Lydia Interview: ‘If I Live To Be 65 That’s Going To Be A Problem For Everybody’

Discussing their sound leads to a discussion of the writing process. Leighton has often said he was responsible for most of the songwriting with Lydia. But after 10 years performing as Lydia, the group says they finally established a comfortable level of collaboration.

“It’s definitely changed. I did ‘Paint it Golden’ all by myself and then for ‘Devil,’ it was all three of us. We collaborated a whole lot more, and for the next record it’s going to be even more. So, I love the help. I’m always down to collaborate, I just didn’t have anybody really to collaborate with for that record, so I was like ‘Fuck it, I’ll do it myself,'” Leighton says.

Leighton Antelman, Matt Keller, and Justin Camacho answering HTS’ tough questions. (Photo by: Rosemary Vega)

Not wanting to take too much credit, Matt says, “The core of it is still him [Leighton] writing songs. But now there’s like- he contribs to the majority of the songs, and he and I [Justin] are like ‘That’s cool!’ or ‘That sucks!’ Or ‘That’s awesome’ or ‘Let’s try this, or let’s change this.’ Just like an extra mind on there, and then we fill in a few extra songs that round out the record. But the band has always been a vehicle for people to hear what this kid has on his mind at any moment.”

“Now I just have kind of more help than I did, than I ever did, which is really cool,” Leighton says.

“We don’t sit down and like, jam and write songs,” Justin adds. “We all have our little kind of studio stuff at home and we write songs, and we send them back and forth. A little different, maybe. I don’t know. I don’t think I could ever imagine us three sitting in a room, like trying to write a song together like, ‘Alright dude.'”

Leighton agrees, “I’ve never been one to like go into a room and be like ‘Hey, let’s write a song right now.’ It’s not how my brain works. I’ll be like, 3 o’clock in the pm, by myself somewhere and I’ll be like ‘I want to go write a song.’ Or something will pop into my head. I’m never scheduling a time to write a song. I can’t do that.”

“It works well for all of us,” Matt says. “If any of us get a song idea, and we put a song down, it’s not like we have to wait and be like ‘Okay now I have to see what the guitar player has to say about it.’ No, we just write a song- I’ll write a song with the piano, and I’ll hear a guitar part and just add the guitar part, and I’ll take it to the band and they’ll be like ‘This is sick,’ or ‘this sucks.’

“Let’s wait to hear what the guitar player has to say. I love that, that’s amazing,” Leighton says, laughing.

Matt uses the next pause in conversation to grab another beer from the mini-fridge. A Budweiser to be exact, it’s the only option in the fridge other than water. The beer cap pops open and it’s like opening Pandora’s box, normal interview answers no longer exist in the tiny dressing room.

“Who would be your dream collaboration?” I ask.

“That’s a good question…What do you got?” Leighton asks the rest of the guys before answering.

“Justin Timberlake. That’d be sick,” Justin blurts out.

“I don’t want to sound like a cliché, but Paul McCartney if you’re reading this. I’d love to write songs with you,” Matt says into the microphone.

I laugh and say, “If Paul McCartney is reading our website, that’s awesome.”

“Right? I feel you,” Matt says.

Justin doesn’t seem to notice that the others are talking and proceeds to explain his answer. “I don’t know why I said Justin Timberlake, he’s just killing it. I saw him play at the AMAs that other day and I was like, ‘Damn, that guy looks good.’ Basically.”

“I’d really like to do a song with Cee-lo Green,” Leighton chimes in after a few moments of contemplation.

“That would be an experience,” says Justin.

“That’s an out of left field answer, I appreciate that,” Matts says to Leighton.

“That guy is just very very talented guy.”

“Cee-lo, that’s a little unexpected. So you got a little hip-hop in you,” I say.

“Yeah, but I mean, he’s just talented. And he’s crazy as shit, which I like about him. He wears a wedding dress,” Leighton says.

Leighton Antelman backstage at the Fonda. (Photo by: Rosemary Vega)

“I saw The Voice the other day, when did he get a head tattoo?” Matt asks.

“It’s not a head tattoo. Somebody told me it’s just like something he puts over his head,” Leighton says.

“It’s a hat?!” Matt exclaims.

“No, it’s not a hat, it’s like- not a henna. Maybe a henna type thing, I don’t know,” Leighton says, shaking his head.

“How did the court date go?” Justin asks suddenly.

“Cee-lo was in court?” Matt asks.

“Didn’t you hear what he did? He got charged for … October of last year, he slipped a girl ecstasy. He’s facing felony charges,” Justin explains.

“That sucks. That’s a bad move,” Matt says.

“He’s facing felony charges right now.”

“He should be facing felony chargers for that,” Matt says.

“Yeah, it’s rough,” Justin says.

“C’mon,” Leighton says trying to steer the guys back to the original question again.

“I want to collaborate with Cee-lo and write a song about that,” Matt says jokingly.

Everyone laughs at Matt’s morbid joke before making one final attempt at being serious. It lasts for about 20 seconds.