Grant Mullen and Gianni Aiello are the guitarist and bassist for Naked Giants, respectively. They sit across from each other on couches in Aiello’s living room under the watchful gaze of a cutout of a spaced-out, fluorescent green Gary the Snail from Spongebob. The lights have been replaced by a swirling psychedelic red, green and blue light pattern projected on the ceiling. A gutted computer keyboard is propped against the window. The few remaining keys spell out “SPXCEBAR;” the number pad, of course, reads “420.” The bookshelves are lined with well-worn philosophy textbooks, vinyl records and Nintendo 64 games. A Playstation 2 copy of Tony Hawk’s Underground 2 sits on the central coffee table, next to an ashtray with a burnt joint, a lighter and unused rolling papers. A page torn from Where’s Waldo serves as a tablecloth. Mullen’s right arm is inches from a red splotch on the armrest that’s either blood or paint; both are likely. But he slouches deep into the couch cushion anyway.

Read our full profile on Naked Giants here.

Split Tooth Media: Grant, we spoke at the Ron Gallo/White Reaper show and you said you have about three album’s worth of material at the ready.

Grant Mullen: I wouldn’t say at the ready, but I would say conceived in some artistic sense. They’ve been birthed either in us jamming, or one of us alone. There’s a lot of songs. But the amount that are like truly ready or very close to being ready is probably like maybe three album’s worth, probably three album’s worth. Although that might be an overestimation, it might be an underestimation.

Gianni Aiello: I’d say two definitely. Sluff is already recorded. We’ve pretty much forgotten about it. But going forward we have the concept for a series of albums called Shredded where all of the songs are like reworks of each other, carry the same kind of themes, whether that’s musically or lyrically. It’s almost like imagining a different universe version of it. It’s like if Naked Giants was also a band in a parallel universe where just like one thing was slightly different, like what would that song look like?

“Shredded Again” is a song on Sluff, right?

Aiello: Yeah, it’s kind of like the preview. So we’ve been putting together basically our second album out of those songs and some one-offs. That second album, we’re almost there. And the album after that we have an idea for an album called Lipstick Face, which is kind of like a rock opera.

Give me a brief overview of Lipstick Face.

Aiello: I like to think of it in terms of vinyl. Side one would be “Lipstick Face,” which is one song that is made up of many different parts. That’ll be like 24 minutes or so. And the flip side, we have a bunch of short, repetitive songs, kinda Minutemen style. So that’s the contrast. It’s almost like a double album, just front and back.

Mullen: I think we still need to write more lyrics to it so it’s hard to make the idea tangible in speech, but it’s like basically there are certain figures and beings that present themselves again and again throughout history. Basically a Lipstick Face is someone who paints their face in order to achieve some sort of gain.

Aiello: I think it’s like how we were talking about with Sluff, how it can mean different things, so people can take what they need out of it. The difference is that Sluff, deep down at the core, doesn’t mean anything. It’s nonsense. But I guess going forward it’s like we’re trying to write something that does mean something at the core but is multifaceted like life is. Lipstick Face is like that where even when we’ve talked about it we’ve all had different ideas of what Lipstick Face might represent. Shredded is the same way. It’s just a concept that we can all brainstorm off of and see what that might mean to different people and different scenarios.

KEXP reported that SLUFF is an acronym for “South Lake Union Fuck Face.”

Aiello: Well, that’s part of the answer. They were taking that out of context.

Mullen: I feel like we only said that one time, and since then people are like, ‘That’s content right there!’ But I guess maybe it’s valuable then because maybe people want this to be a thing. They want to express their frustration at gentrification in cities they love.

Aiello: I guess if we can give them an outlet for that, then that’s good. It began as just a nonsense word. My girlfriend, Celestine, I was writing the song “Sluff” and I needed a word to shout, and it’s like a really grunge rock song, so I asked her what’s a good grunge rock word, and she was like, “Sluff!” And I was like, ‘Yeah! That’s it!’ And that’s how that came to be, literally.

How did you decide the tracklist for Sluff? Was it whatever you felt was ready at the time, or was it more of a grand scheme of ‘we have more than three albums in planning’?

Aiello: It’s kind of weird because I didn’t know this was how it went in the record label industry until we got there. But basically we had, over the years, written and demoed a bunch of songs and we had the album planned out, 12 tracks start to finish. And then the label was like ‘bands never do that. Bands don’t come with an album already in order.’ We’re trying to put on what we feel represents us the most, and the label is trying to put on what will capture the most audience. So it’s kind of going back and forth between what we can do to keep a happy medium.

Mullen: I think it’s interesting too that “Dead Alien” and “Slide” from Sluff would also probably be on the Shredded rework, but they would probably be exactly the same. We would re-record them differently, but the arrangement would probably be the same just because they were initially planned to be on it. We just decided on Sluff to add the songs that we were imagining for Shredded because we were playing them live and we thought, are we going to wait like two years to release them, or are we just going to fucking do it?

How much artistic control would you say you had over Sluff? Do you feel well represented?

Aiello: It’s just strange because just having the idea of where we want to go, it’s tough to commit to the moment because it already feels dated. And especially because these are songs we’ve been playing for a long time. It’s kind of complicated.

Mullen: I feel like, in a sense, we had like 90 percent artistic control because they like us, they want us to make the music and everything is cool. But in another sense I feel like we had 40 percent artistic control because what we would be doing if we could do whatever we wanted would be drastically different.

What would you have done differently with Sluff?

Mullen: It wouldn’t have existed, probably.

Aiello: We would have skipped it entirely.

Mullen: It probably just wouldn’t be an album. The songs would all exist, but it wouldn’t be an album. But it’s great that it is an album then.

Aiello: And it goes deeper because the reason Naked Giants works pretty well is because we each have our own ideas where the sum is greater than the… whatever it is. So adding the [record] label is just another cog. It’s kinda nice in that way because they have the perspective in the business and the industry. When you mix all that together, it creates a new thing. Maybe it’s not exactly what we would have predicted, but it’s worth something.

What about the album cover? Gianni, you’re smiling already.

Aiello: It’s just strange because it’s like I don’t know any album covers that look like that. I don’t know whether it’s bad. It’s just weird. It doesn’t look like an album cover.

Are you comfortable with the cover?

Aiello: I think so. I think I’ll be more comfortable when I see it physically on vinyl. Then I’ll be able to understand conceptually what it is.

Mullen: Me too. It’s never anything I thought would exist. So that’s weird.

Just having an album of your own in general?

Mullen: No, I mean the album cover. I mean having the album that I make have that album cover. It’s really weird.

You’ve both mentioned pop sounds a few times today. Where do you see the band heading? Are you thinking more poppy, for a while at least? No idea even with three albums planned?

Aiello: I guess pop to us is more of a classic melody that sounds good. Going forward it’s about how to capture an audience using those techniques, but also do something that is new that we’ve never done before. Kind of experiment, push our boundaries. I think that’s the general vibe.

Do you feel Sluff is your pop album?

Aiello: I think that’s why this album doesn’t quite hit the mark for me because it’s not particularly either way. It just kind of happened. And it’s got some great hooks on it. And it’s got some weird parts, but it’s not like we necessarily said anything. Again, that’s kind of funny because that’s what it is. It doesn’t really mean anything. It means what you need it to.

Is there anything that could have been done about it to make you feel more secure about it?

Mullen: I don’t think so. Probably not.

Aiello: I think it’s just a product of it being the first album. There’s been so much anticipation. Our friend Kevin, he’s older. He made a Facebook post about living through Star Wars. He was a kid when the originals came out. He made a new post when the new ones came out and he was like, “Spoiler alert: The new movie didn’t follow the plotline you’ve been building in your head for the last 30 years.” First of all that’s just really funny, but that’s kind of how this album is. There’s so many people working on it, and there’s so many different directions it can go. We could have never predicted this. And it’s like what Grant said about the album cover. I would have never predicted that would be on the first album cover.

Mullen: And all the songs and the way they sound. Totally.

I just find it funny that your reaction to your debut album is ‘totally weird.’

Mullen: I don’t understand any other way.

The new songs are more lyric-driven. Do you see that becoming a bigger part of your music, or melding with what you already do?

Aiello: I think directly next there’s still going to be a toss-up between them, but we’re definitely starting to write more intentful lyrics, which I think is good. But for example, “Lipstick Face,” I think we’re hoping that’s going to be a combination of the two where it tells a whole story over 25 minutes, but it also musically tells a story.

Mullen: The Shredded songs also are kind of like that, but it’s still kind of a toss-up. Some of them are still going to be really simple lyrically, and there’s not something deep and complicated being discussed, but the album is discussing something complicated. And each song is just like a little bit of information on it, or a guide for what we’re trying to say.

Grant I’ve got a quote from you from another interview…

Aiello: Oh boy.

…where you said “I don’t write words. They just happen.”

Aiello: (laughs) That’s a great quote!

Mullen: It’s true. I don’t write words. They just happen. I don’t ever write lyrics. Whenever I do they’re bad. I don’t want to spend a week revising. I’m usually not happy with how they sound. There is definitely a time you have to stop with anything. Things get too complex and you have to make yourself stop or it’s not going to be good anymore, or you’re not going to like it anymore because you’re too focused on some deep part of it and you lose track of the whole.

I’m really debating whether we need an extra guitar or bass. Do we need another instrument? I think we’ve come up with so many limitations of playing with just three instruments. Like with Car Seat Headrest when we play “TV,” it’s good, it’s going to be great live, but it’s not going to be nearly as cool as just [Naked Giants] playing it. All the dynamics and the things that make it work aren’t there and it’s just guitar and you can’t hear [the song]. I’m kinda ready to do an album like that and then move on. But then you have to pay someone.

Aiello: But it was really cool to see what that would sound like.

You will be touring in support of your debut album, but a lot of people’s main takeaway from this tour will likely be that you shared a stage with Car Seat Headrest. Have you thought about how that factors into how you are getting your own name out there?

Aiello: Right off the bat, we’re so thankful to them for taking us on a world tour. That’s something we’ve never done before and it’s something a lot of people don’t get to do so that’s super awesome. But we do have to focus on our own stuff because we’re trying to grow as a band, too. The best thing we can do is just play our best every night.

Mullen: I always think that some people will be like, ‘God, these new guys in Car Seat Headrest are making it way worse.’

Aiello: Yeah I think about that a lot. It’s still a weird dynamic to get used to. When “TV,” the first music video for the album came out, the website, literally the first thing in the headline was “Car Seat Headrest-affiliated.”

Mullen: Isn’t that weird?

Aiello: You can’t take it too personally because Car Seat Headrest is a bigger band. It could have at least been the second words.

How do you escape that label?

Mullen: I think we’re good enough that it doesn’t really matter. I think if we were not that great of a band it would be a huge worry. Best case scenario we gain a ton of fans, we make money playing in their band, which is great for us, and we have a great time playing other people’s music, and we get to go all these places.

Aiello: I think we’re kind of saved by the fact that we’re the auxiliary members. They respect that too. They’re not trying to suffocate our career.

Mullen: I think that’s crucial that they understand it.

What do you hope to accomplish with this band?

Aiello: Nothing.

Everything and nothing or just nothing?

Aiello: Just nothing. Lately what we’ve been thinking about is simply there’s a lot of fucked up shit in this world. It’s not anyone’s responsibility to fix all of it, but you can certainly do something about it and I think everyone has a certain skill set that they can put to best use. We’re good at making music. What are we going to do that’s going to be important about that? What are we going to do that’s going to cause some good change? So I think right now we’re just in a learning stage. We’re just really trying to learn what that means.

Mullen: In terms of life, experience, wisdom, all this stuff, it’s not about the end. Which, just like Sluff existing, I could never have imagined what it is. It just feels important to do and we’re going to keep continuing to do it, and people keep seeming to come on board. It’s self-propelling. And as long as it’s healthy for us as individuals to do and it’s stimulating for us to do, hopefully also productive in some greater sense, then that’s great.

Aiello: Yeah, the journey continues. The other day I was talking to some of the roommates about a whole bunch of stuff and every avenue we discussed ended up coming back to oneness and mass consciousness, basically. And we were talking about the journey being that there’s these different levels of enlightenment, or mindfulness and different levels of just being aware. There’s a level infinity. Level infinity is ascending the levels. Like the journey is that level. You never get there, but you are there. And all you have to do is become aware of it. I think that’s beautiful.

Mullen: Yeah, totally. It kind of resolves the great dilemma almost of ‘what do I do?’ It’s like this stubborn feeling of, ‘I have privilege, other people are suffering and I feel for them, but what the fuck can I do for them?’ I’m just going to live my life and do what I want. Which is then not super productive because then you don’t know what to do. It’s a respectable stance because you’re truly like, ‘I don’t know what to do with this. This is me.’ But if you’re always on a journey, this is it. I’m not not doing what I’m supposed to do, I’m just on my own journey and it’s OK if I’m still not perfect and I’m not helping the cause because you’re just constantly learning.

So you don’t think making music is helping?

Mullen: Uh, it could. It’s all just up to anybody else. It depends. But I don’t think you can make music and be like ‘This is going to help.’ Like, you can hope.

But even if it does something as small as make one person happy?

Mullen: Well that’s beautiful in itself. Totally worthwhile. Even just making yourself happy with your own music is worthwhile.

Aiello: If we can inspire someone to pursue [their dreams], and just be passionate about anything, that is so cool. That’s what makes it all worth it. In this day and age, the thing to be mindful of is that there’s certain groups of people that are given this leeway. Us as white men are given that leeway where it’s like we can drop out of school and join a band. Not everyone gets that so how do we respect that and still give this message of ‘follow your dreams’ and make that more easily accessible?

Mullen: The answer isn’t to not play the shit out of your music. Because people always think like, ‘Do I need to be quiet?’ No. I don’t think that’s ever an answer. There’s some cases where that’s an answer — if someone else is speaking. Then you need to be quiet. Especially if they haven’t gotten the chance to speak. But other than that, that’s never the answer. It’s like ‘maybe we shouldn’t have this band because there’s enough white male bands.’ Well, then what are we going to accomplish? Nothing.

Aiello: There was a time when we learned that a young band, Locomotive, had covered “Easy Eating.” That was a band of teenagers and they’re super cool. But like that is what it’s all about. And I think we talk about this a lot because we were inspired by the classic rock musicians and we saw them and we were like, ‘I want to pick up a guitar and learn how to play this shit.’ If we can do that to someone, then that’s God.

Mullen: That is God.

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