NY Loose: Big Seeds from the Bad Apple (NY Rock)

March 1997

We found Brijette West in her dressing room last Thursday night nursing a cold by drinking some frothy brown stuff and chasing it with intermittent shots of Robitussin DM. We had gone down to chat with her before seeing NY Loose perform at Tramps in downtown NYC.

For the uninitiated, West fronts NY Loose and writes the lion’s share of the band’s material. On Thursday, she looked slightly flu-stricken but stunning all the same and our collective hearts did a little cha-cha as we sat down to talk. Her blonde hair is streaked with dark tones in the back, her large eyes are slightly hypnotic; she is easy-going, open and well-spoken.

West brought us back to the band's humble beginnings, recalling how she began in 1993 as a solo act. After a 7-inch single garnered some attention, she began thinking in terms of a group and NY Loose was born. A few years and personnel changes later, the band toured England and the British press took note. "We got written up in the Melody Maker, NME and bunch of other English magazines," West said. "We, like, kind of exploded over there."

"It’s really funny," she continued, after taking a healthy slug of the brown stuff, "the NME wrote that we smelled like sex, sleaze, alcohol and leather. I guess it’s better than saying that we smell like a bunch of puffs. But you know I have to live my life a certain way to stay healthy and to stay on the road so I’m actually the least decadent person you’ll ever meet. On the other hand, when we take the stage, we always have this brash attitude that you don’t get from some band in Bum-Fuck, Illinois."

NY Loose’s "brash attitude" was in full regalia when they played to a packed house at Tramps later that night. With the exception of one minor technical glitch that held the set up for a few minutes, the group -- which comprises Marc Diamond on guitar, Danny Nordahl on bass, and Pete Lloyd on drums -- delivered a pulsating feast of feverish rock & roll.

West and company opened with "Kiss My Wheels" and pretty much covered most of the material on their Hollywood Records release Year of the Rat. West’s on-stage persona alternates between that of the tough bitch, who has no qualms about giving the audience the finger at any given moment during the set, to the shameless vixen who tantalizes the very same crowd, snaking her tattooed arms lustfully to the heavens and slinking her rail-thin body along with selected passages in the music.

So how does Brijette feel about becoming something of a local heart-throb? "That’s fine with me because the bands that I’ve loved have always had that same sort of thing: the Stones, the Stooges, the Dead Boys. I think it’s kind of idiotic that some 90’s bands have decided they can’t be sex symbols, they can’t be sexy. I’m fine with it. When I’m on stage, I know I’m sexual. I think it’s part of what I do. I accepted it a long time ago."

NY Loose’s sound is clearly hard and aggressive. The material, however, often centers on the topic of human despair. "For some reason," explains West, "I zero in on sadness. I zero in on despair. It’s not so much that I’m attracted to it, it’s more like somehow it’s attached itself to me. So it definitely comes out in my lyrics."

The last question we put to West, during our brief chat, concerned life on the great Web way. What does she think of the online medium, we wondered. "I think it’s amazing. I use the internet all the time because NY Loose has two Web sites. I have somebody in LA that takes care of our fan club and collects email for me. It’s a great way for me to keep in touch with my fans and keep it very personal. It’s an incredible thing because you can do an interview with me an have it up there tomorrow whereas in a print publication by the time it comes out it’s old news."