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AMSTERDAM - "It's nice to have friends in bigger bands," says Troy Van Leeuwen. For the European tour of his new project Sweethead, the Queens Of The Stone Age-guitarist made good use of his connections. The rock band opened for Eagles Of Death Metal and Them Crooked Vultures, both bands of QOTSA-colleague Josh Homme.

Snow Patrol saved them a spot as their supporting act as well: “I gave my friends in Snow Patrol a record, and they liked it, so we did a month of touring with them.” 

Van Leeuwen (40) started Sweethead (named after a David Bowie song) together with singer Serrina Sims, who he knew from QOTSA: she had been a background singer on several of their songs. Sims and Van Leeuwen had been wanting to do something together for a long while, but they lacked the free time to do it: “Especially in the last few years, the schedule with the Queens got really intense. So we were kind of waiting for the moment to really focus on it.” That moment came in Fall of 2008 when Homme became more involved with his other bands. Sweethead's debut EP “The Great Disruptors” appeared in July of 2009.

Hazing
Eddie Nappi and Norm Block, who had previously played together with Van Leeuwen in the Mark Lanegan Band, complete the group. For Sims, it was the ideal band to start her career as a lead singer. “You really can’t ask to be in better hands than people that have been playing forever and that are solid musicians who can guide you.”

As the three men already knew each other very well, Sims was the new one in the group and had to find her place a bit: “They call it hazing in America: I’m like the little sister that they punish. But they’re all great and it clicked.”

The Eagles phenomenon
How big a role Van Leeuwen will keep playing in Sweethead, depends on his schedule. If QOTSA needs his attention again, he might take a step back, and only stay on as a writer and producer. Sims calls it the Eagles Phenomenon, after Eagles Of Death Metal, where Josh Homme became less involved after a while and the band got more of a life of its own. Van Leeuwen: “To me it’s about this first record, me being involved, and launching it to get it where it needs to go, and then it can evolve from there.”

Interview: Kristiaan Asscheman
Text: Bas Steeman

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