According to Voltaire ‘anything too stupid to be said is sung’. And it seems that fellow Frenchman Dorian Dumont - The Teenagers’ guitarist – is of the same school of thought. But some might argue that there are things too stupid to even be sung.

“I think it is lame all those bands write about really important things in the world,” he says. “I don’t really mind that some people label our music as ‘style over substance’. I know that sometimes our lyrics are a bit weird. But I don’t think that means our songs are less strong than other bands”.

‘Weird’ indeed. The band’s use of the word c*nt - as in ‘I fucked my American…’ didn’t exactly go down well across the Atlantic in their single ‘Homecoming’. But according to Dumont it wasn’t a deliberate attempt to court controversy. So how come they swear so much in their songs?

“That’s cos we’re French! When we wrote ‘Homecoming’ we knew c*nt was harsh. But there’s not really a French equivalent. We just know it as an American word. I know it’s not really something you say in front of your parents.”

Sadly the boys, Dumont, Michael Szpiner (bass) and Quentin Delafon (vox) who have all known each other since school, do not seem to share Voltaire’s appreciation for all things English. During his exile Voltaire found enlightenment in a greater freedom of thought mingling with fellow professional thinker John Locke. Dumont’s experience isn’t quite the same. The deal with their label requires a London band HQ.

He lives in Bethnal Green with Szpiner – Delafon lives ‘somewhere else’- but he dislikes the high crime levels and the cuisine. “I hate pies. England is the worst place for food.”

And then there’s his disdain for our drinking culture.

“We drink a little, like when we’re writing to have fun. But you drink way more than the French. When I first came to England is was like ‘wow all the girls are really drunk’. But the girls are easier here, and they’re not ashamed of being pissed. In Paris the girls are not like that. But London is fun, I do like living here.”

The band are all best friends and take their name from a nostalgic longing for their uncomplicated juvenile hey-day. Dumont doesn’t miss the trauma of puberty but draws inspiration from the carefree, whimsical lifestyle that lends itself to youth.

As a 12-year-old child Dumont asked his mum to buy him G’N’R’s Appetite For Destruction because he liked the cover and it made him feel like a rebel. Queen’s Greatest Hits Volume Two is also high on his list of early influences.

“We miss our teenage years because you don’t have to worry about anything. It’s horrible being uncomfortable with your body and everything. But your parents are taking care of you and you don’t have any responsibilities. Now it’s all worrying about money and boring.”

How about the fact that they are mid-twenty-somethings calling themselves adolescents and singing about fucking? Isn’t that a little creepy, and causing the band to be labelled ‘sleazy’?

“Oh, well we are.”

The band’s current teen idol (after a previous obsession with Shannon Doherty) is Blake Lively, a.k.a Gossip Girl’s Serena Van Der Woodsen. The band is a big fan of the show about the ‘scandalous’ escapades of the cream of Manhattan’s teen social hierarchy. Perhaps because they’ve both been accused of shameless consumerism promotion amongst youngsters?

But The Teenagers’ imperative lyrics like ‘buy our t-shirts’ are probably more welcomed by credit crunched parents than the idea of a designer-themed school wardrobe for each day of the week, as Gossip Girl dictates.

“When we played in New York last time in April, Chuck (another character from the show) asked to be on the guest list. I don’t know if he came as I didn’t see him but I was quite excited.”

The day after our interview the band are due to hop over to the Isle of Wight for Bestival after a summer on the festival circuit.

“I’ve no idea who is playing,” says Dumont. “I tried looking on the website but I didn’t understand anything. It is so complicated and there are so many bands.”

Since our pre-Bestival meeting the event, now somewhat ironically named, suffered terrible mud/rain combos and was forced to cancel quite a bit of the line-up - with The Teenagers’ set having been among the casualties.

“I think we’ve played most festivals this summer so we’ve already seen a lot of bands. The favourite was probably Rage Against The Machine at Reading.”

The Teenagers’ own first time playing Reading in 2007 is probably their proudest moment.

There have been a few female-led stage-rushing incidents this year – at Glasto and in Brisbane and on a lesser scale at Leeds. The rest of this year, however, is hardly London themed at all. They’ve been to Japan, which was “amazing” and everyone was “supernice” and have a Germany tour beginning in late September with a peppering of France-based gigs in October. There’s also a date with New Young Pony Club at the O2’s new venue Matter.

“It will be fun but that’s not a full gig - it’ll just be like two songs or something and we’ll just be hanging out. Then we’re off to Greece and Singapore and back to Australia and to Mexico too.”

Well at least they’ll be able to get some ‘decent’ food for a while.

Their favourite tour buddies are the notoriously off-ish (or just plain rude) Canadians, Crystal Castles.

“We love them,” says Dumont. “They hate everybody, except us. Generally they don’t talk to other bands. But we’re French so they probably think we’re cool. But we’ve toured a lot with them, they’re our best friends. And Vampire Weekend too. They are quite shy and really cool, they aren’t like other bands just really drunk and talking shit.”

Their own music is meant to be tongue-in-cheek ‘fun’ and not taken too seriously. The band claim they started a fake MySpace band profile as a joke, but after online interest gave the music game a whirl. Either way they seem to be serious about it now.

Their first album ‘Reality Check’ released this year is a bratty electro-pop creation, astutely employing the art of playful smut gimmickry, to be filed under the if-you-think-it’s-trash-you-just-didn’t-get-it umbrella. Or at worst ‘all the tracks sound the same, but at least it’s a good song’ as one online commentator put it.

“We like The Strokes and electronic music – so I suppose we wanted to make music a bit like The Strokes in an electronic way. Sort of like electronic rock but not like insert high pitched whiney sound more like insert low pitched drone.”

With that Dumont is off to open his four new guitar parcels from the Ebay postman (though really they’re probably imported food parcels).