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Hot Club de Paris
Interview - 27 May 2007
DW: Hi lads – well – you're coming towards the end of your UK tour – I hear there have been a few injuries sustained. Are you usually so accident prone?
Matthew: Not really. Touring just generally wears you down and when you're tired you tend to do stupider things because you're not concentrating. That you tend to drink more just exacerbates the problem.
DW: How did the tour go in comparison to the previous one – I assume the audiences are getting bigger – what were the highlights this time round?
Matthew: It's not finished yet. It was good but different. All tours are different to each other. Audiences have been great but it's not like we've made some massive leap, we're playing similar venues to similar amounts of people. We're not really the kind of band that is going to get massive anyway.
DW: Can you give us a bit of band background – how you all met and how long you've been together, that sort of thing.
Matthew: We've been together about 3 years. Paul and I met at University whilst we were temping. Alasdair and I met at birth when he became my brother and I became his. We started playing together because we liked music and wanted to play together. Paul and I were in two different bands at the time.
DW: There's a few musicians around at the moment who are dipping into the past for their inspiration. By that I mean more retro than the 70's – people like Ireland's Duke Special are presenting a more theatrical, musichall feel to their shows. There's a bit of a George Formby vibe to your music is that someone you've listened to, and have you been influenced by that whole era.
Matthew: Uhm, I can honestly say I have never been influenced by George Formby. People tend to confuse our influences because the records we listen to aren't widely publicised in the mainstream music press. People tend to lump us in with a lot of recent bands that we sound nothing like and think are shit. We play with no distortion, tons of time signature changes, open drone tunings, two handed bass tapping... all kinds of things that a lot of the bands we get compared to don't do. We like bands like Minutemen, Owls, Cap N Jazz, Don Caballero, Storm&Stress, Black Flag. I guess we play technical pop.
DW:. You have a very refreshing sound. Was it a conscious decision to make music that is different to the Arctic Monkeys wannabees that are prevelant at the moment, or is it just the way the music comes out of you?
Matthew: I am 26 years old, I probably started playing guitar when the Arctic Monkeys were about 8. I can honestly say I have never considered what I am doing in relation to the Arctic Monkeys. I find it totally bonkers that people search for these benchmarks and must cross reference everything with them.
DW:. Your music has a certain amount of humour – I've yet to meet a miserable Scouser, do you think humour is something that is inbred in the area you come from?
Matthew: There's tons of miserable people from everywhere. It's the nature of being alive and all that jazz. Paul isn't from Liverpool, so that rules out our lyrics being funny because we're from Liverpool. I don't think it has anything to do with it at all. There's nothing worse than meeting someone from an area who insists on conforming to regional stereotype. Liverpool is no funnier than anywhere else. We use humour because that's what our lives are like. We have fun with each other and our collective experiences form our songs. Even if the subject matter is pretty dark, if you can't find humour in the sad things that happen, then you're pretty fucked.
DW: There's also a vein of wisdom running through your lyrics, how sensible are you in real life?
Matthew: We are pretty sensible in some ways and pretty stupid in others.
DW:. You recently played the SXSW Festival in the US – how did you go down there and has it reaped any benefits as yet?
Matthew: It was fun. Playing 3 shows a day for 6 days does tend to batter you though. So far it has benefited us in the way that we got a free holiday in Texas and New York.
DW: Musical Heros – if you were given the opportunity of playing with anyone, alive or dead, in a kind of super band, who would you choose?
Matthew: The alive or dead thing would probably make it Queen circa 86. Personally I'd like to learn from Ian Williams, John Fahey, Victor Villareal, Sam Zurich and Victor Wooten.
DW: Talking about musical heroes, you've recent played at the Camden Crawl – did Alastair get to meet Billy Bragg? If so, how was it for him?
Matthew: Unfortunately our venue got changed and we ended up playing Koko instead of the Electric Ballroom. Al went to see him and said he really enjoyed it but didn't get to meet him.
DW: Your tour is almost at an end, what's next for the band?
Matthew: We're doing some Festivals and hopefully going out to Germany in October with Maximo Park. Other than that, no touring. We're taking some time off to fix our minds and bodies and also to try to write a new record. We've written about 5 songs so far and have a ton of others that are waiting to be finished.
DW: What is the music scene in Liverpool like at the moment – and what other bands from the area can you recommend we check out.
Matthew: We don't spend a lot of time at home. We'll be able to tell you more after we've had some time off to go to gigs. The best band in Liverpool is a band called SSS, they're on Earache records and are totally mind blowing. Although not from Liverpool, the best band we've seen on our travels are a band called Safetyword who are currently on tour with us. They're unbelievably good musicians and their music is amazing.http://moshimoshimusic.com
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