Somewhere in between conquering the entire planet and having the bushiest eyebrows in electronic music everyone's favourite cheeky Parisian dance duo Justice have somehow found time to release a DVD. It's out next week and it's called A Cross The Universe. See what they did there? We decided to catch up with Xavier (he's the one who doesn't have a beard) because most music DVD's are boring as hell compendiums of promos or live footage yawnathons with close ups of the boogers in the singers left nostril but this one shows Justice live and on tour as being this big, sweaty riot with a crowd consisting solely of 8 or aboves. I heard they require that as part of the door policy on their rider. Check out the trailer if you don't believe us: there's more fights, jail, sex, guns and drugs than in that Motley Crue book everyone claims to have read but just bought in the HMV sale and now lives by the toilet.Vice: The DVD's pretty intense. Have you seen the whole thing yet?
Xavier de Rosnay: Yeah, we all worked on the edit so there hasn't been a moment when we haven't been looking at it. When we got back from the US tour we had over 200 hours of footage and we saw like 100 different edits. So yeah, we've seen way too much of it if anything.Was it strange having this experience that lasted such a long time being compacted into a little package for people to look at?
It wasn't that strange, but it was interesting to work on because it was the inverse process of making a movie. Normally you write something then you shoot it. What we did here was shoot it and then write a story. It's interesting to see how much you can drive things just by how you edit. You can sort of make whatever you want with enough footage.How did you find America as two lost French guys?
North America is a world in itself. Every time you change state it's almost like changing a continent or country. I think that's why we chose to shoot the thing in America. It's the only place where you could get that many situations and landscapes and people in just three weeks. We knew we would start off on the East Coast which is a bit like Europe in terms of weather and stuff, and then we'd go across North America which was in winter with snow and stuff, and then we would finish in California which is obviously all sun and beaches and whatever.Did Gaspard really get married in Vegas or was that all just for the camera?
No, it happened. But you know if you get married in Vegas it's only legally binding in America, just Nevada even I think. But it wasn't like he was in love, we were just in Las Vegas and thinking: "what would Axl Rose have done if he was here?" Those moments, even if they seem really cliché or whatever, are really enjoyable. Plus Vegas was at the end of the tour, so even if we were having a bit too much 'Axl Rose' time, we knew that we'd be back in France in two days.Romain Gavras who shot the DVD seems to be able to capture a lot of little moments that add up to be this big thing.
I was really surprised that he could film that way. It requires anticipation skills. We went into it not knowing what would happen, and he managed to capture some really cool expressions, and movements by somehow anticipating what would happen. There were things that I didn't even notice at the time when I watched it back and I was there!Was it a relief to finally get home? You look like you were going at it pretty hard out there.
Yeah for sure. We really keep our life touring and our life as Xavier and Gaspard at home in Paris separate. It's really nice to get back to France. It doesn't feel like we have to get wasted every night.Why bother with a tour DVD at all? You could have just shown us your process in the studio or something?
We'd just finished an album, and we couldn't face talking about music anymore plus we've never been able to talk about ourselves. I don't think anyone gives a shit how we write our music anyway. No one who's seen us gives a fuck about that. We just thought: "Ok what would we want to watch if we were making a documentary about a new band?" We've only been around for like four years so the studio's not interesting at all to anyone but the live show works. We initially just kept in the footage where we looked like smart-asses but that was really boring, so then we just put the footage in where we look really stupid. It's way better that way.There is one shot I really liked where you're just standing there with these Hooters girls looking really confused.
I think picking up on every kind of interaction gives much more of an authentic image than just showing beautiful people. Beautiful people tend to be really boring.ARIANNA REICHE(Read more Arianna here)
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Xavier de Rosnay: Yeah, we all worked on the edit so there hasn't been a moment when we haven't been looking at it. When we got back from the US tour we had over 200 hours of footage and we saw like 100 different edits. So yeah, we've seen way too much of it if anything.Was it strange having this experience that lasted such a long time being compacted into a little package for people to look at?
It wasn't that strange, but it was interesting to work on because it was the inverse process of making a movie. Normally you write something then you shoot it. What we did here was shoot it and then write a story. It's interesting to see how much you can drive things just by how you edit. You can sort of make whatever you want with enough footage.How did you find America as two lost French guys?
North America is a world in itself. Every time you change state it's almost like changing a continent or country. I think that's why we chose to shoot the thing in America. It's the only place where you could get that many situations and landscapes and people in just three weeks. We knew we would start off on the East Coast which is a bit like Europe in terms of weather and stuff, and then we'd go across North America which was in winter with snow and stuff, and then we would finish in California which is obviously all sun and beaches and whatever.
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No, it happened. But you know if you get married in Vegas it's only legally binding in America, just Nevada even I think. But it wasn't like he was in love, we were just in Las Vegas and thinking: "what would Axl Rose have done if he was here?" Those moments, even if they seem really cliché or whatever, are really enjoyable. Plus Vegas was at the end of the tour, so even if we were having a bit too much 'Axl Rose' time, we knew that we'd be back in France in two days.Romain Gavras who shot the DVD seems to be able to capture a lot of little moments that add up to be this big thing.
I was really surprised that he could film that way. It requires anticipation skills. We went into it not knowing what would happen, and he managed to capture some really cool expressions, and movements by somehow anticipating what would happen. There were things that I didn't even notice at the time when I watched it back and I was there!Was it a relief to finally get home? You look like you were going at it pretty hard out there.
Yeah for sure. We really keep our life touring and our life as Xavier and Gaspard at home in Paris separate. It's really nice to get back to France. It doesn't feel like we have to get wasted every night.Why bother with a tour DVD at all? You could have just shown us your process in the studio or something?
We'd just finished an album, and we couldn't face talking about music anymore plus we've never been able to talk about ourselves. I don't think anyone gives a shit how we write our music anyway. No one who's seen us gives a fuck about that. We just thought: "Ok what would we want to watch if we were making a documentary about a new band?" We've only been around for like four years so the studio's not interesting at all to anyone but the live show works. We initially just kept in the footage where we looked like smart-asses but that was really boring, so then we just put the footage in where we look really stupid. It's way better that way.There is one shot I really liked where you're just standing there with these Hooters girls looking really confused.
I think picking up on every kind of interaction gives much more of an authentic image than just showing beautiful people. Beautiful people tend to be really boring.ARIANNA REICHE(Read more Arianna here)