The xx
Why put effort into any type of creative work? In chatting for a few minutes with Jamie xx before their set in Edmonton, for The XX the answer is simple: because they can’t do anything else. For some that means they’re extremely lucky, for others that might mean that they’re brave. For me, when you know you couldn’t be doing anything else with your life you’re living the best possible version of yourself. “The thing that is driving us is the fact that we’re not really able to do anything else. We’ve spent a lot of time before we got recognized… trying to do other things, and honestly we weren’t very good at that.” They might be surprised, but at this point most people shouldn’t be. With a slew of collaborations, remixes and projects since their debut album xx in 2009, The xx have put together a catalogue of work that bands twice their age would envy.
Sonically the band has carved out a distinctly unique sound right from the start. With sparse chords, deceivingly simple melodic lines and the call and answer pairing between Oliver Sim and Romy Madley Croft, The xx craft song after song that scratch the same pop itch. This was a completely intentional part of the band from the outset. “When we were recording the first album demos, we had the idea that we had to make everything identifiable throughout our career from the first thing we put out. We wanted people to recognize it.” Ambitious? Yes. Admirable? Yes. Easy? Not at all.
Contrast the idea of maintaining a sound that pleased the masses that embraced your first effort with the idea that you need to grow and develop your sound as you put out new work. Many bands have faced this pressure and not every band has successfully jumped the hurtle. How does a band show their core strengths while at the same time show depth by exploring new musical territory? When put the question, Jamie responds, “I think that some could see it as a wall where you can’t stray too far from the sound that everybody knows you for. I kinda see that if we can keep this base where everybody recognizes us, we can go off in a number of directions and experiment a lot more. On this album we pushed it as far as I think we were willing to go — it’s a lot weirder in places and a lot poppier in other places. I’m not sure what we’re going to do for the next one, but I’m pretty excited about it. In the end it will still sound like us.” And push it they did. Not necessarily in the direction we’d expect. On Coexist, they went sparser and they picked up on a lot of the club influences that Jamie xx has experimented with since 2009.
Regardless of the subtle tweaks and experiments in the sound, it all still sounds very much like The xx — which is the main goal for the group. “We’re still making music for us. We did it again for this album — we took a year off so we felt like we could go back to our normal lives and come back and make music for us again.” I’m sure that The xx’s version of normal is much different than mine. Regardless, I appreciate their effort to take some time to gain some perspective before returning to the studio. It communicates a purpose and a vision for the work The xx have.
This idea of creative vision also comes up when the band is approached with the expected stream of offers and opportunities. For such a young band, there’s a surprising maturity and perspective: “[We value] something that we create on our own rather than trying to do something else for someone where we don’t understand what they want. Maybe they want us because we’re the hot bit at the time. There were a few things like the Great Gatsby where we were happy to do it because we’re big fans of Baz Luhrmann. He was really nice and he approached us in a good way, and so that worked out nicely, but not everything is for us.” Maybe it’s just the huge amount of success The xx has had on their own terms, or maybe it is the product of three individuals with an immensely strong sense of self, but so far The xx have been able to pursue the work they want to do rather than the work the feel pressured to do. I choose to believe it’s because of the latter.
In a round about way, this returns us to the start. What drives The xx? I think some of it has to do with a sense of accomplishment. The xx can’t do anything else at the moment because they’re not yet satisfied that they’ve done all they can do. It’s why they go beyond producing records and selling shows. When asked what excites The xx these days, Jamie doesn’t answer money or fame, he essentially answers ‘more work’.
So there you have it. The xx are big right now, but they are also grounded. They know what they want and they chase it without compromise. It doesn’t seem to matter. Whether music, art, or just plain work, when you know that you couldn’t do anything else with your life, you start to make things worth paying attention to.
