You might recognize Summer Walker for her smooth and seductive vocals, but the R&B star is not someone who speaks a lot. In truth, the Atlanta artist is pretty reserved. And while many people struggle to draw the 29-year-old out of her quiet nature, Paris Hilton, who sat down with Summer before she dropped her third album, Finally Over It, connected with her over an unexpected shared love of farm animals, especially turtles, goats, and Silkie chickens. But life is far from simple for Summer. As she explains to her fellow mom and musician, trying to manage her home life while keeping up with the demands of her music career is a constant challenge.

SUMMER WALKER: You know what? I might have fucked up. She said talk for 40 minutes but I’m such a bad talker.

PARIS HILTON: [Laughs] 

WALKER: How are you?

HILTON: Good. I just got back to town. It’s so good to be home with the baby and the puppies. Where are you?

WALKER: I’m in Atlanta. You have a brand new baby?

HILTON: My daughter, London, just turned two on 11/11, and then my son, Phoenix, is going to be three in January. And you have three?

WALKER: Yeah. Two boys. They are about to be three. And then I have a 4-year-old daughter.

HILTON: So cute having them around the same age.

WALKER: Yeah. How’s motherhood been for you?

HILTON: I love it. I just feel like my life is finally complete. It’s definitely a lot to balance with everything, but I always put my babies first. I try to bring them with me everywhere.

WALKER: I feel you. I think my life would suck without them. I used to try to bring them everywhere, but trying to bring them on tour was really hard.

HILTON: I bet. Especially with twin boys.

WALKER: So what’s your favorite color?

HILTON: [Laughs] Pink. You?

WALKER: I should have known that. Um, pink. My bathroom and my whole room looks like a young girl’s princess party.

HILTON: Same. [Laughs] I love it. What sign are you?

WALKER: Aries.

HILTON: Nice. I’m an Aquarius.

WALKER: Oh, I love Aquarius. They’re really tactical and smart and calm and intuitive. So what do you do for fun?

HILTON: I work all the time, but if I’m not working, my favorite thing is just to be at home with babies and my pets and cook and do art and chill and write music and just play in the backyard. I love being outdoors. What about you?

WALKER: Literally the same thing. I just don’t have as much time, but I would really, really like to do more staying home, cooking, just being with the kids, painting, decorating the house, shopping, and building stuff outside. I just built a chicken coop.

HILTON: Like, for eggs?

WALKER: Yes. I’m excited to just have chickens for eggs and just chickens that are just cute—like, you know the Silkie chickens?

HILTON: Yes! That’s what my husband and I want. Are they sweet?

WALKER: I mean, I chilled with one for five seconds. We called him Teriyaki and he was nice.

HILTON: [Laughs] The way their little feathers look is so funny. I wanted to get a couple of them because I heard it’s so much healthier to grow your own eggs.

WALKER: Absolutely. I want the whole thing, the goats and all the animals.

HILTON: I used to have a goat, I got it in Vegas. I named it Billy.

WALKER: How was that?

HILTON: It was a little miniature one. It was so cute and sweet but then it got older and grew horns and udders. Then it was trying to butt everyone in the head, like, chasing people.

WALKER: Not so cute anymore.

HILTON: [Laughs] Yeah. We sent it to my ranch. It got a little crazy living in Beverly Hills. I should have got a girl.

WALKER: Yeah, I’m going to look into that. I just got my little greenhouse so I can start gardening. All of this requires me to stay home, so I don’t know what the hell I think I’m about to do.

HILTON: [Laughs] Hopefully you’ll have someone to help you with that because with the amount we both have to travel, it’s hard to keep all of that up.

WALKER: Absolutely. Do you have any fish?

HILTON: I used to have an aquarium but then I moved houses. Do you?

WALKER: No, I think I want a turtle though.

HILTON: They’re cute. I used to have the little ones. I love animals.

WALKER: I heard.

HILTON: I just got a new dog named Iconic Princess Hilton. She’s like a little mini teacup chihuahua. 

WALKER: Iconic Princess Hilton. Period. 

HILTON: [Laughs] Yes.

WALKER: She’s a diva.

HILTON: She’s a little baby icon. By the way, you looked so beautiful at the VMAs in New York.

WALKER: Thank you. So did you. I was like, “Wow, did I just talk to Paris Hilton?”

HILTON: I loved when you came up and said hello. I loved your hat. I loved your outfit. It looked so gorgeous.

WALKER: Thank you. Yeah, it was a fun little time. I love dressing up.

HILTON: Me too. 

WALKER: Speaking of cooking, I was in the store a while ago and I seen your cookware.

HILTON: Were you at Walmart?

WALKER: Maybe. It had the crystals on it. I was like, “Oh my god, I got to get this.”

HILTON: I’ll send you a whole package of stuff. All the new products are so cute.

WALKER: Really? I don’t mind buying it.

HILTON: I would love just to send it to you as a present to say congratulations on the new album.

WALKER: Thank you. It’s Christmas.

HILTON: I know. I cannot believe it’s the end of the year already. It’s so crazy how time has flown so fast.

WALKER: I mean, I think NASA actually said that time did speed up, you can really feel it though.

HILTON: Life is so precious. We have to enjoy every moment.

WALKER: Definitely. So how is your mom?

HILTON: My mom is amazing. She just called me last night. She’s in Vegas for BravoCon with all the other housewives and my sister, and they were just having a time. I love her so much.

WALKER: I love when people are really close with their parents even when they’re grown as hell.

HILTON: Yeah, family is everything. What was your day to day before getting into music and releasing albums? 

WALKER: Honestly, painting and just playing the guitar. Just doing art, basically.

HILTON: When did you start singing?

WALKER: I was maybe 13. I was in the church choir—I have a question for you.

HILTON: Yes.

WALKER: What was the first business you opened?

HILTON: When I lived in the Malibu colony, my sister and I would have a lemonade stand, so I was an entrepreneur at a young age. [Laughs] And then I did my first perfume in 2004 when The Simple Life came out. I just released my 30th fragrance.

WALKER: Congratulations. 30 is crazy.

HILTON: Thank you. It’s called Iconic, I’ll send you that as well—

WALKER: Love. Okay, so we have the dog name, Iconic, and we have a perfume named Iconic. Is anyone else named Iconic?

HILTON: If I have another daughter, I’ll name her Iconic.

WALKER: Period. 

HILTON: [Laughs] Oh, yeah, my new music documentary is called Infinite Icon. So that’s iconic too.

WALKER: Dope. So what’s your favorite type of genre?

HILTON: I love dance, EDM, and pop. 

WALKER: So you want to put me on? Give me your favorite EDM artist.

HILTON: I love Martin Garrix, David Guetta, like when he does remixes, they’re so sick. He’s so talented. Kygo is amazing, and Avicii was incredible. I always loved his music.

WALKER: Is that what inspired you to DJ?

HILTON: I just have loved going to raves and music festivals since I was a teenager and then 15 years ago, I got offered to do this huge music festival in Brazil and close out for JLo, even though I’d never DJed before. My team was like, “It’s a huge offer. Will you do it?” So I was like, “Okay, fine.” So I did it and I loved it so much. And then from there I just started getting offered DJ residencies in Ibiza and Las Vegas and all around the world. 

WALKER: Yeah, why not make money off doing what you love?

HILTON: Yeah, exactly. I was the first one who invented getting paid to party in Vegas, doing club appearances. But then I noticed around that time when I started DJing, that it was more about the DJs, so I hired the best people in the business to come to my house and train me, because it’s very technical. It took a minute to learn everything. Being a girl in that business, you really have to prove yourself. So I just wanted everything to be perfect.

WALKER: I love that. I think when I finally learn how to DJ, I will officially stop singing.

HILTON: Do you ever get nervous when you go on stage?

WALKER: A little. It’s not as bad as it used to be.

HILTON: Same. I used to get so nervous, but I spoke to other artists like Sia and Miley [Cyrus] about it, and they’re like, “It’s normal. You’re only nervous because you care so much.”

WALKER: I feel like that’s something Miley definitely agrees with because she gets on stage and be doing anything. It’s hilarious. 

HILTON: She slays. I love her. Soafter this trilogy, what’s next?

WALKER: Probably funk. I like old school stuff, disco.

HILTON: I love disco. Who are some of the artists that you were inspired by when you were a little girl?

WALKER: Erykah Badu. What about you?

HILTON: I always loved Madonna, Janet Jackson, Britney  [Spears], Alanis Morissette—who else? Paula Abdul. 

WALKER: The pop legends.

HILTON: Yeah. Do you come to L.A. a lot?

WALKER: Yeah, unfortunately.

HILTON: Why?

WALKER: I don’t know. I’m a down South girl, so L.A. is just so different. I always have trouble adapting.

HILTON: Why?

WALKER: Why? You really want me to get into it? [Laughs] I can’t ever seem to find really good food without going to a five star restaurant and spending $500 to $1000 just to eat a meal. And then the traffic is so bad, it’s so crazy. It’s kind of a little bit bougie, but maybe I’m going to the wrong places. And the air has a lot of smog, and I just be like–

HILTON: “Take me home.” [Laughs]

WALKER: Yeah. And I think it’s like that southern hospitality, like people open doors, and they say, “Yes ma’am,” or “No, ma’am.” I think in New York and LA everything’s just moving so fast that people just be like, “Get the fuck out the way.” 

HILTON: [Laughs] Yeah. I love Southern food. 

WALKER: What is your favorite type?

HILTON: Biscuits and gravy–everything just feels so cozy and yummy. I love anything that’s fried. I’m not really a healthy eater. 

WALKER: Life is short. Enjoy yourself.

HILTON: I love Taco Bell.

WALKER: Period. Yeah, I think Atlanta needs to chill with the lemon pepper though. You can’t have lemon pepper with everything.

HILTON: [Laughs] What do you like to do when you relax?

WALKER: When I like to relax, I like to get a massage. I don’t even know how many times I get a massage in a month. That’s my shit. Hopefully one day I can open up a spa because that is my passion and then I can just sit there all day.

HILTON: Do you like facials?

WALKER: Yes, I love any type of red light therapy, any type of healing things you can do.

HILTON: Yeah, I’m obsessed with all that. I’m building a crazy spa at my house right now that has all of the most insane medical devices and facial things that you would see in a real spa or a doctor’s office because I’m obsessed with longevity and wellness and looking hot forever.

WALKER: Speaking of looking hot forever, there’s this machine and it’s super cold, and they put it on your face and do that lymphatic drainage, but it snatches your face and you look like Michael Jackson after. You know what I’m talking about?

HILTON: I have a couple different ones. I have an actual cryotherapy machine called CryoBuilt that you walk in. Four people can fit in it.

WALKER: Oh, wow.

HILTON: But then I also have the face ones. This other new thing they just came out with as well, it’s called the Sherpa CryoBuilt and it’s like a cryo facial that blasts this freezing air on you. And then there’s another one that’s like a metal thing, and it’s like a circle, and it just gets so cold, and it makes your face look snatched. I love it.

WALKER: Yes. I need to learn about some more machines. My facial lady is crazy. It looks like a mad scientist room in there. It’s like 50 machines.

HILTON: Yeah, that’s how I am too. I get three facials a week for three hours each time, and I feel like I’m working because she hooks up all these little sticky things on my body with the electric EMS, so it’s kind of toning the body while doing the facial.

WALKER: You have the thing that does the crunches for you?

HILTON: Yes. The NeurotriS machine. It’s so sick. 

WALKER: See, I do them, but I don’t know what they’re called. 

HILTON: [Laughs] So what was the inspiration for your album cover?

WALKER: Anna Nicole Smith.

HILTON: Yes. I remember when I saw that when you posted on Instagram, I was like, “This is iconic.”

WALKER: Thank you. We love the girls. We love Pamela [Anderson], we love Anna.

HILTON: So amazing that you recreated that.

WALKER: Thank you. Well, don’t be a stranger because I’m trying to come to one of them DJ sets.

HILTON: Oh yes, definitely. And I’ll let you know my next house party is in real Slivington Manor. It’s so much fun.

WALKER: Oh, I love house parties. That’s actually my favorite thing. Particularly ones with no air.

HILTON: No air?

WALKER: Yeah. Like a Jamaican party.

HILTON: What is that?

WALKER: We’ll get into it. [Laughs] But I’m so over the clubs. Everybody wants to stand around and stare at each other.

HILTON: Yeah, it’s not fun. But my house parties are lit.

WALKER: Okay, I’ll be there.

HILTON: Hell yes. I’ll find out when the next one is and I’ll send it to you. Wait, what’s your favorite song on the new album?

WALKER: “Don’t Make Me Do It.”

HILTON: What’s it about?

WALKER: It’s just like, don’t make me break up with you, because I don’t want to, but I’ll do it if I have to.

HILTON: Loves it. Congratulations on everything, honey. And I look forward to seeing you soon. I hope you have an amazing Thanksgiving and Christmas. I’ll send you over the prezzies.

WALKER: Thank you. Blessings to you and the family.

HILTON: You too, honey.

M.O.T.H.E.R. – the new collaborative band helmed by Robbie Furze of The Big Pink and currently featuring Jamie T and Jamie Hince of The Kills – have given their first proper interview, talking to NME about the emotional origins of the project, their aim to be “the guitar version of N.E.R.D.”, and their hit-list of future collaborators.

Revealing the new project at the end of May alongside the blistering anthemics of debut single ‘My Love’, Furze shared that the seeds of M.O.T.H.E.R. had come from losing his own parent after a prolonged illness. “My mum got sick about five years ago and was ill for about four years before she died,” he told NME.

“In that period I had a daughter, which was this real juxtaposition of death and birth. My mates – Jamie T and Jamie Hince – came together for me, and then sadly Jamie [Hince] lost his dad too,” Furze went on, sitting in a West London pub alongside Hince.

Hince continued: “I lost my dad four days after Robbie [lost his mum], and it felt like, if ever there was a calling, it was that. But it didn’t all come out of that doom and gloom. I hate mentioning COVID but everyone had so much time on their hands and there was this open creativity back then. I was working on music with Jamie T, sending each other stuff, and the idea for the three of us to do something together came out of that. It felt nice, like we were buying into this camaraderie, and this gang.”

The three musicians have previous credits together, with the two Jamies also writing on The Big Pink’s most recent album, 2022’s ‘The Love That’s Ours’. Fully collaborating on M.O.T.H.E.R., Furze joked, was like “the clash of three egos”. “Everyone wants to work with each other because you like what each other does, and so it’s not quite imposter syndrome but you have to live up to [that idea] and jump in and be a character,” Hince continued. “You can’t be too humble about it.”

Recording between Hince’s studio in LA and Furze’s studio in London’s Bethnal Green, the current trio have also dropped their self-titled debut EP featuring three further tracks: ‘Real Human’, ‘Traitor’, and ‘Surrender’. The ethos of the band, meanwhile, is for the line-up to shift with each release, bringing in familiar faces from other groups and working with whoever might be available at the time.

“We did a little bit [of recording] with Jenny [Lee Lindberg, bassist] from Warpaint who I love; I really want to get something solid down with her,” revealed Hince, while Furze suggested that names including Zach Hill of industrial hip-hop trio Death Grips, and electronic producer Skream have all been in the mix for future iterations of the band.

“We ran into Zach and he seemed into it but then he started ghosting me,” he noted. “Whether or not he decides to text me back, it would be wonderful to have that kind of thing. Jamie Hince, Skream, Rhys Webb from The Horrors [who played on their recent radio session], and Zach – if I saw that, I’d wanna hear what that nonsense sounds like!”

Check out the rest of the interview with Furze and Hince below, as they discuss their endearing bromance, their admiration for Jamie T, and why the band are unlikely to ever make an album.

NME: Hello Robbie and Jamie! You must have been kicking about at a lot of ‘00s parties, how far does your friendship go back?

Robbie Furze: “Me and Jamie T started becoming friends on the circuit of festivals when the first Big Pink record came out in 2009. Then me and Jamie Hince met at Corona Capital in Mexico in 2012.”

Jamie Hince: “He had a reputation – I think we all had reputations… I remember his wife giving me these dried insect snacks and I didn’t eat them because I thought he might have laced them with something…”

Furze: “Every band playing Corona Capital was staying in this massive hotel, so it was just chaos.”

Hince: “It was at the height of ego. Everyone had bodyguards. Bands were trying to outdo other bands. Like, The Black Keys – you’re two guys from Ohio, you don’t need armed bodyguards…”

The Big Pink
Robbie Furze with The Big Pink, 2022. Credit: Ashley Rommelrath.

Where does Jamie T fit into all this?

Hince: “Our orbits crossed quite a bit. I remember seeing him at some tiny little pub when he was probably about 19, and I love how it’s come full circle. My heart sinks a little bit when I see Jamie T working because I know I’m nowhere near [as good as] that. I have to chip away at things and stand back and then dive in again to get the feeling, whereas he’s just got the feeling from the start.”

Furze: “He’s pretty incredible. The song ‘Traitor’ on the EP was supposed to be for my vocal, and he was almost getting pissed off that we couldn’t get the verses right. He was just like, ‘I’ll sort it out’, goes up to the mic, does one take and it’s done. See you later. He’s that kind of guy.”

Do you have to leave your ego at the door in those situations?

Hince: “I did this amazing beat for ‘Traitor’ that I loved, and I sent it to Jamie T and got back a text saying: ‘One pound fish’. Fuck! I mean talk about leaving your ego at the door… I know what he was saying, he thought it was a bit ‘cor blimey’ waltz. But some of the shit he ends up doing, it’s totally ‘cor blimey one pound fish’!”

Furze: “But whatever works for the track works, and everyone has to be happy with it. You push each other without really knowing it.”

How did you envision the project?

Hince: “These things just come together. It sounds cheesy, but I wanted it to be the guitar version of N.E.R.D. – a production team of people that love each other.”

Furze: “We’ve got songs in the pipeline with other artists already, and it makes it like an N.E.R.D. or Unkle or Massive Attack thing. Being collaborative makes me more excited.”

Hince: “It feels like that time has gone where albums really last. Records seem to come and go quite quickly now. So I’ve shifted my enthusiasm because I think the attention span has gone. You spend so much time making records and so little time getting any reward.”

Furze: “I’d like to do standalone singles, or another EP of four or five tracks as a batch. I wouldn’t wanna go further than that.”

None of your individual bands and projects sound that alike – where do you think your tastes align?

Hince: “There’s something unspoken that we all seem to agree on which is this epic-ness. There’s a line in one of the songs that talks about ‘the last of the hooligans‘ and that seemed to be the feeling behind it all. If there’s a similarity with what everyone wanted, it was maybe just being a bit romantic and epic.”

Jamie Hince and Alison Mosshart of the band The Kills perform
Jamie Hince and Alison Mosshart of the band The Kills perform live. CREDIT: Harmony Gerber/Getty Images

Why do you think you were drawn to that?

Hince: “I don’t know, maybe we’re just lonely men?”

Furze: “Beaten down but being pulled up by hope…”

Hince: “We’ve all been bashing around, making all this noise and spending so much time doing it; I think it gives you that feeling. There’s something tiny and irrelevant about what you do but something life and death about what you do too, and I think the cocktail of that makes it… well, the last of the hooligans.”

Tell us a bit about ‘My Love’ – the first proper single.

Furze: “It’s one of the most basic songs. It’s a love song about hope, but it just has such an incredible energy to it with its simplicity. I’m not a massive Beatles fan but it has this relatable energy [like their early music]. ‘I wanna hold your hand’ – you don’t get more basic than that, in a great way. I think simplicity is power. Sometimes less is more, and if you mean it you can get away with it.”

Are there going to be live shows?

Furze: “Definitely. We’re playing a bit of catch up because we didn’t think ‘My Love’ would get the reaction it has, but we’re desperate to get out and do gigs.”

Hince: “In the spirit of the collaborative project, I’m really liking the idea of having different people in different countries playing with us; having a different vibe each time.”

Furze: “It would be really exciting to see different characters that you know from different bands. For the radio session [with Steve Lamacq on BBC 6 Music] we had Rhys Webb from The Horrors on bass, and I love that idea.”

Jamie T performing at Glastonbury 2022, photo by Eva Pentel
Jamie T performing at Glastonbury 2022. Credit: Eva Pentel for NME

You’re obviously very close – what are your favourite memories of this charming bromance?

Furze: “Jamie’s probably my best friend in the world and we’ve been through a lot together. In 2015 we both uprooted and went out to LA together, I went out there for about five years and he stayed, so we were pretty inseparable. It got to a point where it was breakfast, lunch and dinner together.”

Hince: “We just became one person. People would confuse us even though we don’t look the same. He had an ex-girlfriend who he went to say hello to and she said, ‘Hello Jamie’. We just started having the same vibe. The same embarrassing energy. We’ve chilled out a bit recently but when I was in LA and Robbie was in London we’d speak to each other for four hours a day. I was getting complaints from his wife.”

The ‘M.O.T.H.E.R. EP’ is out now.

The Big Pink returned with their third studio album, ‘The Love That’s Ours’, in 2022. It marked their first full-length effort in over 10 years. T and Hince worked on that LP, too, co-writing the single ‘Love Spins On Its Axis’.

The Kills released their sixth and latest record, ‘God Games’, in 2023.

Jamie T, meanwhile, made a comeback with ‘The Theory Of Whatever’ the previous year. He recently joined forces with Fred Again.. on the track ‘Lights Burn Dimmer’, and performed with The Maccabees at their big London reunion gig last summer.

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