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[FACTS - ALICE GLASS] AnOther Man - Autumn / Winter 2013

ALICE GLASS IS 24 YEARS OLD, CANADIAN AND LEAD SINGER OF THE CRYSTAL CASTLES. SHE IS ALSO THE MOST FEARSOME FRONTWOMAN ALIVE TODAY.

HERE ARE THE FACTS SO FAR…

She hates labels like “punk” but reluctantly admits to being “a rebel by default”.

She isn’t sure what “punk” means anymore. “For women in Saudi Arabia, driving is more punk than music. That Saudi woman’s YouTube video of her driving got a million hits a week… that’s punk rock!”

She could live with “Dance Punk” but would prefer “Grave Rave” to “Electro-rock” or “Indietronica” as a description for the Crystal Castles sound.

Ethan Kath – the other half of Crystal Castles – first saw her perform in Fetus Fatale, “an all-girl crust-noise band”.

The engineer secretly taped her microphone check for the Crystal Castles demo in 2005. Renamed “Alice Practice”, the track became the band’s debut single. They released only 500 copies on 7” vinyl – it sold out in three days. A mint condition copy is now worth $300.

The band’s biggest hit, 2010’s “Not In Love”, features The Cure’s Robert Smith. “I’ve loved The Cure for a long time so it was surreal. I can’t censor myself so I would say things to Robert that made other people cringe. Like when he asked me, ‘How was the show Alice?’ And I said, ‘Oh, it wasn’t that good. I just got the curse and had major cramps.’ He didn’t flinch.”

In 2008, she beat Jay-Z to the top spot in NME’s Cool List. “I’m flattered, thank you,” she responded, “but back in school the people who held themselves in the same regard were also the biggest waste of skin I’ve ever met.”

At the age of 14, she ran away from her Toronto home to live in a squat community under the name Vicki Vale. “It was my nickname for when I got arrested… I used it when I got caught with an ounce of mushrooms and two ounces of weed. It totally worked!”

She never listens to her doctor. In 2008, she broke two ribs in a car accident and was advised to take six weeks off. Two days later she was back on stage. In 2011 she went on a five-month tour with a broken ankle. It did little to calm her anarchic performances – at Coachella, she cast aside her crutches and went crowd-surfing.

She watches a lot of Korean horror cinema but, for desert island viewing, she would definitely pick a porno movie.

She doesn’t want to act but doesn’t think it’s a “scummy” thing to do.

She doesn’t do social media of any kind. “I have enough time explaining myself in person. I wouldn’t want to do it on a screen. It’s really dehumanising… and, anyway, I have a phone.”

If Andy Warhol was alive today, she thinks he would have a Facebook page all about Facebook.

She refuses to go to the MET’s Punk: From Chaos to Couture exhibition because “it seems really counter-productive for punk to look into the past. And charge to look at something behind glass – it should be free!”

Jessica Chastain copied her look for the Spanish-Canadian shocker Mama. “No, I haven’t seen it,” she says.

She’s currently reading The Chalice and the Blade by Riane Eisler, “it’s about women being misrepresented in history – it’s really interesting.” She loves books on conspiracy theories, and every year reads the Censored News Stories book.

She’s “kind of” in a relationship at the moment.

She doesn’t think she’s a “totally depressive person”. “People are complex. If I’m smiling at you now, who’s to say I won’t go home and slit my wrists? People are complicated. Nobody is just happy and nobody is just bleak.”

She thinks Taylor Swift is “some fucking idiot pop star who said, ‘I don’t believe in feminism’. You don’t believe you should get equal pay for the same amount of work? Are you serious?” And thinks Katy Perry helps “sell sex to children”.

Her life philosophy is: “We live, we die… and hope that nobody has sex with our corpse. I don’t care where my dust is scattered. Throw it in the fucking sewer!”

AnOther Man - Autumn / Winter 2013

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Crystal Castles At The Boulder Theater New Year's Eve (December 31, 2010)

Photos taken by Caseytron.