Joining Audacy host Dallas backstage at BottleRock Napa, Annie Clark aka St. Vincent dropped by to talk about her experience at the festival, working with John Mulaney, hitting the road in support of her new album, and more.
LISTEN NOW: St. Vincent at BottleRock 2024
“I've never played it,” Annie says of the annual food, wine, and music festival now celebrating its 11th year, “but it's always been described to me as really fun -- really food and wine and boozy and fun.” St. Vincent performed on the main stage at this year’s festival -- extra exciting as she’ll essentially be opening up for the legend herself, Stevie Nicks. “I did get to meet Stevie at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction,” she remembers. “I was inducting Kate Bush a few months ago and she was lovely and she showed me her ‘Barbie.’ It was at the height of Barbie-mania and they had made a Stevie Nicks ‘Barbie’ -- and she showed it to me -- it was really cool."
Annie was featured on the new Netflix show Everybody's in L A., hosted by her favorite comedian of all time, John Mulaney. “First of all, if someone was like, gun to your head, 'Who is your favorite stand up?’ I would say John Mulaney, without hesitation,” she admits. “I don't know why there had to be a gun to my head; I don't know why I had to interject violence into this. He just is so incredible.”
“I met him a little bit through David Byrne,” she continues, “and then he just hit me up and asked me if I wanted to be on the show… I'm such a fan of his. Anything he does -- sign me up.”
“That said, I didn't really know what the show was and I think in some ways they didn't either,” she says of her inclusion. “We get to watch them discover it in front of our eyes. It was very fun."
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St. Vincent's 2024 album All Born Screaming, dropped back in April, her seventh studio release and the follow-up to 2021's Daddy's Home -- featuring the singles "Flea," "Big Time Nothing," and "Broken Man" -- and just kicked off her North American tour in support just last week.
“You never really know what a record is going to be until you actually perform it for people and see how it's hitting them -- and if it's weaving its way into their lives or not,” she says. “But I gotta say we, we just did one warm-up show for BottleRock a couple of nights ago in Ventura and people were more excited about the new stuff than the old stuff -- and that was palpable. I mean, all due respect, that's never happened. Usually, it takes people, you know, a few months to kind of like, ‘OK, we've absorbed it now. Yes, now we're on board. We like it, but we're not like, you know, hands up in the air, Yes! Thank God you're playing the song.'”
“But on this show,” she says, “so far it's been that -- where people are more excited about the new stuff than the old stuff."
Choosing the perfect setlist, however, proved a little more daunting than she first envisioned. “Every song from my old catalog kind of goes through the lens of this ‘All Born Screaming’ tour,” she explains. “Certain songs, you know, just weren't gonna fit. I tried some things from ‘Daddy's Home’ -- tried to shoehorn them into this new aesthetic -- and I was like, ‘Nah, that's not really working.’ I conceived of the show as having these arcs and these portals -- starting in hell and ending up in heaven. I know, it sounds a little corny, but every song that I selected helps define the shape of the show.”
Listen to Dallas' full interview with St. Vincent above, and stay tuned for more conversations with your favorite artists right here on Audacy.
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