Diamond Rings is my first, my last, my everything.
Just kidding.
But he is my first, in a way. And while not my last, he is also my 200th (post). And because he’s so godsdamned beautiful inside and out, I’m gonna also say he’s my everything… for at least this week.
John Gregory O’Regan – lately of SPIN magazine style issue fame – was the subject of my first-ever bespoke photo shoot, and last week, left his soundcheck opening for Twin Shadow, donned a Vancouver Grizzlies cap and came to hang out with me on the roof of the city’s Biltmore Cabaret for BackstageRider’s first-ever video interview.
In it, John O answers my Top 11 Questions (Remember, kids! Our questions go right to 11!) and discusses Kylie, his guilty pleasures, ball caps and how he’s so thankful to be doing what he’s doing (making awesome music, flailing around like a dork on stage, channeling Ziggy in a Canadian Tuxedo and making the boys AND girls swoon.)
You won’t see me on camera because I was not as pretty as he was, but HE is all kinds of adorable here. Enjoy:
After the cameras stopped rolling, we chatted a bit more about the new album, which will – OH MY GODS SUCH COOL NEWS KERMIT THE FROG-STYLE WAVING HANDS AND YELLING! – be produced by Björk and Austra knob-twiddler/producer/electrical wizard Damian Taylor. And he’s excited by Damian’s involvement. “They’re my songs,” he said laughing, “but he’s got all the great gadgets.” After this tour, he’ll hunker down for a few weeks to work on it in earnest in Toronto. Of the two songs – the keyboardy “All the Time” and the guitary “Runaway Love – he showed off in Vancouver, “Runaway Love”‘s definitely got the grittier lipstick-smeared rock edge. Oh and did I mention that one of his B-sides covers is going to be a cover of Teenage Fanclub’s “Mellow Doubt”? No? “Yeah,” says John, “My roomate Colin chooses all my covers for me.” This is gonna be good, folks. So stay finely, expertly…tuned.
And in the meantime, let’s all imagine a world that includes a video where 6-foot-something-lots Diamond Rings is stood next to the perky pint-sized Kylie Minogue. That’s what I’m doing now. And it’s making me very, very happy.
KYLIE MINOGUE! CALL JOHN O RIGHT NOW! I GOT HIS NUMBER! I CAN SORT YOU OUT! \m/
Happy 200th post to BackstageRider, and special thanks to Rob Leickner, Shelby Gaff, Dan Taylor and of course, Diamond Rings.
