The Bird And The Bee

Well, Greg [Kurstin] and I met through our mutual friend Mike Andrews – he produces my solo stuff. We were making my first solo record together, and he brought Greg on, and one day when we were recording everyone kind of left the room, and Greg and I just kind of played jazz songs, and just kind of had fun, and I didn’t even realize it, but we had started writing. We wrote a bunch of songs, and I didn’t even realize it, but we had a record.

Yeah, I like jazz. I’m like an amateur jazz appreciator. Greg’s kind of the real thing.

We had a different name, but it turned out someone else had that name -- The Falling Leaves, which is a line from this song "Autumn Leaves," a jazz song. We found out someone else had that name, so we had a song called "Birds and The Bees," and I thought, “Why not The Bird and The Bee?” It just sort of happened. There wasn’t very much thought put into it.

Yeah. I knew before we released anything that people were really responding to the music. Mostly my friends, but I’ve been playing music for a really long time, and all my friends like my music, but they probably wouldn’t buy it if it wasn’t me. But I got a sense that people were really enjoying this. And you’re always surprised, but of anything I’ve done, this seems to be the most universally liked.

I think that there’s something about the music that makes people happy. I don’t know why necessarily. But I think that -- I don’t know why exactly it works so well in an entertainment element -- but I know that people enjoy the music, and I think that when things are enjoyable it translates well to other mediums.

No, because I think people are fond of profanity. It wasn’t played on the radio; the most success it had was in dance clubs -- there was a remix of it. I wasn’t surprised that people liked that song because there’s a shock element to it.

I always loved David Lee Roth, and I always loved Van Halen, but I wasn’t like a huge fan, and my husband and I got tickets to see them play again in L.A. at the Staples Center. I was so blown away by David Lee Roth. Just his showmanship. I thought that if Greg and I wrote a couple days later, it would be fun to do an homage to the great David Lee Roth.

We’ve always wanted to do a cover record. We hadn’t decided on Hall and Oates, but with Hall and Oates it seemed like a good time to kind of pay them a tribute. We think that they’re such great pop-song craftsmen. So we thought it would be a fun idea, and we went with it.

Well, that was about three years ago or something. It was great. She’s a really talented girl, and Greg had worked with her. He produced all of her last record, and the record that we were on tour with her for, was her first record, and he produced a couple songs on that one. But she’s a lovely girl, very spirited, super smart and sassy.

We’ve been lucky enough to play some really cool places. We got to play Carnegie Hall, which is kind of a big intimate venue, but I think with our music, what’s fun is to have an environment with a lot of people, because it’s not an intimate show. It’s much more like a party, we like to think of it as a party. We’ve never played huge venues, like stadiums, I don’t know how I’d feel about that, but we’ve played larger venues. I think it works a little better, with a little more people.

A new record, and it’s sort of slow going. Greg and his wife had a baby a few years ago, and I just had a baby 6 months ago, so we’re taking it slow, and the new direction on the record, I think, is going to be pretty cool. I can’t really elaborate on what it sounds like yet, because we’re still in the beginning stages of it, but we’re excited.

I don’t know. We don’t have a label. So we’re just going to make it, and then see who wants to put it out, but I would think it’d be next summer.