You wouldn’t know it by the band’s thrashy
dance-until-you-break sound, but the first song Hot Hot
Heat’s drummer Paul Hawley ever learned was the famous
pre-school tune “You Are My Sunshine.”
Of course, Hawley has moved on since then. His CD collection
includes the usual lineup of the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, the Velvet
Underground and Pink Floyd albums along with the required handful
of record obscurities. But despite the tight pants, the
punkish beats and the band’s recent signing with Warner
Bros., Hawley proves that behind the blonde shag of this rocker is
just another kid who loves making noise.
Well, melodic noise anyway.  Part of Hot Hot
Heat’s recent mainstream success may be due to its
willingness to evolve past the less-popular hardcore punk sound for
which it was originally known. By replacing its singer with
keyboardist Steve Bays and adding guitarist Dante DeCaro in 2001,
the band was able to dress its punk roots up in the candy-coated
colors of synth-pop and garage rock.
“We just wanted to be able to explore melody,”
Hawley said from his apartment in Victoria, Canada. “We
couldn’t do it with our old singer, because he was a bit of a
yeller. As time went on, we became limited by what we could do
with his vocals, and we sort of had to bust out of it. And by
adding guitar, we could have more layers and textures, so we could
be more of a real rock band than just some sort of rock
experiment.”
Perhaps it worked. Hot Hot Heat has been enjoying the same
ironic success that the recent wave of indie-gone-pop bands such as
the Strokes and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs have. But Hawley wouldn’t
necessarily pin Hot Hot Heat down as an indie band that fits neatly
into a particular genre, and it doesn’t seem like anyone else
is too sure what to call it either.
“For a while, we were called garage,” Hawley said.
“Then new wave, then indie rock. But we don’t really
concern ourselves with that. It just so happens that people wanted
something refreshing, honest, sort of hip ““ it was just good
timing for us. All those other bands are just different,
they’re from different places, they do different stuff.
It’s the same spirit, but I wouldn’t say we have a lot
in common with those bands ““ other than we’re rock
bands doing stuff we like rather than concern(ing) ourselves with
trying to sell records.”
Hot Hot Heat just kicked off another round of touring this past
Monday after only an eight-day break from its last international
tour. Hawley used some of the in-between time to work on the
band’s next record, due out during the summer of
2004. Although drums may be his weapon of choice, he’s
been playing guitar since age 9, so it’s not unusual for him
to work out a melody before handing it over to guitarist
DeCaro.
“He’ll (DeCaro) take it and make it his own,”
Hawley said. “Which I think is important in this band because
we’re all sort of ego-driven, and if someone doesn’t
feel they added their part to the song, they don’t feel
passionate about it. We all need to feel like the song is great
because we’ve added our part.”
Hot Hot Heat plays at the Greek Theatre with The White Stripes
and Soledad Brothers Sept. 24.