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NASHVILL Story: Juliett Rowe “I started playing [guitar] when I was about eight,” Ruyter Suys remembers. “I started playing piano when I was a little kid, and the piano got taken away from the house, so I turned to one of my dad’s guitars and I’ve been jamming ever since. I took a break for a little while and went to university. I thought that playing music was irresponsible, and then I met Blaine, and he’s like, ‘You’re a way better guitar player than you are anything else.’” Ruyter Suys (pronounced Rider Sighs), lead guitarist for southern fried rock outfit Nashville Pussy, never thought much about playing in a band until she met Blaine Cartwright and the two formed Nashville Pussy seven years ago. Blaine (vocals, rhythm guitar) and Ruyter, are joined by Katielyn Campbell on bass, and Jeremy Thompson on drums, and the Atlanta based quartet will be heading out this month on a southeast tour in support of last year’s Say Something Nasty (Artemis). Ruyter and Blaine are in Austin for a show with Blaine’s other band, 9 Pound Hammer, a rousing cow-punk act that’s been doing cow-punk, since way before cow-punk was cool. (“It’s like the Ramones with Johnny Cash vocals over it,” Blaine says.) Growing up in Vancouver, Ruyter’s parents were supportive and encouraged her to play. “Well growing up I was kind of a classic guitar geek, Zeppelin and Hendrix, and all the stuff that you’re supposed to learn at the time,” Ruyter says. “I wound up getting into the blues, which is a stepping stone. It wasn’t until I met Blaine that I started listening to the punk rock. He came from the opposite school pretty much. He’d never listened to Ted Nugent really, or a lot of Zeppelin or Hendrix. But I had never listened to the Ramones, and I most certainly had never listened to Johnny Cash or Lynyrd Skynyrd.” Those disparate musical influences would help create a sound that Nashville Pussy would take to new levels in a Motorhead meets Aerosmith in a back alley kind of way. Blaine’s alcohol fueled vocals and Ruyter’s charismatic guitar playing anchor Nashville Pussy’s sound as a band that easily shares stages with a rockabilly band one tour, and a stoner rock band the next. Rag: The band has this image of ‘sex, drugs, and rock and roll’. Do you ever feel trapped by that, like you’re just ready to move on? Ruyter: People have some strange ideas about us, so yeah sometimes it can be a little–it’s not restricting for us or anything like that, but we’ll get on the phone with some DJ or something like that, and he’s expecting us to just like give him phone sex. [laughs]. So they might be a little let down. But then at the same time we’ll talk to other people, depending on the day of the week, I don’t prepare, obviously, for interviews. I don’t know when I’m going to be in the mood to start saying all the wrong shit. We’ll get people coming to shows [who think] that we’re going to jump off stage and fuck everyone in the audience. There was a rumor for a while that we lit our genitals on fire. [laughs]. Rag: Before I ever saw you live I had heard that, and this was when Corey [Parks] was in the band, was that you two would make out on stage, and then of course the fire breathing. Ruyter: We’ve made out with chics in the audience...and there’s nothing stopping us now. [laughs] If someone’s a good kisser, I ain’t going to say no. But at the same time, you can’t prepare for something like that. That ain’t rock and roll. Sometime late this summer Nashville Pussy will be heading into the studio to begin work on a new album. “Basically me and Blaine–I don’t know what you’d call it–we’re gleaning. We’re driving around crazy places in America and getting inspiration from our brethren. [laughs] A couple of days ago we did two lane roads down from Kentucky to Austin. We went and saw the Stax, which is an old soul label from Memphis. We went to their museum, which was awesome. We didn’t know they had it, we just kind of accidentally found it in Memphis. We wound up going to the Crossroads, the famous Crossroads where you can sell your soul to the devil at the right time. We drove through there...and we just kind of went on this little miniature blues hunt, and seeing some interesting people, and writing down inspirations from crazy places we’ve traveled to and stuff like that. We’ve been doing a lot of jamming and stuff.”
E PUSSY “People don’t realize it,” Ruyter says, “but most of the stuff we write about is real.” [laughs] “We’ve got some crazy friends, like our song “Blowjob From A Rattlesnake” came from a real person.” Rag: Some bands have the struggle of effectively capturing their live sound on tape–their cd comes out really polished and it lacks that raw energy. Is that a concern for you? Ruyter: I don’t think so, but at the same time we still want to put out live albums. That might be admitting yes. [laughs] Rag: Do you enjoy studio time? Ruyter: Oh fuck yes. We live on the road, and for us going in the studio–it’s like being babied or coddled or something. Like being able to do things over and over again, you never get to do that on stage. You get on, entertain, and then get off, which I love too, but the studio is like the most self indulgent place you can be. Rag: People have been debating for years on the whole analog and Protools thing, then the White Stripes come out and brag about recording on 1930’s and 1940’s equipment. Ruyter: Whatever. That’s like so old hat. That’s all we’ve ever done. Pretty much all the shit that those guys were bragging about, we’ve done on everyone of our albums. When we first started off, I think because we got more accomplished over the years, we definitely started off with more of a garage thing going on. But at the time no one had any kind of reference point to what we were talking about. There have been like twenty different garage revivals. Like Blaine’s old band, their country punk thing was definitely garage revival. There’s one every five years. Rag: I was in Hot Topic the other day, and now they’re selling Poison t shirts, and Bon Jovi t shirts. And I still have mine from fifteen years ago. Now all these young kids are buying the shirts because it’s cool and that shit is coming back, but it’s like give me a break. Ruyter: I know but you’re still cooler because you’ve got the real one. [laughs] My mom was saying a couple of years ago when everyone was wearing hipsters and flares, my mom’s like, ‘Everyone’s wearing your clothes now! You’ve got to come up with a new style!’ Rag: I know you get this a lot, but do you feel like female musicians have to prove themselves more than a man would? Ruyter: Oh definitely. But at the same time, you definitely get different types of advantages. Like people pay way more attention to you. I wouldn’t have it any other way, but I have definitely felt that my whole life. I’d been playing guitar for three or four years already, and my teacher in elementary school got pregnant and we had this asshole in between for a little while. I had already been playing guitar like in the school choir or whatever. Everybody was playing recorders and ukeleles, and I was the only one playing guitar because I could. Then we get this dork to come in and teach us whatever, and he had the nerve to tell me that I would never be able to play guitar properly because my breasts were too big. I’m like twelve right...it’s like, ‘Fuck you! I’m already playing “Stairway To Heaven”. Give me a fucking break.’ Don’t even try to play that game. I guess it was a little different being up in Canada. My parent didn’t ever make me think male/female was going to make a difference at all. You do come across it here and there. “We’re driving around listening to riffs and stuff, writing lyrics. We’re trying to take our time so it will be really good,” Blaine says about the upcoming album. The band split with Artemis last year, and have pretty much been doing things on their own since. “We’ve actually been able to maintain stuff with out having a record label behind us. Everything has pretty much been stuff that we have generated ourselves. Rarely do we have anybody behind us and pushing us at all.”
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