Lightspeed Champion

Fri 17th Dec, 2010 in Features

Lightspeed Champion aka Devonté Hynes is known for his unique film clips, quirky lyrics and cool hair. FasterLouder spoke to him briefly over the phone as he prepares to return to Australia for the Pyramid Rock and Peats Ridge festivals.

Before going solo, Hynes was in the short lived but popular dance-punk band Test Icicles which have continued to retain a cult following. Their sole LP, For Screening Purposes Only catapulted them to fame in the British indie world, all while Hynes was still 18. Since their break up almost five years ago the multi-instrumentalist Hynes has had a successful solo career. Not only producing and writing lyrics for other artists, he has also made a number of comics.

In an interview Hynes did with NME after Test Icicles broke up he claimed saying that he and the other two members of the band didn’t like that music they’d made. However, now Hynes admits that “it was all a joke; I lied about not liking Test Icicles.” Though when pushed on why he dramatically changed his sound he simply shrugs off the question with the answer “nothing in particular”

Influenced by “The classics: *Marvin Gaye, Harry Nilsson, Neil Young, Van Morrison*”, Hynes also admits to an admiration for numerous Australian artists: “I used to like Silverchair’s older stuff, I like You Am I, The Triffids and Steve Kilbey [from The Church]”.

As for his own writing Hynes says that he writes the music first as “lyrics are just the first thing on my mind. I write them as quickly as I can, I hate spending time on them”. Despite his casual approach to writing lyrics he’s keen to focus his attention on writing lyrics for other people more in the future and he has an album coming out under his Blood Orange moniker early next year which describes as sounding “like 80s soul”.

So despite his forays into writing short stories and comic books – “I write them mostly for fun, I originally came up with the name Lightspeed Champion writing comics in math class” – Hynes there’s still plenty of new music to come from one of the most patient and friendly guys in music.

Lightspeed Champion sideshows:
Wednesday 29th December – Oxford Art Factory, Sydney
Sunday 2nd January – East Brunswick Club, Melbourne