Fontaines D.C. “think they could do a really good tune” with Lana Del Rey

Fontaines DC have said they think they could do “a really good tune” with Lana Del Rey.

Speaking to NME for this week’s Big Read, the band’s vocalist Grian Chatten said he wanted to write songs with Rey when discussing some possible future collaborations.

“I just want to write some tunes with her,” Chatten told NME. “Her music leans into an era of cinema that I love, and she writes in a way where people can find stories in her music. I honestly think we’d do a really good tune together.”

The band also said they’d like to work with Northampton rapper Slowthai in the future.

“Slowthai has got an incendiary quality,” Chatten said. “It’s just so refreshing to work with somebody who has an incredibly open mind. His charisma reminds me of something that I read about Mick Jagger before, where those around him would be able to identify his distinctive voice in an instant. That’s what Slowthai is becoming.”

Fontaines D.C.. CREDIT: Fiona Garden for NME

Elsewhere in the Big Read, Fontaines said that the future of the band could see them moving away from using guitars completely.

Chatten and drummer Tom Coll discussed the creation of the band’s new album ‘Skinty Fia’, which was recorded live to tape over a two-week period.

“Whenever I have an idea for a tune, it doesn’t necessarily exist in a world of guitars and drums, even though those are the tools that we have to express ourselves with,” Chatten said. “I’m getting increasingly bored and unsatisfied with writing for just a bassline and a drum kit.”

Coll added that the band “aren’t listening to much guitar music, if at all” at the moment, with Chatten citing ‘ATLiens’-era OutKast and Kanye West‘s ‘808s & Heartbreak’ as his current favourites.

Chatten continued: “I’d like to unlearn the sounds of ‘Dogrel’; otherwise we’ll have the same ideas coming into our music again and again. We could probably throw away the guitars eventually, and the music will still sound like us. I don’t think people would be that mad if we decided to do that, either.”

In a five-star review, NME said of the new album: “No matter how tormented this album gets, you can feel ‘Skinty Fia’’s wounded heart beating throughout. The fight for a better Ireland deserves songs that mirror the depth of the crisis, and in its endlessly captivating glory, ‘Skinty Fia’ rises triumphantly to the task.”

Last month, the group bagged the award for Best Band In The World at the BandLab NME Awards 2022, beating Amyl & The Sniffers, Ben&Ben, Bring Me The Horizon, CHVRCHES, Glass Animals, HAIM, Måneskin, Nova Twins and Wolf Alice to the gong.