New Politics

BONZAI 2010 ALUMNI NEW POLITICS ARE BACK!

The New Politics have a motto: “F**k It.” It’s kind of a crass, apathetic motto. But for the Copenhagen band it doesn’t mean giving up. It means taking chances—something they do with reckless abandon. For instance, when the band was on the verge of signing with RCA in November, they realized “If we’re going to become insanely famous in the U.S. we might want to actually live there.” So the three musicians packed up their instruments and recording gear, said “Fuck it” and moved into a loft in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

“We were at a point musically where you could say we had given up, honestly,” David says. “It was at that point. We were doing it solely as a hobby. In the back of our minds we might have been holding onto the dream but it was more about the joy of music and having fun. We were trying to help each other out and we ended up experimenting. We came up with a couple of good songs.”

So the guys uttered their ubiquitous motto and haphazardly sent two songs— “Stress” and “Make Money” –– into the Danish National Radio P3’s cleverly-titled Karriere Kanonen (“Career Cannon”) competition in early 2009. And somehow, out of the 973 bands that entered, the Politics were one of 42 selected to perform. Except, they weren’t even really a band.

David and Soren called Poul, another lifelong musician about to call it quits. In fact, the call came just a month after Poul had decided to give up music in favor of learning to be a professional bricklayer. But Poul too said “F**k it” and the threesome rehearsed a few times, decided against adding a bassist, and played a raucous first show that left the judges both bewildered and amazed. The band, defying all possible odds, made it to the next round and in April were one of four bands to win the Karriere Kanonen, which unfortunately turned out not to be a real cannon.

The New Politics, who signed with RCA in November, are not done blowing off convention and expectation. They are currently writing their debut album, most of which is demoed in a really professional looking makeshift recording space in Soren’s bedroom. The trick, as the band will tell you, is not to spend too much time worrying about the technical aspects of the music. Just play it with energy and passion, say “F**k it” and everything else will take care of itself eventually.