Interviewed: Drug Rug (MP3)

Everything about the Cambridge, Mass. duo of Sarah Cronin and Thomas Allen says "sweet."
They are a couple making music that people can't seem to shut up about.

Somebody should possibly take a shot at me for that statement about sweet but in all honesty that is the sort of overall sweetness Drug Rug represents. They might be the most perfect pop machine in service today.
Kinks, Dylan with The Band, Belle and Sebastian, the lighter side of the Velvet Underground, Elephant Six, this duo (and their rotating groups of friends who perform live with them) has bits of everything great.

Sarah was kind enough to let HexEd. in on a few secrets to try and help explain exactly what it is that makes everybody like them so damned much?



So whats new in Cambridge?

Well, me and tommy were sleeping in our van on cambridge st for two months and we noticed that there is a particular weirdo lady who walks up and down the bike lane all night long cussing and smacking the sides of parked cars. She is new to our neighborhood, as far as I know. Tommy stared her down through the tinted glass of our van window while i hid under a blanket. The showdown concluded when she spat in the street and muttered "thats right biitch."



What is the process between you guys to write a song?

Usually tommy has to distract me from pacing around the kitchen to show me a riff he wrote. Then we will get into a little fight because he thinks i rolled my eyes at him and go into separate rooms. I will start thinking about love and death and write down some lyrics on the back of a receipt. Then we will go back into the same room and i will hum a tune over the chords he has worked out. Then sometimes we fight a little bit more until the song is done. We only have arguments about music. Thats why our relationship is so good when we're not in a band. If we weren't making music together we'd get a divorce.

What makes a good drug rug?

I like the ones that don't have little bits of twigs and stuff woven in with the cotton. Some are soft, but I don't have any of those fancy ones. Good colors too, i guess are important.



Do you own one?

My boss at the thrift store i work at got a whole shipment of them in. No one bought them so she gave them all to me. I have rainbow ones, stoner ones, stainy ones, little ones, holey ones. I don't remember where i put them.



Do people ask you about drug rugs a lot?

No, just you. want one? what is your address i'll mail it to you.



What does the future hold for you guys?

Hopefully a fucking wedding. Quit the band, make some kids...no just kidding. But we really need to move out of the city and start a garden. Theres this thing we keep reading about called "codex alimentarius" and some controversy about the worlds powers conspiring to take all nutritional value out of the foods we eat as a form of population control. it sounds kind of wacked, and its probably not true, but I guess its kind of like those people who believe in being a good person in this life just so they won't go to hell. There's nothing wrong with being a good person, nothing wrong with starting a garden, so who really cares what your motive is. In terms of the future, i'm looking into spiritualism and other theories about what happens after you die, trying to decide a few things. I'm trying to encourage Tommy to develop his latent psychic abilities and we're starting to see and hear some pretty strange things.


Do you sit on a drug rug to figure out the future?

I just sit on my bed and try to let my mind go out of my body and see what i can see. The future is happening right now.

Listen: "Day I Die"