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Five Guys and A Lady: Grace Potter Interviews My Morning Jacket (Relix Revisited)

Photo by Michael Weintrob

That makes a lot of sense listening to the lyrics. It’s turned itself inside out and made itself something completely different but the lyrics are still covering themes you might hear in a Sam Cooke song, but in a very different way.

Jim: Right.

Did you change lyrics when you got into the studio or was everything pretty much laid out?

Jim: Everything was pretty much laid out. We went out to Colorado for a month before we went to New York to make the record, so the record was 90 percent done. I mean there were a couple of songs where I was finishing up lyrics toward the end of the whole thing but for the most part it was pretty much done.

I have to say that it is a surprise that you guys recorded in New York because after hearing the Allaire studio thing, I thought you guys would always record there. Did you feel like New York added to that experience at all?

Jim: Totally.

Patrick: It took us out of our element.

Have any of you ever lived in New York before this?

Patrick: No.

Jim: I’ve been kind of experimenting with living here now. It’s just fun to change it up a bit. We’ve always been out in the middle of nowhere for all our records—you know in Shelbyville [Kentucky] or upstate New York. We just wanted to try something different. Being here is just kind of crazy.

I feel like it would be distracting though.

Patrick: Not while you’re in the studio.

Jim: It’s more like a work thing. It wasn’t like a psychedelic adventure. We had our psychedelic adventure in Colorado and then we came here to work.

And, finally, what has been your most evil urge in the last hour?

Patrick: I wanted to kill the van driver. But I didn’t kill him because it was an urge and I didn’t act on it, but goddamn it I wanted to kill him. I really did.

Jim: I didn’t want to get product from Starbucks, but I did. Cause I was hungry and tired.

Carl: I wanted to get some tequila, but I knew nobody else would have joined me.

Jim: I would have gotten tequila instead of vodka.

It’s a stimulant.

Patrick: That’s not an evil urge. It’s beautiful.

Carl: That’s taking it a little bit too far.

I’m drinking whiskey, dude.

Bo: I wanted to binge on cookies but I didn’t.

Where were the cookies?

Bo: At Starbucks. I have a serious sugar addiction. If I have one, it’ll be over for a month.

Patrick: I’m proud of you—that’s awesome.

Really? Good for you.

Bo: Thanks. We’ll see what happens tomorrow.

Tom, what’s yours?

Tommy: Not getting Bailey’s in my coffee.

That was your evil urge—that you didn’t?

Tommy: I didn’t do it, but it was tempting.

Carl: Nobody would have even known—it would have been your little secret. Just you and God.

Tommy: Just me and the big man.