Dinner With Bronques: Chromeo's anti-celebrity lead singer, Dave 1, and OK Magazine Editor, Lindsey Hunter at Ilili. Dave tells us why Proust was the ultimate scenester and Lindsey, getting saucier with each "Poison Sumac Margarita", gives us a backstage view of "OK" and tries to scoop some personal information out of the elusive Dave. Kanye, Britney and Vampire Weekend all pop up in conversation.

Ilili's Amuse: Pita Crackers with Lebanese Olives, and Zaatar Flavored Labne. To see the full meal CLICK HERE

BRONQUES: I've never partied with you. When is that gonna happen?

DAVE: What does that entail? Getting really really drunk?

BRONQUES: No, just coming out and staying out past 2AM. I saw Armand and P-Thugg last night. They had fun.

DAVE: Oh, The Six Six Sick party! They wanted me to guest DJ that... You know, I drink, but not that much. It doesn't take much for me to be tipsy... Last night after you left I drank that whole bottle in the dressing room.

LINDSEY: Is it hard to be a teacher and balance the rock star thing?

DAVE: I turn down 5 to 6 gigs a week because of school. Teaching is my priority. The thing with music is that it's very easy to let it control your life. You have all these people that are working with you on it... Record labels, managers, lawyers... You're the artist and you kind of feel indebted to them, you know? It's your music and they're working so hard for you, so it's very easy to start saying "yes" to everything, but when you do that you lose yourself. I actually learned that from Kanye. My brother has worked with Kanye for years. Kanye would turn down Letterman and other huge TV shows and his attitude was that he had to draw the line so it didn't feel like it was controlling his life. I think it's a healthy thing. If they have their way with you, they'll have you play a show every night. If it's not a show, it's a showcase, if it's not a showcase it'll be an instore...

LINDSEY: You're teaching graduate at {University} right? What's your specialty there?

DAVE: French literature. One of the hottest bands in America right now is from my school.

LINDSEY: Who?

DAVE: Vampire Weekend.

BRONQUES: They have my favorite album cover of the year so far. That chandelier... It's such a great party photo.

DAVE: That was taken at the school. That chandelier is in the Literary Society. The photo is from one of their first shows. I think they took it themselves.

LINDSEY: I studied Proust in France at the American University of Paris. I lived with this crazy woman. She thought I was her daughter. It was a weird bad situation.

DAVE: I start Proust in two weeks, actually.

BRONQUES: Who's Proust?

DAVE: He's like the French Shakespeare.

LINDSEY: I think that Proust's "In Search of Lost Time" is the best book ever. Wouldn't you agree?

DAVE: Yeah... Maybe not in all the world's literature, but in definitely in western literature... To a western reader it might just be the most fulfilling literary experience out there.

LINDSEY: And, the longest...

BRONQUES: Wow. How are you guys going to elevate a book to that height? Does it have a good ending or something?

DAVE: It's not just a book. It's an intense work of 6,000 pages.

LINDSEY: Seven volumes. But I only read the first two I must admit.

BRONQUES: Okay, but why is it better than, let's say... Lord Of The Rings?

DAVE: (laughing) It's different. First of all you have to draw this arbitrary distinction between popular literature and...

LINDSEY: Literary literature. Right?

DAVE: Yeah. And it's arbitrary. It's like drawing a line between graffiti and what's at the MOMA. Sometime graffiti gets into the MOMA and conversely there are people who do PHDs on Lord Of The Rings as well... But most of the literature that's read is not studied in an academic context, and I admit that's strange. But, in the literary world, "In Search Of Lost Time" is one of the greatest, if not the greatest work. I say that because other bodies of work like Shakespeare are harder to read for an audience today. You need more background to get into it. But the thing about Proust is that people of our generation and our sensibilities can understand it. Even though, when you start it, the first hundred pages is about a kid that can't go to sleep until his mom kisses him goodnight...

BRONQUES: (laughing) Does it keep you on the edge of your seat?

DAVE: Well, you're carried by it because...

LINDSEY: You know that something good is coming...

DAVE: It's another rhythm... There's parts where the plot is really intense and there are other really slow descriptive sections.

BRONQUES: So it's kind of like Tarantino's Jackie Brown, but in book form?

DAVE: (laughing) Slower. Slower than that. The thing is that, it's such an exact portrait of our psychology that you cannot believe how accurately this guy put down our most intimate emotions. Stuff that's so inside your brain you don't even ever bother to think about it. He describes "involuntary memory" to a "T". Like when I smell spray paint and it reminds me of a specific moment in 1994 when P and I got busted for writing graffiti in Montreal...

BRONQUES: Did that really happen?

DAVE: Yeah. (laughter) You remember things so vividly... It's hard enough to talk about it, so imagine writing about it, then reading it and then relating to it exactly! Every person that reads this feels like "Oh my god this happened to me!" The thing about Proust is that he came of age really late. He was probably the most unlikely guy to write a deep psychological body of work. He was the ultimate scenester. Maybe even more superficial than that... He was out at every party. He used to tip the doormen to sit him down and tell him who was there and what everybody was wearing. He would tell everybody that he was writing this great book, and they were like "Yeah, whatever"... And he actually did it against all odds. He had to pay people to have his books published.

Waiter: Excuse me. Are you ready to order?

BRONQUES: Oh... uh, no... Maybe we should look at the menu...

DAVE: (looking at menu) I get that it's Middle Eastern?

LINDSEY: I read in a review that it's better to stay with the classics with Middle Eastern and not go off into the duck schwarma for instance...

BRONQUES: You read a review before you came here?

LINDSEY: Yeah. I always do that before I go out.

BRONQUES: You're such a sleuth.

LINDSEY: New York magazine said to stay with the classics.

DAVE: I don't know, duck is pretty classic...This is straight up Lebanese. Kibenaya is basically raw meat. I have it at P's house all the time. (to Linsey) P-Thugg is the other guy in Chromeo. He's Lebanese and his mom is a great cook.

BRONQUES: Does P have a sister?

DAVE: Yeah...

BRONQUES: Is she hot?

DAVE: (laughing) Uh, yeah, she's pretty good looking... Bronques, she's like my sister...

BRONQUES: Lebanese women are hot.

LINDSEY: I have to ask... Dave, are you single?

DAVE: Uh, yeah.

LINDSEY: Why?

DAVE: I don't know. I just am... You see the dressing room at our shows? It's like a boys club. P, Armand and Nicky. P's growing his beard. He's got such a great working visa to get into the states that he's trying to see how long he can grow his beard before he gets into trouble. He could be almost a Jalaba and they'll let him in... (laughter)

LINDSEY: I find that a lot of men have beard envy. Do you get that?

DAVE: My beard is terrible. I have a little scruff. I couldn't grow mine forever. I never really shave. I'm not a hairy dude...

BRONQUES: You got some George Michael shit going on now... I know you keep it trimmed...

DAVE: George Mikahlecacous...

BRONQUES: (laughing) What the... How do you know that?

DAVE: I saw a Behind the music. It's not the first time people make a comparison to Chromeo and Wham. In England we get a lot of gay press, so we feed into it a little bit. I grew up with Wham. I'm a product of videos and MTV. I'm from the first generation that grew up witnessing the birth of the video artform. I listen to Hall and Oats...

Waiter: Excuse me. Are you ready to order?

BRONQUES: Yes. You guys can order for me. I like everything on the menu.

Waiter: If you'd like to do the sharing bit, you could do a Mesa Royal. You'd get to all the sections of the menu. It's sizable, so apart from that you wouldn't need anything else. I can course you in on that. You're going to get everything in the vegetables section except the grape leaves and the shoshito peppers, but you get the lamb sausage, tabouli, baba ganoush, the fried kiba, homemade pita bread...

LINDSEY: That sounds good!

Waiter: I think the three of you will be very satisfied...

DAVE: (to Lindsey) What do you do?

LINDSEY: I'm the music editor at OK magazine. I have to call publicists every day after celebrity things happen to find out if it's true. Publicists can be the most horrible people ever though. They lie 90% of the time. They'll yell at you on the phone, and make death threats... Celebrity publicists are horrifying. Music publicists are great, so are DVD publicists, but celebrity publicists will scream at you for hours if you let them. We'll resolve something and they keep calling back, insulting me, insulting the magazine...

BRONQUES: Do they know what you look like?

LINDSEY: No, most of the time they don't know me at all. They just want to intimidate you me so that I won't run anything about their client. "We will rip you a new asshole, you piece of shit..." They go personal.

DAVE: I always thought that when I saw all that stuff about Britney, that the publicist was behind it all. I mean it's like a campaign. She's in every magazine!

LINDSEY: You would think! But they flip out... I called once on a 100% positive item for {a celebrity} saying that she {virtuous action} and her publicist bitched at us. They were saying that they wanted to stab us! All this drama for a fluff piece? Then they'll call you10 minutes later and be like "Hey girlfriend, what's up... Let's try to get THIS in.." It's emotionally draining. I can see how people get burnt out on this.

BRONQUES: How do you deal with it? You're so good-natured!

LINDSEY: I drink. (laughter) Especially after a hard day like Mondays. That's our closing day. I might have to get out of it at some point.

BRONQUES: Yeah, but you're also getting hard-wired to learn to deal with that sort of shit. If you went and got a regular job now, you'd be bored so fast!

DAVE: It's like on Wall Street. People scream at each other and then they're all friends later.

LINDSEY: Yeah, but I'm not reciprocating. I don't yell at anybody. I realize that what we're doing here is silly... It's just entertainment.

BRONQUES: Well that, and money...

LINDSEY: For them, but not for me...

BRONQUES: When you get a scoop. That's a lot of money for your magazine. Like that Britney thing, when she walked out of her photoshoot with OK, that kind of put the magazine on the map here in the States.

LINDSEY: My pet peeve right now is people who feel bad for celebrity. The famous people all know where to go to be seen. You don't go to Robertson boulevard if you want to be incognito.

DAVE: What's that?

LINDSEY: It's like the big shopping LA street where all the paparazzi go stalk... Celebrities will go to lunch at the Ivy and be like "Oh those paparazzi, they're killing me! My life is horrible." Please...

BRONQUES: Did you see the Lindsey Lohan thing?

DAVE: What happened?

LINDSEY: She gets nude. Fully nude as a homage to Marilyn. In New York Magazine. Nude. Nothing to promote... Just for the press. They even had to reprint. The website was down for a couple of minutes. It totally worked.

DAVE: Man, I don't know... I just wanna hear a hot song. I don't care what it is you do, if you deliver great art, then, you have my attention. Britney, anybody... If you come with a hot song, you win. If Backstreet Boys came out tomorrow, or that funny dude with the beard from NSync came out tomorrow with a hot record, we'd all love him. I remember when it was right in the middle of the R. Kelly scandal, he came out with "Ignition"... Remember? Man, "Ignition" is proof... It shows you that for our collective consciousness, a hot song will bypass everything.