Porn Valley- It's funny what $200 gets you these days. Just ask Rilo Kiley.
The band's video for "The Moneymaker," the sultry first single about the sex trade from new album, "Under The Blacklight," features the band performing amid porn stars.
Adult actress Faye Runaway earned $200 less than her usual fee for her appearance in the video since she wasn't having sex, according to Rilo Kiley guitarist and singer Blake Sennett.
"So for an extra $200 it could have been a sex scene," Sennett said. "I think it's fair, but you got a record label's budget — money's thin when it comes to porn stars."
A year ago, the only ones who would have associated smut and Los Angeles' Rilo Kiley together might have been fevered fans hoping a sex tape of lead singer Jenny Lewis would surface on the Internet.
Such is the varied new direction of Rilo Kiley. From bittersweet indie anthems like "Portions For Foxes," from 2004's "More Adventurous" to the brazen disco of "Breakin' Up" from "Under the Blacklight."
"It's better to make a different record than to make a mediocre carbon copy," Sennett said.
Of the music that inspired the new CD, which also nods to country and classic rock, Sennet lists dub reggae and artists like Dolly Parton and Fleetwood Mac.
When Fleetwood Mac is brought up, you wonder if Sennett's asking for more than just musical comparisons to the '70s supergroup which was also notorious for its inner turmoil.
The backstory of Rilo is that Sennett and Lewis, both former child actors, founded the four-piece around 1998. The pair then dated and broke up around 2002.
Four albums on, there have been whispers of tension and jealousy. Last year, Lewis became a breakout star with the success of her first solo stab, "Rabbit Fur Coat," while a 2006 album from Sennett's solo project, The Elected, flew well under the radar.
The whole scenario seems to mirror Gwen Stefani and No Doubt, particularly in the public's adoration for Lewis.
"It doesn't really affect me that much," Sennett said. "Every band has to have a figurehead. Ours is an attractive redhead. So, there you go. If you had a band with an amazing frontwoman, it'd probably go the same way."
Sennett wouldn't divulge much about inner issues with Rilo, comparing the group to a family and saying it will take things as they come in terms of the future.
He does have a forward-looking plan in betting that "The Moneymaker" will become a standard for strippers across the world.
"Ten years on, when I'm down and out, I can go into a strip club and there it is," Sennett said. "A royalty being paid while 'Moneymaker' is making its money."
