Beatweek Magazine issue #82: Goo Goo Dolls interview, Apple Event, Auburn, Hey Monday, Zoe Scott and more

New in the 82nd issue of Beatweek Magazine:

• Goo Goo Dolls cover story interview: Johnny Rzeznik and Robby Takac discuss their new album Something For The Rest Of Us and reflect on twenty-five years of Goo

• a look at Apple’s September 1st media event

• interviews with Auburn, Hey Monday, and Zoe Scott

• reviews of new iPad cases, iPhone docks and more

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Zoe Scott interview

She’s a world-traveled British rocker invading America, but she arrives fully influenced by the American rock that came before. Zoe Scott’s new single “Hard Habit” hits airwaves today, with an album soon to follow – and she gives Beatweek the early scoop on what we can expect, along with why her album is called Woman On Top.

You’ve had such an interesting background. You’ve lived everywhere.

Yeah, I have. I love travel. I quite enjoy being an outsider, actually, because I think it gives you space to kind of grow into who you want to become. I love Italy. I lived there for four years. I speak fluent Italian. Love the States. Love American people. Love the enthusiasm and the creativity of this country. And this has kind of become my home. But I have. I’ve spent time in New York. I’ve spent time in Spain. Obviously Los Angeles. So I’m a bit of a nomad. I feel really free when I’m traveling it’s really inspiring.

And yet listening to your music, it seems to be pretty heavily influenced by American rock.

Yeah, it is. That’s my passion. Love American rock, especially I love the sixties stuff. I love all the rock that came out of the west coast in the sixties. I really got into music cause I was really into The Doors and really into Jim [Morrison] and his poetry and his whole thing. That was my vision and my dream to come out west and make music. I now live in Laurel Canyon, where all that music came out of in the sixties, and I find it really inspiring. Being British, we’re into history. So even if The Doors aren’t living in the canyon now, I still feel the spirit of everything that happened there.

You started in music when you were very young, then at some point there was maybe a rebellious stage where it was like “I’m going to go be an actress.” Were you trying to get away from the music when you went to the acting?

I actually think going back to the music was more of the rebellious streak. I grew up in England, and it seemed like more of the right thing for a middle class British girl to do, to go and be an actress. And then I realized that it wasn’t really what I wanted to do. So I think really, going back to the music was more of “Hey, I’m just gonna do what my soul wants to do.” I worked in Europe as an actress and I worked in Italy, and I worked in England, and I think people thought I was crazy when I said I was going to the west coast of America to make my kind of music (laughs). It was a big adventure. My sister and I lived in a cave out west when we first got there. And I remember my mum, my poor mum who’s wonderful, she flew out west and we showed her our cave and she was crying, and she said “Well, whatever makes you happy.” So I think that was pretty rebellious.

Some of your songs like “Eight Lovers and a One Night Stand” and “Hard Habit” are obviously about relationships, but then you’ve taken it a step further by blogging about your dating life.

Relationships are a big part of who we are, right? And also because I’m such a fish out of water here in America. Well, not a total fish out of water, but I grew up dating in Europe, and the dating scene in Europe is very different, maybe not all over America but in LA. So I find it so amusing, LA, in terms of dating, that’s why I feel like writing about it in terms of blogs.

I’ve been more single over the past, let’s say, three years than I was in the past. But there were some love stories of the heart while I was writing this record. I guess as a writer, whatever comes up for you, your life is like a canvas. And while you’re making that passage of writing a record, whoever or whatever comes in your aim of fire (laughs). I write about my life, the people around me. A lot of my songs are born out of passionate emails. I’ll write letters.

I had a brief fling when I was first writing the record. The guy actually moved to Italy, and we were sending a lot of emails. Some of my songs came out of the emails that I wrote to him.

I’ve actually found that’s quite a good technique. If I have a feeling about somebody, I’ll write a letter, a passionate letter. I won’t necessarily send it, but then I’ll start parsing it out and putting it on guitar chords.

It’s fun music.

Yeah, it’s supposed to be fun. It’s supposed to be sexy and fun. It’s called Woman On Top, and even that’s supposed to be fun. You can take it literally. I heard Katy Perry’s song “I kissed a girl and I liked it” and I thought well I don’t really want to go around kissing girls right now. What do I want to be? I think I want to be on top. So let’s write Woman On Top. But I think it’s also pretty significant where we’re at as women. Women have done it all at this point. They’ve had careers. They’ve raised kids. They’ve done just about everything, swum the channel. I kind of think it’s time to have fun being a woman. It’s a great thing being a woman.

“Hard Habit” is your new single.The song “Hard Habit” is basically about addiction to a certain type of bad boy.

Learn more at ZoeScott.com • iTunes • Twitter • Facebook