More by chance I got to know AIN’T UR ENN a few months ago and wow – who is this young guy?! His sound seems unfamiliar, fresh and fast! And there is one song that struck me immediately: A Corpse Is Lying In My Bed. But more about this one later. His record Languish was released via Tomatenplatten in May and when listening to it for the first time it was just fun! Right at the beginning he speeds things up, just to switch to his acoustic guitar the next moment. The whole record is a big playground, whining cats are playing with rythm machines, while Ennio de Caro enjoys his swings through the tuning jungle.
Source: YouTube, AIN’T UR ENN
So two weeks later we meet up at the Monbijoupark in Berlin. It’s summer in the city and I organized an acoustic guitar for a little live session in the capital. We find a nice place among the shades and I get to know that guy from Switzerland and his friend Calvin Lundin from Amercia, who happens to be his drummer as well…
Man, this is crazy. You’re just 19, played at the Schokoladen here in Berlin and now you released your second EP, or your second album. So I need to ask: Do you remember your first contact with music?
Ennio: Music has always been a prevalent topic in our household. My dad is a rapper and my mom is an avid music lover. Thinking back, I can’t pinpoint the exact timeframe, I just remember this song (singing The Lion Sleeps Tonight) playing on our family computer. I must’ve been one year old at the time. That’s my earliest memory. Then I remember one Christmas, shortly before I turned two, where I first heard Stadium Arcadium by the (Red Hot) Chili Peppers. That was my first encounter with a real band. The next year I started listening to Kings Of Leon. I obviously don’t remember much from so early on in my life, but when it comes to music, I somehow have certain snippets in my head that go really far back. Sometimes we watch family videotapes from back in the day and I’m like, damn, I really was just a year old when these snippets I have in my head took place. Along with my curiosity came a desire to create music. At age three, I got a children’s drum set, my grandpa gave me a children’s guitar, and I was always strumming and drumming on everything I could get my hands on.
It only became serious when I started taking drum lessons at 8, but music has been omnipresent all along.
AIN’T UR ENN
You’re doing everything on your own. Does this make the process of making music lonely for you?
Ennio: Maybe in the beginning. I’ve been composing music for a long time, but AIN’T UR ENN started when I was 15. At first, I wanted it to be a band, but I couldn’t find anyone because the scene in Lucerne is so small that you couldn’t find anyone my age – and still can’t – to start a band with. Initially, I was desperate to experience a life in a band, so after making about 50 songs, it felt a bit lonely. Some of the songs were ones I wanted other people to sing on, but that didn’t work out. Eventually, when I decided it should be a solo project, I stopped concerning myself with those feelings. Now it’s even less lonely because I play and rearrange my songs with a band for live performances. I get to fluidly choose between experiencing my art thru the lens of a band or all by myself.
Could this be the reason why your whole stuff sounds more intense? What do you take out of you? What are you digging out? I mean, most of the time it’s pretty straight and powerful.
Ennio: My songs are all snapshots of time. There are only very few exceptions where I sat down to write a song that I’d wait to record. It gets to the point where I rarely tweak anything at all after my initial session. 99% of the time, I write a riff, and then three and a half hours later, there’s a file of the finished song to listen to. Even on the new album, Languish, every song is essentially a snapshot, and they’re more honest than anything I could write with words. Expressing myself through music simply comes from the heart. But that was difficult at first. I had to find my way into the philosophies of making music and all that. Now it’s simply a process of expressing myself as honestly as possible in that exact moment, and I’m not afraid of anything. I’m sitting on hundreds of unreleased songs. Some of them are really out there. They sound completely different from what you’d hear on any of my records. I think it’s about not pretending to be someone I’m not, but for my records there is a process where I filter things out a bit. That’s the one part of the process where I decide what I want to share and what I’d rather keep to myself.
But alas, I just give… it’s just me, what you hear in these songs. I hope that answers your question somehow.
Languish
With your record came a nice press release: “The first break up, poured into music.” Sounds heavy. As we were just talking about intensity, what does your record Languish means to you?
Ennio: Languish holds a very special place in my heart. I recorded Languish last summer, right after the end of a long relationship. That was also the time when I slowly began to understand more about art and music. The making of the record was the most emotional time of my entire life so far, because on the one hand, I lost so many things during that time and practically couldn’t get over it. On the other hand, I suddenly got to play for the Beatsteaks, I made real friends, I was able to play concerts… Live the life that I would always dream about during the time I felt so lonely writing my first batch of songs. I also recorded many of the songs in the Netherlands. I’m half Dutch, and my grandmother lives there. Half the album was made in her attic. I can still vividly picture those scenes in my mind when I listen to the songs, recording them and then listening to them on repeat while riding my bike around. I’d already written 300 songs by that point, I was knee deep into the creative process, trying to figure out what it all actually means. And a lot happened for me with this album. That’s why Languish means so much to me in that aspect.
Whore, isn’t that one too sick? Or was it just like that?
Ennio: Actually, that song is one of the very few on Languish that don’t relate to the breakup. Besides that, in the lyrics, the word “whore” relates to myself. For me to be as honest as possible in my art, it has to have no boundaries. I simply transcribe my feelings into a piece of music. Whore is one of my favorite songs on the album, because it’s a cocktail of those feelings. It might be pretty extreme for some, but if I like it, I don’t care whether it’s too extreme for others or not. It’s funny you should bring that up, though. While still recording at my grandma’s house, I sent Whore to a friend in New York. She replied with ‘I don’t know if you should name a song that.’ I really thought for a moment about whether I should scrap the song, rename it, or change the lyrics somehow. But the reason why the words to the song are the way they are is that they’re actually meant to be extreme; they’re meant to evoke that feeling in those people. The song exists for that reason; everything I did there was quite deliberate.
Source: YouTube, AIN’T UR ENN
A Corpse Is Lying In My Bed – damn man, where does this Strokes-impact come from?
Ennio: Everyone keeps saying it sounds like The Strokes, which is true because I’m a real admirer of Julian Casablancas’ music. But during that time I was mostly listening to The Voidz. One of the most influential songs to me, Human Sadness – the chord progression in it is Julian’s favorite. Before I even knew what chords are, I noticed that he likes to use that melody a lot. For Corpse, I consciously decided to make a song using those chords. I didn’t want to rip anything off, but I wanted to make my own version of that melody. Also, I don’t think the Strokes comparison comes from the sound of the song. Sure, on it I sing like Julian and utilize distortion similarly, but everybody thinks Strokes because of the sequence of chords, as Julian used it in so many songs… Human Sadness, You Only Live Once, One Way Trigger…
By the way, the first Voidz album, Tyranny, is one of my all-time favorite albums. I think it’s better than anything he ever did with The Strokes.
Role Models and Friends
We just spoke about role models. With whom you’d like to write music?
Ennio: Maybe John Frusciante. Although it might be difficult, as his approach to music is really unique. His music is very spiritually charged. I don’t think it will ever happen, but I’d like to see what we’d come up with if I had to choose someone.
It’s such a fluke I got to know you through Tomatenplatten. But how did you get to know them or how did Thomas (Götz) learn about you?
Ennio: Beatsteaks were my gateway into punk and hardcore. They were my absolute favorite band for a big chunk of my early teen years. I met Thomas for the first time at the Gurtenfestival in Bern, two years ago. Calvin, my drummer from Seattle, was there too, actually. About a year later, he played in Aarau with his side project NinaMarie, which had just a released a really great album. After the concert, I just wanted to shake his hand, since we only hastily interacted for Gurten Festival. We ended up talking for so long that my last train had already left. My dad had to pick me up, and funnily enough, my first vinyl record, Summer/Winter, was still in his trunk. So, of course, I gave it to Thomas, like, ‘Hey, if you want, give this a listen, I’ll give you the record, maybe you’ll like something.’
Ennio De Caro and Calvin Lundin…
Two months later, while being bored at school, I got a message asking us to support the Beatsteaks on their three dates in Switzerland. That was probably one of the most exciting moments of my life. I had only played six concerts prior to the tour. The tour elevated our gigs to a new level, we were quite tight. And then I sent Thomas an early version of Languish. He liked it, so he collaborated with me for its release. Of course being on Thomas’ label huge honor for me. Since then, things have sorted themselves out a bit; I’ve been in contact with Thomas quite a bit, it feels pretty collegial now. I’m still a huge fan of the band, which is why we’re still in Berlin – their anniversary concerts are tomorrow, and I definitely don’t want to miss those setlists! I’m really looking forward to it, and I’m incredibly grateful for all the work Thomas has put into this project, because that’s certainly not something to take for granted.
You just thanked some people on social media, for example your parents. How much do they support you?
Ennio: My parents are a huge part of my musical career in the sense that they’ve always seen that there was something inside me that needed to come out. I didn’t have it easy at school for various reasons, and I couldn’t settle into the working world. I couldn’t take on any more schoolwork; at some point, my body physically rejected the life I was living. They allowed me to take a break and get my shit together. I learnt so much during that time. And of course, they support me financially. There’s this stigma around nepobabies making art, but I have to mention it out of appreciation and respect. I’m currently working as a radio host, and I don’t make enough money to do what I’m doing right now. But their support goes beyond the superficial financial aspect. They understand what I want to do. I feel it’s incredibly rare to find parents who truly see their children’s artistic potential and nurture it. They don’t say things like, ‘You have to get a master of economics now’, or whatever. They see the talent that’s genuinely there and they don’t force their own interests on me. Without my parents, I wouldn’t have met Thomas, I wouldn’t have played my first gig, and Calvin wouldn’t be here right now. It’s all thanks to my parents, and they are, in that sense, my biggest supporters.
…in the Monbijoupark.
You just mentioned Calvin.
(Towards Calvin) Seattle… – what did happen?
Calvin (laughs): So in 2021, me and Ennio met each other on Twitter. I followed him randomly and the reason why it’s so random, my dad is Swedish, so there’s a lot of Swedish bands that I’m into. I was into Mando Diao and he was also into them, so we followed each other and we just got to talking and he showed me like a bunch of German bands I didn’t know. He showed me Beatsteaks, he showed me Madsen, like a lot of these German bands from like the 2000s and the late 90s. I don’t know, we connected over that. And then we connected over the fact that we both played music, that I played drums and he also played drums, so it was just online friends for a while. And then in 2023 I was in Switzerland with my parents just visiting and I told Ennio this and he was like we need to meet up while you’re here like I cannot lose this opportunity. So I was like okay and I asked my parents and they were like, this is a random guy from the internet, like, okay okay I guess, but just be safe and they were like you can meet up with him, but stay in Zurich, don’t go to Lucerne. So the first thing we did, is hop on the train, go right to Lucerne so we can play and we played like 30 minutes. We were together like 4 hours and we played like 30 minutes, because I had to get back to where we were staying like before 9 or something, because my parents were worried, but we played and it was really awesome. We played like a Beatsteaks cover I think.
Ennio: I think we played Panic.
Calvin: Yeah, we played the song Panic by Beatsteaks together and it was just a really good time and we connected really well. He had like a shitty amp that didn’t even work and I was like I don’t even care ’cause this is the most fun I’ve ever had like playing music, so that happened. And then, you know, I left and I went back home and we felt we had some unfinished business, because we just clicked well. So then, that summer, summer 2023 I came back for a week and this is before he released anything. He wasn’t on Tomatenplatten and none of that, but we just played for a week and this was coming up on his first release, so I listened to like his first masters of that, which was pretty crazy to think about now. But we just played the whole week and then we met really randomly his bassist Cedric as well, who came in when we were jamming in his rehearsal room and that trio was kind of like the power trio and we all clicked really well. I went back home for two years. Now I’m back in Europe again (laughs) to play these shows with him, so we had our first show together ever on June 5th. So I’m back out here for the shows until July 6th, so we have three more shows that we’re playing together and hopefully I’ll be back sooner next time.
That sounds nice, good, like a bromance.
Both (laughing): Exactly! Absolutely!
What was Berlin like? What did you do? Did you get some inspiration for new music or are you just living in the now?
Ennio: I love Berlin, this is my 5th time in Berlin. We already played in Berlin last summer, but this time I feel like it’s the first time I’m really getting to know the city very well. It’s giving me a lot of inspiration, whenever we’re at our Airbnb, I noodle on that guitar to see if there’s anything interesting coming up. There’s nothing interesting yet, but I feel something brewing up. I know that once Calvin is gone and once I’m going back to the Netherlands in a month, which is where I wrote most of Languish…, so I feel like I’ll just need to get all the impressions in my head and I need to process everything that’s happening around me first. I haven’t written a song since March, which means – that’s really rare that I haven’t written a song in a while and I just know – when I’m back in the Netherlands I’m going to write song after song after song. Berlin is probably going to be a big part of that, because like I said, a lot of emotions here and emotions are such a big part of my music, when I feel like I’m in the right moment I can come back to these emotions, that I felt here and transcribe them musically. Berlin is very important for the music that’s going to come out. Maybe sometime soon. The music that’s still going to be created and of course the Schokoladen show was absolutely awesome
Calvin: Really special.
Ennio: Your parents came.
Calvin: Since I was 13, I’m like, Berlin is a goal. I want to play a show in Berlin and it finally got to happen with a very special person, special band so that was really cool. I wasn’t expecting anybody to show up, because you never know in a new city but people really showed out and that was really cool and they were really into it as well. We played with a really great band from New York called Tea Eater. They were awesome as well, really nice people. And the venue, I didn’t know much about the venue, but it’s apparently super historical, which was pretty awesome. But it’s been a really fun city to explore, we’ve just been walking a lot trying to see all the different parts of the city. Yeah, we’re also going to the Beatsteaks 30 year anniversary shows on Friday and Saturday, which are gonna be super super fun, we’re really excited. But yeah, this is a really great city, very happy we’re here.
Ennio: I also want to say that Kreuzberg is fantastic. I love being in Kreuzberg. We’re far from Kreuzberg, because we’re staying in Mitte, but we’ve been going back there a lot, so I feel like the next time I’m staying here, I’m definitely going to be in Kreuzberg for a while.
So that’s it, my interview with AIN’T UR ENN. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. The journey to Berlin, as so often, was worth the way.
Thank you!
And Ennio, thanks for the translation of your answers!
