Last week All Girl Summer Fun Band challenged the band Blübird for the next interview. Blübird are two young girls, Úna, who is 13, Katie who is 12 and turning 13 this month. Like AGSFB, they hail from Portland, Oregon, the indie music capital of the USA. They have strong opinions on politics, a very catchy song about global warming, a guitar almost as big as themselves and nerve enough to call their president an idiot in a song.

How and when did you form the band?

Katie: We formed the band at Rock 'n' Roll Camp for Girls in the summer of 2005.

Úna: When we first started the band, it was called Soundboard. That was for one show.

Katie: We wanted something unique, something different from the other bands.

Úna: They were called things like "Kitty Kat." But I guess Kitty Kat is kind of like Blübird.

Katie: Not really. (laughs) When we decided to stay together as a band, we had a lot of conversations over the phone on a band name.

Úna: We wanted to be called Furious George, but we looked on the Internet and there was already a band with that name that played at casinos in Las Vegas. Then we thought of other names …

Katie: … like Yukon Cornelius.

Úna: We decided on Blübird because it sounded cool and we liked the umlaut. It seemed very European.

Katie: It seemed cool. It sounded cool.

Úna: We like birds, but that had nothing to do with it.

Where did you learn to play your instruments?

Úna: I got my first guitar on my 8th birthday. I learned how to play at the Rock 'n' Roll Camp for Girls that summer. I still take lessons.

Katie: I learned to play at the camp, too. I was 11. But I had no interest in drums at first, I thought they were really hard, I wanted to switch to guitar. Then the second day at camp, I got my first rhythm and stuck with them. We have practice at the rock camp everyother week and we learn a lot from our coach Marisa.

Tell me a little about your forthcoming album.

Úna: It's a five-song EP called "We Are Birds." It was recorded at the Old Library Studio in Portland.

Katie: They're all original songs, except one – "Little Yellow Lemon" by Cheralee Dillon. She's from Portland, too.

Úna: It took us two months to record it. It's coming out in May. You'll be able to buy it on our website and at our shows and at indie record stores and on CD Baby.

Katie: We wrote the songs from lyrics we kept in a notebook. They reflect how we're thinking at this time in our lives. The songs obviously say something about the problems in the world and things we would like to change.

Úna: We had a lot of lyric writing. We pieced most of the songs together from that notebook. Except "Global Warming." I wrote that in about five minutes.

Katie: You should have seen her, she just started writing like crazy. Then you could tell she felt really bad. Really depressed. Like the world was being ruined.

You are obviously very concerned about environmental issues, will this be a dominant theme in your songs?

Úna: Not just environmental issues -- political issues, social issues…

Katie: Like the song "The Way You Thought It Was" on our CD. There's the lyrics …
"Look what has happened/We fall from a ladder that has no ending point."
In a way that could be about a political issue, like the war…

Úna: … but it could be about any issue. Any situation that is bad. The song also has hope …
(Sings) "Our lives come to a halt/To see where we have stopped/On this unending road of determination."
… The next verse…
"We turn around, confronting the future/Finally looking away from the past."

Katie: Not only does it show how hectic our lives have become, but also that people can stop and welcome the good parts of life with open arms.

Can we really halt global warming?

Úna: Yes. Have hope. But we have to act quickly.

What are your current favorite bands/songs?

Katie: Death Cab for Cutie, "Marching Bands of Manhattan" definitely. Also, The Decemberists "O Velencia!"

Úna: Arcade Fire, especially "The Headlights Look Like Diamonds" and"Rebellion (Lies)." Oh, and Beck and Björk.

Blübird - Global Warming
Blübird - The Way You Thought It Was

Video for "Global Warming"
Blübird official home page

Rock 'n' Roll Camp for Girls
Rock 'n' Roll Camp for Girls on Myspace
There is a documentary in the making about the camp, which will open in theaters next Autumn. More on that here.

And yes, the band challenges Raining Jane for the next interview!