Give It Up

Sexy, sharp and bursting with attitude, the Donnas are irresistible - and so is their music. Teeming with loud guitars, brash lyrics and undeniable energy it's no wonder this band has garnered so much attention. What makes them even more appealing is that they're such a cohesive unit - this all-female four-piece has been together since their early teens, and in the time since, the band has worked their lascivious charms on fans and critics alike. Now, after releasing four albums independently, the Donnas have made the jump to a major label and are beginning to seduce the mainstream as well. On the strength of their breakthrough single, "Take It Off," their major label debut, Spend the Night (Atlantic) debuted at #1 on the Billboard Heatseeker chart.
The Synthesis recently caught up with guitarist / vocalist Donna R. (Allison Robertson) over the phone as she and the band were on their way to Denver, Colorado, traveling on a boisterous tour bus. Over the course of our conversation, Robertson revealed herself to be hardworking, dedicated and levelheaded amidst her band's rising popularity. We spoke about where the Donnas have been, where they're going and why Atlantic Records is such a good home.

I got a hold of your press kit and it's like bible-thick with clippings from Spin, Blender and so on.
Yeah. There's a lot of stuff in there.

Are you sick of talking to people like me yet?
No, no. Not at all

How does it feel with all the media attention you've been getting lately?
We've gotten a lot in the past with the last three albums before [Spend the Night]. So, the media thing isn't as big of a deal as you might expect because we've already had good write-ups and critical acclaim on the last album [The Donnas Turn 21]. We've just been getting a little more, and it has gradually built up to the point where it is now.

I read that you formed the band back in middle school to compete in a battle of the bands…
Yeah. It wasn't really a battle of the bands, though - it wasn't a competition. It was just a show at our school that other bands were playing in.

What did you play for your first set?
We played cover songs - we covered an L7 song and Shonen Knife, this all-girl group from Japan, we covered a song of theirs and a Muffs song. There were three or four songs and that was it.

How long was it before you realized you could pursue the band more seriously?
It was probably about five years. From eighth grade to pretty much the last year of high school, it's not like we didn't take it seriously, but we didn't think of it as a career, or something that would make money, or get any kind of press. Nobody even seemed interested in putting out a 7-inch, even on an independent label. So we just thought we would go to college and keep playing whenever we came back to town, but we didn't really think we'd go out on tour or anything. Then Lookout! wanted to put out our record, so we had a little more incentive to stay together. That's when we knew we would last a lot longer.

How did you get hooked up with Lookout! Records?
We were kind of acquainted with the people running it and a few of the bands on the label. But [Lookout!] sought us out. There were rumors that they were gonna sign us to do a record - they have a record to record contract system. Just the fact that they were thinking about it made us nervous. Nobody was actually asking yet, it was just rumors. We didn't know if it was going to happen or not. Then Lookout! finally asked, so we put out an album, and then we did three more.

You've been together, growing as a unit since middle school. How has that reflected upon your songwriting process?
I think it affected our songwriting process in an interesting way. Most bands, everybody takes lessons, or one member knows more about writing than the others. With us, it's all about instinct - it's more natural. No one knew the 'right' way, so we came up with our own way. We still work like that. The same way we were in the eighth grade when we would just write songs together is pretty much what we do now. We start with lyrics, which is sort of backwards for a lot of bands, and then I usually make up the music when we have a lyrical idea. We finish the song up when we all start playing it together. It's really simple - we kind of have a formula, but it's just what works best for us. Other bands might think of what we do as strange, but it just happens to work with the four of us.

Given your long history together and having four albums out prior to Spend the Night, how does it feel when you get ranked on charts like Billboard's Heatseeker for "new artists?"
In the music industry, "new artist" isn't always literal, it's more like new to the charts, new to radio. We don't mind so much, because even on MTV when we were on "Spanking New Bands Week," there was a news clip that showed all four of our early albums. I think most people know by now that we've been together for almost 10 years. It really doesn't bother us at all - we're just happy to be on the charts. And it's true. We are new artists if you're in that world. We have this history together, but we are new to all this.

This is your debut with Atlantic. What made you sign with them as opposed to one of the other majors vying for your attention?
We got a family type of a feeling from Atlantic. They keep a lot of their employees around for [a long time]. There are a lot of other labels that have done a lot of switching around and firing people. To me, that's a bad sign, because you need people who've kinda grown with you at your label - someone who understands you. You don't want to go to a label and suddenly all the people who were on your side to get fired, and the only ones left couldn't really give a shit about you. That happens to a lot of bands. Another thing that Atlantic offered was a little less money and a lot more power. That was the most important thing. I think you need to earn the money, and I think it's a lot better to not think about the big advance. We didn't want that. Other labels tried to woo us with big sums, but then we wouldn't have had much of a say when it came to recording, picking a producer or a single, or designing the album cover. Instead, well, we all have no money right now, but I'd much rather see our album do well in the end and have it be something we thought of ourselves. Spend the Night, from the artwork to the music, is all exactly what we wanted. We're really stubborn, so it's kind of hard to tell us what to do anyway.

I read that you were able to complete the entire recording process of your 1998 album, American Teenage Rock 'n' Roll Machine in just two days. How did you apply your experiences recording at an indie label to your major label debut?
Rock 'n' Roll Machine was just fun. We didn't fix any mistakes - pretty much what was there, stayed there. All of our overdubs were done the next day - we recorded all of the tracks on the first day and we did extras on the second. I think we can work really well like that, but then the album after that, Skin Tight, we had three weeks and …Turn 21 we had a month. Spend the Night was pretty much a month also. We felt like we could relax a little more. I think it's important to have just enough time. When you have too much time, I think that's when you get too slick, adding on things that you won't do live just because they might sound good. It's tempting, because I love to do that - I love to do lots of guitar tracks. We like to do backing vocals and percussion. I think the key is to be subtle and just do basic stuff like that. The more time you have, the more ideas you get. But you might end up regretting some of them later. We like to have just enough time. We like to be under the wire just a little bit.

Where would you like to see the Donnas' music go next?
We've always been the kind of band that progresses slowly. I don't think the next album will be a big departure from this one, but at the same time, we don't want to rehash the same old songs over and over. What we deal in is making good albums people want to listen to over and over, and not just two songs. I think the next album will just be bigger and louder, but never the wrong attitude. The same Donnas feeling - the same ideas, but we'll always have a new and interesting way of presenting them to people.

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