Discotheque Confusion

Advent Season: Day Six
Dev Hynes Interview

I had a little chat with Dev Hynes, who is these days also known as solo musician Lightspeed Champion (named after a comic strip he used to made), rather than one third of the his old band, the short lived yet triumphant Test Icicles.
He's now making music that he truly enjoys, working and touring with a band mostly made up of his friends.
The setting? An old church, which was venue to a fantastic evening with Patrick Wolf performing, with Dev there to support.

Ask him about Marios Schwab or what he thought of Hedi Slimane's last ever Dior Homme collection, and you may get a somewhat confused response, because as Dev confesses, he has "no idea" what is going on in the fashion world at the moment.
"So you wouldn't fancy yourself as anyone's muse, then?" I ask. "Well, it would be flattering to be a muse..", it's clear that Dev doesn't make concerted decisions about how he dresses. As he simply put it, he'll wear "whatever I'm in the mood for in the morning." Dev is perhaps being modest; he has been known to don a Spiderman costume at his gigs and his trademark thick black glasses must appeal to the spectacle obsessed Cobrasnake collective. He and Mark Hunter are "mates"; infact when Mark last visited london he crashed at Dev's flat in Dalston and one of his snaps was used for the cover of one of the Lightspeed Champion LP's.

"So what do you think of Cory Kennedy?" I ask cheekily, not so subtley dropping in a couple of words that some people may use to describe her, to see if he'll succumb to bitchiness. He doesn't. "No comment" he replies with a knowing grin. "she says shes a virgin" he shrugs with jokey innocence mixed with doubt "but I don't know!.." Apparently he has a few Cobrasnake tees but he doesn't really wear them. He agrees that he should give them a bit more wear out of them after I suggest that he could make a small fortune out of them on ebay.

If he could collaborate with any artist, he doesn't hestitate to say that it would be Amy Winehouse, and it would be "singing something upbeat yet depressing". A good choice and she has certainly had enough experience to fuel that sort of material.

When I drop that cliched phrase "modern day style icon" he names states that Brandon Flowers is someone who he thinks dresses very well indeed. It turns out that Dev is a huge Killers fan, and is one of a select few who is a fan of the bearded western look. "I am influenced by their music and then how I dress just follows.. I'm actually a little obsessed". Funnily enough, a couple of weeks back while staying in a brazilian hotel in spotted the band huddled outside having a smoke. "I hate meeting people that I like" so he chicked out and "had to walk straight past them." A shame, they could have chatted about facial hair "With mine, I'm basically just copying what he's doing!"

check out the short film version of the video for "Midnight Surprise". Directed by a mate Ferry Gouw (of band Semi Finalists), it's prettypretty, so I know you'll all like it.