines' performance at Fuji Rock, when Masako Karasawa, a former editor of this magazine who had been in charge of interviewing them for many years, came to the backstage area, Craig Nicholls suddenly shouted at her "Get out!" before they could even exchange a word. It was hard to believe that this was the same person who had been asking various people about her whereabouts just the day before. From an outsider's perspective, he seemed to be in a complete freak-out state, unable to distinguish between anyone around him.

However, it is precisely because of Craig's constantly unstable mental state that The Vines' music possesses a rawness that cannot be replicated by anyone else. What sets The Vines' music apart from countless power-pop bands and makes it special is not only Craig Nicholls' exceptional talent as a melody maker but also this cruel structure underlying their sound. In this sense, the fourth album Melodia, set to be released in the last week of September in Japan, can truly be considered a complete comeback. This is because it recreates the unique emotional rollercoaster of The Vines, where a young man, emotionally exposed like a five-year-old raised in a remote wilderness, often experiences intense distortions and fleeting moments of happiness. And much of it is captured in compact 2-minute pop songs. 

Their Fuji Rock stage performance was brilliant. Craig commands an overwhelming charisma on stage - you can't take your eyes off him for a second. Even before he went on stage, he was completely freaked out, repeatedly pouring water over his head, taking off his ripped t-shirt, putting it on backwards, then taking it off again. His face contorted to the limit, eyes wide open, he screamed in a completely turned-over voice. It was nerve-wracking throughout, and of course, while they are by no means a perfect band, there were many great moments. The wonderfulness of "Ride" that started right after the short MC "Sing along, clap too!" was unmatched. The audience was also great. The audience was amazing too; most likely, they were genuinely celebrating his return. Yet, the young man on stage repeatedly screamed, "I'm getting out of here" during several songs, which creates a cruel paradox. Oh well. But that's the peculiar structure that pop has.

The following interview took place in Tokyo the day before Fuji Rock. While the interview itself was calm throughout, the atmosphere during the photo shoot became quite tense and stark. After a chaotic segment in the second half of the first television interview that day, where Craig made some incoherent statements, the staff started to feel anxious just as it was our turn. As soon as Craig entered the room, he raised his voice, "No one is answering my questions properly!" Although Marie Hagiwara from our editorial team, who had met Craig as an interpreter several times before, tried to address his various concerns which seemed to calm him down for a bit, as soon as the shooting started, he began showering the record company staff and surrounding people with relentless verbal abuse, saying "You're all speaking in Japanese on purpose! I can't trust anything anyone says."  He exaggeratedly rolled his eyes and started making nonsensical shouts mimicking the Japanese language. Thus, we gave up on all the shooting ideas we had prepared.

After a short break, when he returned to the interview room, Craig seemed a little calmer, so we decided to start the interview with topics that would allow him to relax. Although he regained his composure throughout after that, at one point when Craig took off his sunglasses, I noticed his whites of the eyes were a bit reddish compared to earlier. I understood then. Ah, I see. He probably can't maintain his sanity in a normal state after all. Welcome back, Craig. Welcome to this wonderful cruel world.

—Here is an email from Masako.

Craig Nicholls: Wow! Oh, but I can't read. (laughs)

—But don't you remember this character from the e-mail?

Craig: Oh, it's Astroboy. Yeah, I remember she gave me Astro Boy. I still have it. I like it a lot.

—But she quit after she went to Australia to interview with you, because she thought she'd done everything.

Hamish Rosser: So, after the last article?

Craig: What's she doing now?

—She's out of the music business.

Craig: Oh, yeah, that's right. Okay.

—She's starting to work again, though.

Craig: Good. Then she's just like me.

—But she's coming to see you at Fuji, too.

Craig: Cool! So we'll get to see her.

—Yeah. So, today is the first time I'm talking to you, and since I'm replacing her, I'm a little overwhelmed.

Craig: It's okay (laughs). For me, this feels almost like my first real interview too.

—So, for you, what kind of time period and feeling do you think this album represents for you? I think it's a declaration that you're back in the cruel world once again.

Craig: Well, everything has always been cruel to me. Before I started writing songs at the age of 17, I didn't understand anything. I didn't understand all these clichés like, teachers, the government, my parents, and so on. But music was the only thing that spoke to me. That's why I want to give something back to music. So I guess I'm going back to the beginning, back to the start. After "Vision Valley", we didn't tour much and I was going through a tough time in my life (laughs). But now we're back, literally, and we have songs. I think that's just what we do, what I've been doing for a long time. While I was writing these songs, I was thinking, "I want them all to be singles" I’ve been able to visit other countries. After the last album, I thought I’d never leave Australia again.

—So, are there any autobiographical aspects to the first song, "Get Out" or "He's A Rocker"?　

Craig: Well, they're both part fiction and part fact. All the songs are like that. So you have to sing what you know, what's true, but at the same time you have to add something to it. It's like writing a story in a book.

—Basically, that's your style, right?　

Craig: Yeah. I start out writing about myself or somebody else that I know, and then my story becomes about someone else, and someone else's story becomes about me. So, in a way, it's very broad.

—So, what kind of "trip" is referred to in the lyrics of "He's a Rocker"?

Craig: That trip is LSD. What I'm referring to there is just acid. That's it. If I had anything to add in the interview, it would be that I believe LSD can teach people a lot. Throughout life. I don't want to say anything more than that, because talking about acid doesn't equate to me doing it. But it also doesn't mean that I haven't done it before. It's all a mystery. (laughs)

—Yeah (laughs). Well, so the last album was very much focused on sadness, right?　

Craig: Yeah.

—Looking at it objectively, is there any particular emotion that you consciously focused on?　

Craig: Like you said, there was a sadness on the last record. Literally, I've been to hell and back. It's like I've seen the afterlife. I've experienced a lot of things. But I don't have a single regret. Because I feel like I learned a lot (laughs). I just wanted this album to be full of one and a half, two minute songs. Yeah, I think this album is very similar to Highly Evolved, both of which are full of pop songs. With the last album, I had the songs and I was just trying to make an album out of them. I had to get it all out and exorcise my demons. But this time it's different. See, because you can see the cover, right? Last time, this (showing the black cover) was the cover. And this time it's very colorful and lively. For me, it means life. For me, this [Melodia's cover] is what life is now, and my life used to be like that [Vision Valley's cover].

Hamish: It was all black. It was always dark.

Craig: Yeah (laughs)

—Can you tell me about the title "Melodia"?

Craig: The only thing about the title is that I wanted it to be something that wasn't too long. I thought "Melodia" was cool. It means something to me... but it could mean something else to other people. Yeah, it's just a cool word to me. Also, I was quite involved in the cover design—photos and collages. When the album was finished, Hamish took a lot of pictures. Around that time, we went to see Silverchair. And this one (pointing to the top center photo) was taken after the show. Originally, Daniel [of Silverchair] was in it too. Yeah, I liked what the Dandy Warhols did. You know, how they took pictures of themselves with their celebrity friends? Like Courtney [Taylor-Taylor] with Mick Jagger. I liked that. I have a lot of respect for Courtney. That's why this cover is a part of my work.

—So, did you decide from the beginning that this album would have this short length and number of tracks?

Craig: Yeah, I wanted 14 new songs, all like hit pop songs. Like shiny and grabbing your attention right away. And makes money (laughs).

Hamish: It's a streamlined album that doesn't lag or stop in the middle.

Craig: There's not a lot of instrumental parts, you know. I think it's a very song-based album. "He's A Rocker" and "Orange Amber" are both song-based. It's not a record where I'm like, "I'm singing about my pain." It's kind of more like small paintings or an art exhibition record.

—In fact, most of the songs are in the one or two-minute range, but there's one song in the middle of the album that's over six minutes long, "True as the Night". Why?

Craig: When we first wrote that song, we thought it might be the closing song of the album. But then Hamish and the producer suggested, "Why don't we make this the centerpiece?" The order of the songs was a real trial and error. We went to SXSW and played shows in New York and LA. The whole time, we were making different track lists every day. But when we finally got it done, we were really happy with it. The whole band made it together.

—Why does the album end with the psychedelic song, "She Is Gone"?

Craig: That was producer Rob's idea, I think. It's got that big "Wall of Sound" sound to it. Compared to that, most of the songs are very stripped down with just guitars, vocals, bass and drums. But that song has acoustic guitars, electric guitars with distortion, and a lot of vocals. It's just a trippy, acid song.

Hamish: It's got a big ending to it. So that song and "True as the Night" were the finalists.

Craig: It's got a little bit of a spacey feel to it.

—Masako told me that the title of the ninth song is the real name of your girlfriend, right?　

Craig: Kara Jayne?　

—Yeah.

Craig: Yeah.

—But singing such personal songs is something only John Lennon or you would do, right?

Craig: Yeah, of course, because I worship John Lennon as a god (laughs).

—But isn’t it scary to sing such a personal love song?　

Craig: Of course! I've never done such an overt love song before, but it was fun to do. You know, the song before this one, "Braindead," is like a punk song or a metal song from hell. I like the fact that it's after a song like that. Like all our albums, we jump around and shift around as much as we can.

—I think the first album had a clear ambition straight through. With the second album, particularly in songs like "Evil Town," there was a notable expression of discomfort with the industry system. In other words, rather than ambition, it was more about feeling out of place in the music industry. What’s your distance from that ambition now?

Craig: I think I'm very confident in the music we're doing now, because I'm totally useless at everything else. I can't use a computer, I don't have a cell phone. All those things are very strange to me anyway. All I like to do is listening to CDs and writing songs. So yeah, I definitely have ambitions. I think you have to be ambitious. Because there are so many bands out there now, right? There are way more than when we first started. That’s why, if you’re an artist, that should be at the top of your list: the level of ambition. Because that’s the only way to reach something great.

—The Music, which you were good friends with, were on the same label in the States, right?

Craig: Yeah.

—So from our point of view, we witnessed both bands rapidly tiring out and disintegrating from the inside out at the exact same time. Looking back on it now, was it really that hard to survive in the music scene back then? How do you feel about that?

Hamish: Yeah, it was hard work, that's for sure. Around the same time as Highly Evolved, The Music released their first album, and we were on the same label as them, right? So we ended up touring the US with them for a long time. We were constantly told, "Keep touring, do more shows." We were in our 20's, Rob was around 20 years old, and after a gig, we’d often get kicked out of bars and feel pretty miserable.

Craig: Of course, there were some fun times, but there were definitely some hard times.

Hamish: So, maybe we consciously scaled things down a bit to prevent the band from falling apart. (laughs)

—Do you still talk to the guys of The Music these days?　

Craig: We've kept in contact all along—emails, phone calls. I just got off the phone with them the other day.

Hamish: Yeah, I just sent them a text on my phone too. We've been texting back and forth. We knew that The Music was coming to Fuji Rock. We'll be at a festival in Korea on Saturday, and they'll be at Fuji Rock on the same day. So we won't be able to see them in Japan. But they're coming to Australia next week. So I said, "I'll see you in Australia." Actually, we haven't seen each other for a long time. Two years? I think the last time we played in England was two years ago.

Craig: Yeah, they came to our show in London.

Hamish: Phil and Rob did, yeah.

—When you guys were touring the U.S., there was a time when we put Craig and Rob on the cover, right?

Craig: Yeah, I was just thinking about that right now. It's funny. (laughs)

—Back then, you said that "changes are happening thanks to a new generation like us." What do you think has happened with those changes since then? You mentioned earlier that there are more good bands now...

Craig: Oh, I didn't say there are more good bands now. I just said that there are a lot of bands out there. And we've never really considered ourselves part of the scene. We were often compared to bands like The Strokes... and of course, I think that was good because we liked those bands. But I don’t really understand that.  We were just trying to make a good album. In the late 90s, I was writing songs and playing shows in pubs and stuff, and then in the following decade, we went to America and made a record. That's what we wanted. So it was a combination of a lot of fun and a lot of hard work at that time. Yeah, I think we've accomplished quite a lot already. If we retired tomorrow, I think we've done a lot of things as an Australian band. In the US and in the UK. In the US we toured twice with The Music and played in front of a lot of people. Yeah, The Music are a good band. But I think there are definitely more good bands and bad bands now. Unfortunately, I hear a lot of bad ones too (laughs).

—Well, what about the new wave of bands that have come out in recent years?　

Hamish: The thing I was happiest about was that Arctic Monkeys said they started their band because of us and The Strokes. I thought it was really cool to know we had that kind of impact.

Craig: Yeah. It's nice to know that even though we're not U2 or R.E.M., we've made some impact. It’s true that we made a mark on rock music. Because, like Hamish said, Arctic Monkeys came out.

—When I talked to Alex, he said, "I saw Craig drawing on his jeans, and the next day, I drew on my jeans too."

Craig: Wow.

Hamish: Hahaha! So it’s not just musical influence; you’ve had a fashion influence too!

—Anyway, they talked about The Vines a lot.

Craig: I'm so glad. I think he's a genius. And The Last Shadow Puppets record was amazing. He's a great artist.

Hamish: I've met him a few times. They're really cool guys. The last time I saw them, they were already very successful. Especially in England. And yet, they were still just four normal guys. Where are they from again? Newcastle? No, Sheffield!　

—Yeah.

Craig: That's where Mark E. Smith is from. And Pulp (laughs).

—Klaxons were talking about you, too.

Craig: Klaxons, we like them a lot. We went to one of their shows, and met them afterwards.

—Oh, I might have mentioned that. I said to Simon, "I heard Craig is your idol?" and he turned bright red.

Craig: I think they’re a really cool band. They’re great. We went to the Klaxons' show in Sydney, and afterward, we hung out a bit. I thought they were an exciting new band.

Hamish: I didn't even know Klaxons were fans of ours. That's cool. (laughs)

—But really, there's a lot of stuff that wouldn't have happened without you guys.

Craig: Thank you. But as an artist, I'm just doing what I do best. If it affects people, then what more can I ask for? I don't have to be humble about it, right? (laughs)

Hamish: Yeah, it makes me feel less disposable, because everyone still cares about us. That's great.

Craig: Yeah, no matter how I act, no matter what happens, our albums are going to be around for a long time.

Hamish: And they're made of plastic, so they won't break easily (laughs).

Craig: The shows are much better now. I finally feel like I can enjoy it myself. My schedule is better organized, and I think I have a much more professional approach than before. Yeah, I think we've been 100% professional with our CDs and albums. That's how we made Highly Evolved and all our other albums. And then we went on tour and made a lot of noise. But now we're trying to recreate the sound of the album as much as we can in our live shows, with harmonies and everything. We're trying to recreate the sound of the album as much as we can, without it becoming rigid and boring. Because if you watch a band live and you feel like you're listening to a CD, it's really boring, right? So you have to find a balance, and I think we've finally found that perfect balance.

—So, what kind of mode are you in right now? I know you have to promote this album, but what about after that?

Craig: We've already got some new songs, so we're going to demo them soon. We've got five or six new songs. I'm going to record demos in a couple of weeks. I'm really excited about that. People are just starting to listen to the album now, but it's not our "now". Of course, it's fun to play on stage. But I'm already thinking about the new songs. That's just my personality. I've been doing that since I joined the band. The most important thing is to write as many good songs as possible. That's the only criteria, and that's what I'm trying to do the most. That's all I do when I'm at home. Demos are very sacred to me. For example, when I listen to the early demos, it feels almost magical. Last year, when I was recording with Rob [Schnapf] again, I said to him, "Probably the most exciting time of my life was when we were recording Highly Evolved." But I might have been even more excited during the mixing stage of this album. In fact, I feel like this album, Melodia, is a continuation of Highly Evolved in a musical sense. So, I wanted to keep that feeling from “Highly Evolved” through to “Autumn Shade” throughout the entire album this time—like one long song. You know... Can someone please stop me from talking so much?

—No problem (laughs). But is there any plan to continue the Autumn Shade series after this third installment?

Craig: I was recording and I said to Rob, "This is it." And Rob was like, "You can't say that." So I said, "Okay, I'll leave it at that." Yeah, I think it's nicer to have the possibility still open to what's going to happen. I mean, there could still be a fourth one (laughs).

Hamish: You can't say "not anymore".

Craig: Exactly (laughs).

—Okay, last question. I'm sure there were a lot of good changes that came from starting music, but on the other hand, do you think there were any bad changes?

Craig: No, not at all. As far as I'm concerned, I've never made a mistake in my life.

Hamish: (laughs)

Craig: Because I've always put positive things out there. Even in songs like "Scream" and "Get Out". I may be broken in those songs, but at the same time, it's art. As far as I'm concerned, I'm happy with the four albums I've made and everything I've done on this earth. Absolutely.