Vivian Girls new album

Vivian Girls will release their second album, Everything Goes Wrong, on September 8. I’m not that excited by this prospect as I quickly tired of the Vivian Girls’ rather limited range, highly manufactured, cartoon-ish image, action figure stage names and aggressive marketing of releases that seemed to be about cash rather than quality – 2009 is all about Brilliant Colors and Dum Dum Girls, right? – although the press release below suggests that there might be more substance come the second album.

Vivian Girls have had an extremely eventful couple of years as a band, from appearing at major festivals, to playing the Bowery Ballroom about a million times, to having their own question on Jeopardy. The band spoke with Pitchfork's Tom Breihan back in March while in the studio in LA working on their sophomore LP, Everything Goes Wrong, due Sept. 8 on In The Red - below is an excerpt to give you and idea of what to expect from album number two:

"Last time, the album was really rushed," says guitarist Cassie Ramone. "We were just go, go, go, go. And now we're taking our time with every step of the process, making sure we're really happy with everything before we move on."

With this band, though "taking our time" means they're taking six days to record the entire thing instead of the three days they used for their first album. Ramone says, "We recorded 15 songs, but if we put them all on the album, that'll be an hour's worth of music, so we're going to have to cut some of them out. Our last album was like 22 minutes, so we figure if this album is longer than 44 minutes that'll just be insane. It would be twice as long."

"We're aiming for around 35 minutes," adds bassist Kickball Katy. So you'll probably still be able to plow through the whole Vivian Girls album on your morning commute.

On the first album, the two longest, slowest songs, "Tell the World" and "Where Do You Run To", were clear standouts. The band says they'll focus more on that side of their sound on the second album. "The songs are longer," says drummer Ali Koehler. "I think it's moodier. I think we have basically the same influences as on our first album, but with more influences added."

Katy elaborates: "We have a few songs that kind of sound like the Gun Club. We have, like, a Neil Young-inspired song."

Ali: "We're using No Doubt's hi-hat."

Cassie: "That's not actually an influence. We actually are using No Doubt's cymbals, though. That was an accident."

But the band is still making sure to keep the raw, fun edge that animated the first album. They're recording most of their songs in single takes, they're producing it themselves, and they're not bringing in any guests. "We haven't turned into perfectionists," says Ali.

01 Walking Alone at Night
02 I Have No Fun
03 Can't Get Over You
04 Desert
05 Tension
06 Survival
07 The End
08 When I'm Gone
09 Out for the Sun
10 I'm Not Asleep
11 Double Vision
12 You're My Guy
13 Before I Start to Cry