Distinguished art-rockers Blonde Redhead have been unceasingly pegged as an American band, even though no one in the band is, in fact, American. It always struck as a rather strange thing to not second-guess. Founded by Japanese artist Kazu Makino and the Italian twin brothers Amedeo and Simone Pace, Blonde Redhead have been perfect strangers from the very start: a band at the right place at the right time. Though culturally speaking, they remain relatively unmoored from the East Coast hotbed of alternative music that set their progress in motion.
In hindsight, that sense of rootlessness may have benefited Blonde Redhead over the long haul. Their music seems forever ageless, existing outside time and space. “We have a new manager now who’s so great, he has been digging up our past for a business reason,” says Makino, referring to 2016’s , a Numero Group compilation of and 1995’s ) on Steve Shelley’s Smells Like Records. “And he’s scratching his head, telling us, ‘You just keep changing, floating and moving around. You work with the same people, you work in the same place. You just keep . I’ve been in this business for many years, and I can literally tell you every person with some capacity has worked on your band.’ Hearing that was a little bit frightening to me. But I guess that means that we’ve been totally fluid all the time and just kept moving in the other way.” She pauses and giggles, as if a private thought just entered her mind. “A fucking hot mess, you know?”
