Eels frontman E has been talking to Rolling Stone about a number of up coming music projects.
First, the score he is writing for the upcoming Billy Bob Thornton movie ‘Levity’: "I've been asked to write scores over the past several years. The requests come in fairly regularly and it's almost always something I'm not interested in doing because of the movie. But this one I felt like, 'Alright, I'm gonna give it a whack'."
Second, the new Eels album which is set for a Summer 2003 release: "The stuff we're working on now is really heavily polka influenced. There's a lot of clarinets and tubas. I think it's going to be a big hit on LA rock station KROQ … Having a big KROQ hit just means a bunch of assholes start coming back to your concerts. Maybe that sounds bad, but it's kind of true. I might be the only artist who has actively worked at paring down his audience over the years to keep out the jocks and the assholes."
E confirmed he is considering using some material he recorded with REM guitarist Peter Buck a couple of years ago. "They sound more like REM songs with me singing instead of Michael Stipe!"
And finally, on the music of MC Honky, a reclusive LA musician whose record E produced after finding him through a fan. "We met when his daughter came to our concert at the El Rey Theater a few years ago and handed me a tape. She recognized the genius and I did too right away. It was the one outside project I really wanted to work.” MC Honky's record ‘I Am The Messiah’ hits the UK in February.