Amelia’s Magazine | An interview with Fairewell and review of debut album Poor, Poor Grendel

Fairewell by Jacqueline Valencia
Fairewell by Jacqueline Valencia.

The debut album from Fairewell starts with the beauteous tones of Grendel, after which the album is named. It’s the soporific sounds of a thousand voices, electronic rustlings gradually underpinning the sampled loops as the whole comes to life before abruptly cutting to the jangly indie pop of Others Of Us. This is a record where seemingly random influences rub shoulders and dance along together in the Faraway World of Fairewell… a fairytale land full of half recognised tunes to lull you towards a beautiful haven. But I’ll let Johnny himself explain what lies behind the dreamy sounds of his first long player.

Fairewell window
Fairewell is Johnny White – where does the quaint sounding name come from? 
I like the word a lot. It’s a reference to the song Farewell, Farewell by Fairport Convention and also I suppose to the song Farewell by Boris. Putting the ‘i’ in it makes it a really long word which I like for some reason or another. 

Fairewell illustration by Laura Ellen Anderson
Fairewell illustration by Laura Ellen Anderson.

Who is the Grendel character after which the album is named? Can you tell us plebs a bit more about him and why you were attracted to him?
Grendel is the monster from the poem Beowulf. I don’t mind admitting, in fact I take great pleasure in stating, that I only really became aware of him because of the cartoon of it that came out a few years ago (the one with Ray Winstone in it). There was something about the way he screamed that made me feel an affinity with him which is hard to explain. I don’t make a huge amount of noise or anything so I’m not sure why the screaming was such a big thing it just sounded really great. Anyhow after watching the film I read the poem and also the John Gardner novel Grendel, which is really amazing and I recommend if you like that sort of thing. It’s John Gardner’s Grendel which was really the thing that inspired the album name. Obviously Grendel is me in some way or another so the ‘poor, poor’ is slightly sarcastic, although I do genuinely like him a lot as a character feel this closeness with him. I don’t really know why, I could give you a different answer every hour on the hour for the next week. I suppose I’ve felt very alone at times, we all do of course, and Grendel is that side of me. Also it’s lamenting the fate of Grendel himself. 

Fairewell_COVER_Jo Coates
Speaking of which, who painted the album cover (featuring yourself as Grendel) and how did you hook up with the artist?
My friend and longtime collaborator Jo Coates did the painting. I just had a vague idea for this image and she brought it to life. I’m very happy with it, it even has my blue coat on!

Fairewell illustration by Calamus Ying Ying Chan
Fairewell illustration by Calamus Ying Ying Chan.

Why did you move down to London from Sheffield, and has it been everything you imagined it to be? 
Sheffield is a lovely place but I also hate it in a way. It’s hard to explain. People in Sheffield can be very smug, especially when it comes to moving to London. I think I was probably like that when I was younger. Obviously Sheffield can get rough but a lot of the city is really nice, I’m from and was born in and around the student bit, Broomhill, which is just lovely, really peaceful and green. Then you move to London and people from round there get funny about it. It’s ridiculous really. I went to the pub with some sheffield people in London last year and they were getting funny because I’d left my card behind the bar (which I’d done as there was a ten pound minimum). They played this part like they were simple god fearing northerners and I was an aristocratic playboy or something. It was just stupid really, it’s just an easy way of feeling a little bit superior to someone for no reason whatsoever – Sheffield seems to induce that inclination. The daftest thing was that I’d been borrowing money off of Wonga.com that morning. Anyhow London’s nice, I like it. I find it relaxing being in a huge place. 

fairewell johnny
Any recommendations for the best hidden places to hang out? You’ve got a bit of an obsession with supermarkets, but where else could we find you?
It’s not really an obsession with supermarkets, I just like them, I don’t see why I have to hate them. I was having a conversation with someone who said they were ‘soulless’. I just don’t see them like that. I like it that they’re the same every time and I like the feeling that I’ve got a clear objective when I’m in them. I like the lights in them. I wouldn’t really miss them if they were wiped out, I’d just go somewhere else. When I sing about supermarkets in the songs it’s also just a device to say ‘I am here, Fairewell exists in real life‘. I’m not saying ‘accept and venerate the mundanity of your existence’ because I don’t think any of it’s mundane, mundane implies I understand it all but half the time I don’t know what’s happening. Like the experience of shopping, I really have no idea what’s happening in my head when I’m shopping. Things are interesting to me. It’s better that way though isn’t it?  Other places you can find me include my flat, Big Red (on Holloway Road), other peoples flats, London’s fashionable east end, etc. I lived in Muswell Hill for a year and I became really attached to that area: I was more towards Wood Green. Wood Green is amazing, if I was ever feeling depressed I’d go down to the high street in Wood Green and feel better. 

Born Under a Bad Sign

Your music has a very dreamy and otherworldly feel not dissimilar to the current flurry of chillwave acts. What type of music inspires you? Do you mind being aligned with this genre, and what are your current favourite contemporary music acts?
I slightly mind, although I’m wary of making too much of a fuss about it that can have an effect like struggling in quicksand and ultimately it doesn’t really matter all that much. That said (!), I don’t think it’s similar to a lot of that stuff. I’ve only heard Washed Out once in my lifetime and that was only after people kept telling me it was similar, I’d never heard of them before. I’m not hugely fussed with most chillwave stuff I hear, although I’m not saying I hate it, I’m just genuinely unaware of it. In terms of musical influences I would say that metal has always been a big influence. Far, far more then anything on the indie spectrum, although I’m aware that that’s where MY music probably falls. That doesn’t seem weird to me, I think it’s better that way. It’s always better to channel one thing into another rather than just rehash something. Something like the Lurker Of Chalice album is a big influence for me. It’s hard to say really. Here’s a way of explaining it. Max Cavalera from Sepultura once said that he had a heavy guitar sound in his head and what he was doing with his music was trying to get to that sound. Well that’s what I’m doing, although with a different sound. I have this thing in my head that encompasses it all: Christmas Carols, Lurker, the score from Candyman, Fairport Convention, Simeon Ten Holt, Heart The Size of A Horse by Black Hearts Procession, all of that plus this imaginary music which I get a feeling about sometimes. When I was a kid I used to really like pushing a standard lamp with my foot because it would come back and I could repeat the action. Then I worked out how to loop things on Windows Sound Recorder, and I knew that there was something about repetition that I liked. So I have always had this kind of pseudo-minimalism in my head but minimalism with romantic harmony, similar to Simeon Ten Holt although more insistent and less pretty. That’s a big influence, trying to reach these points. The other thing is that music is often not the main influence for the music, which sounds odd, although if you just think of music as art then it seems normal. 

In terms of my favourite contemporary bands, I don’t know really. From recently I really liked the Actress album and I bought the Locrian album The Crystal World, which is intense. I am in official unofficial extra member of London (post)punk band Hygiene, so a lot of what I hear is punk although this doesn’t really influence my own stuff. In fact I wrote and recorded the Hygiene christmas single, which hopefully I’ll have to sell at my album launch. Anyhow I’m getting wildly off topic. In summation I don’t really mind about the Chillwave tag it just feels a bit like being told you have a strong accent from a region you’ve never really been to. Randall Dunn (Sunn O))) and Wolves In The Throne Room producer) said that Honey Street sounded like Dennis Wilson, which is possibly the coolest thing anyone’s ever said about my music! 

Fairewell tv
What inspires your lyrics and are there any key subjects that you keep returning to?
The lyrics always happen very quickly. I normally write and record them in one go in a daze/panic. Others Of Us was slightly different, I had that in my head for a long time. I’ve always felt like there was a version of myself that lives on trains and I activate that version when I go on the train. That’s what that’s about, but it’s maybe not a key theme. There aren’t a huge amount of lyrics on the album. Most of them deal with some kind of loneliness, not necessarily a really bad kind. I’ve spent so much time on my own walking through city centres, and that inspires lyrics. And this feeling of magic when I think about being a really young child. I feel like growing up was like coming out of a dream. I was born in the dream, and over the years I slowly woke up and I sometimes think I’ll go back to the dream after death. There’s this bit in Enid Blyton’s The Faraway Tree where they visit some land and it’s by the coast and one of them’s in a bed and the weather’s really hot or something… I don’t really remember the specifics but I have this really powerful feeling that there’s somewhere I can never go back to but that I’m so familiar with that it’s embedded in my senses. That feeling is probably the main inspiration for the songs. How badly am I explaining this on a scale of 9 to 10? 

Born Under a Bad Sign (free download)

Your first live gig is coming up… is that daunting and which bit are you most looking forward to?
Yes it’s daunting. To be perfectly honest I’m so nervous about it that I’d rather not talk about it in case I jinx it. I think it’ll be good though. I’m most looking forward to hearing the songs with an audience in the room. This will be a total first.

Poor, Poor Grendel is released by Sonic Cathedral on 5th December and the album launch party takes place on 6th December at The Shacklewell Arms.

Categories ,Actress, ,Beowulf, ,Big Red, ,Black Hearts Procession, ,Boris, ,Born Under a Bad Sign, ,Broomhill, ,Calamus Ying Ying Chan, ,Candyman, ,Chillwave, ,Dennis Wilson, ,Enid Blyton, ,Fairewell, ,fairport convention, ,Farewell, ,Grendel, ,Heart The Size of A Horse, ,Heavy Metal, ,Holloway Road, ,Honey Street, ,Hygiene, ,Jacqueline Valencia, ,Jo Coates, ,John Gardner, ,Johnny White, ,Laura Ellen Anderson, ,Locrian, ,Max Cavalera, ,Muswell Hill, ,Others Of Us, ,Poor Poor Grendel, ,Post Punk, ,Randall Dunn, ,review, ,Sepultura, ,sheffield, ,Simeon Ten Holt, ,Sonic Cathedral, ,Sunn O))), ,The Crystal World, ,The Faraway Tree, ,The Shacklewell Arms, ,Wolves In The Throne Room, ,Wood Green

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Amelia’s Magazine | Album review and interview with Swedish duo Pallers: The Sea of Memories


Pallers by Shauna McGowan.

The upcoming album from Swedish duo Pallers is a blissed out slice of wonder. The Sea of Memories opens with Another Heaven and indeed listening to this is a license to float away to another place, viagra buy where chilled out beats back dreamy vocals. Lush melodies remain integral even on mini tunes such as Tropical Fishbowl, nurse with pop music a key inspiration for the boys behind the sounds. Wicked, information pills all bleeps and glitches, soon morphs into a super danceable melody with guest female vocals. The Kiss is one of my favourite tracks, tribal beats heralding a story of love and yearning. But to be honest I love the album as a whole. Scandinavian Chillwave, you have me hooked. Let’s meet Henrik Mårtensson and Johan Angergård.

pallers-cover artwork

How did you first meet each other and what do you remember about that day?
Henrik: I was classmate of Karolina, Johan’s girlfriend at that time, this was a long time ago and I don’t have any specific memories from the first encounter. We shared the same taste in music but Johan had tons of records and I didn’t so I borrowed tapes from Karolina that Johan had recorded for her. Lots of Sarah Records stuff and Television Personalities on these tapes…

YouTube Preview ImageThe Kiss

How have your locations over the past few years… across Sweden and the rest of Europe, Miami and South Africa… affected your approach to music making?
Henrik: It has probably inspired us a lot, both the fact that these places are very different and shape your thoughts and impressions alot and also the fact that it is possible to bring a computer and create music everywhere. It’s very comfortable doing music in a hotel room and not have to sit in a studio. After a mellow day in the sun it’s pretty difficult making uptempo breakcore or something like that so I guess the environment affects me.

Pallers by Chris R Wright
Pallers by Chris R Wright.

Your music has been described as ‘shimmering‘ – how is this effect achieved with the use of instrumentation and has it be a conscious decision to achieve it and if so why?
Henrik: I dunno about the specific term ‘shimmering‘ but we try to make our rather monotone music come alive in different ways, for instance by adding sounds that slide in and out of focus. Or using way too many sounds at once. Personally I think the term shimmering is used as soon as there is some reverb and a stereo-delay or an echo involved.
Johan: I always use the word ‘three-dimensional‘ to describe our music. That’s where I’m aiming and that’s what effects the instrumentation I want to use. Most songs have ridiculously many channels and a large amount of effects to create a musical mystical world of it’s own where the sounds surround you and absorb you.

pallers
What inspires you? Are there key themes that you keep returning to in lyrics and if so what are they?
Henrik: Musicwise I get inspired by artists making music that takes me away in my mind and also makes my feet move. Not necessarily dance but to me it’s rather important that there is a nice rhythm. But mostly music doesn’t inspire me that much, I tend to think about it in a more technical way nowadays and that spoils alot of the fun. Nice sceneries and nice daylight inspires me though, the yellow evening light is one of my greatest loves.
Johan: Death and desolation are recurring themes. Death has been a fixation of mine since I was very young. I got rid of some of the less pleasant sides of it a couple of years ago through therapy, but the shadowy, desolate sensation of non-existance still seems to creep into the lyrics. And the music.

Pallers
Pallers
Which of you is the photographer and are you responsible for your press shots? How do you set these up?
Henrik: I am the photographer and responsible for those moody faces that represent Pallers. (see Henrik’s website here) We usually discuss what we want in terms of colors and light; then we take our shirts off and take turns pressing the button on the camera that we’ve put on a tripod.

Pallers_duo
What is your involvement in the world of pop? What do you like most about a great pop tune?
Johan: It’s where I live. I’ve always been fond of melancholia in music, anti-macho expressions and I’ve always loved a great pop melody. For a long time a great pop melody on it’s own could more or less do the trick for me, but now I tend to demand more and more. A great pop tune should be a world of it’s own.

pallers by chloe bonfield
Pallers by Chloe Bonfield.

How do you balance your other commitments with making music with Pallers? Is there ever any conflict and how do you resolve this?
Henrik: There’s a constant conflict for me since I feel a bit bad doing music when I should be working on pictures and also the other way around. But I know at the same time that there is the a reason I like doing both, if I only did music there would eventually be this pressure around it and then creating wouldn’t be as playful as it is now.
Johan: I haven’t really thought of it. Perhaps that means there hasn’t been any conflicts with other commitments?

pallers art
Will we be able to see you in the UK anytime soon? What can we expect from a live show?
Johan: I don’t think we expect a live show at all. I think live shows are terribly overrated.

The Sea of Memories is out on September 28th 2011 on Labrador Records.

Pallers by Caroline Coates
Pallers by Caroline Coates.

Categories ,Another Heaven, ,Caroline Coates, ,Chillwave, ,Chloe Bonfield, ,Chris R Wright, ,Duo, ,Henrik Martensson, ,interview, ,Johan Angergård, ,Labrador, ,Labrador Records, ,Melody, ,Pallers, ,photography, ,pop, ,Revier, ,Sarah Records, ,Scandinavian, ,Shauna McGowan, ,Swedish, ,Television Personalities, ,The Kiss, ,The Sea of Memories, ,Tropical Fishbowl, ,Wicked

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Amelia’s Magazine | Album Review – Chad Valley: Equatorial Ultravox

chad_valley_Equatorial Ultravox

From the teasing synths of opener Now That I’m Real (How Does It Feel?) to the closing wails of Shapeless it is clear that this new super long length EP from Chad Valley is steeped in a deep love for the period when I came of age, check the late 80s and early 90s. His beauteous take on the Chillwave phenomenon pays more than adequate homage to the blissed out Cafe Del Mar style Balearic Beats that I listened to during so many beachtastic student nights on the South Coast. To be clear, order this is no bad thing. Oh the joys of studying in Brighton…

Chad Valley by Lea Rimoux
Chad Valley by Lea Rimoux.

It’s curious, then, to learn from our previous interview with Hugo Manuel that Chad Valley is also inspired by the early 1970s, references which are far less obvious (read: I can’t hear them at all, maybe they’ll surface in future work?)

YouTube Preview ImageNow That I’m Real (How Does It Feel?)

Rose Dagul of Rhosyn provides harmonies on the first track, but from then on in we’re pretty much with Hugo alone – reverb, vocoder and lush atmospherics surrounding his voice with an ethereal ambience as the drumbeats drive us forward. Occasionally the tempo picks up or drops pace but essentially this is an EP best listened to as a whole. Drift away though the beautiful Equatorial Ultravox musical landscape with Chad Valley. It could just be the soundtrack to your summer.

Chad Valley by Amy Brazier
Chad Valley by Amy Brazier.

YouTube Preview ImageAcker Bilk

It seems astonishing that he was only a few songs into the EP when we last spoke with Hugo Manuel back in February. But it’s true, Equatorial Ultravox is out now on Loose Lips in the UK and on Cascine in the US. You can catch Chad Valley live at the awesome Truck Festival – I know I’m looking forward to it. Watch a beautiful remix video of Now That I’m Real from Newdust here.

Categories ,80s, ,90s, ,Acker Bilk, ,Amy Brazier, ,Balearic Beats, ,Blissed Out, ,brighton, ,Cafe Del Mar, ,Cascine, ,Chad Valley, ,Chillwave, ,ep, ,Equatorial Ultravox, ,Hugo Manuel, ,jonquil, ,Lea Rimoux, ,Loose Lips, ,Newdust, ,Now That I’m Real (How Does It Feel?), ,Oxford, ,Remix, ,reverb, ,review, ,Rhosyn, ,Rose Dagul, ,Shapeless, ,Truck Festival, ,vocoder

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Amelia’s Magazine | Review: Dot-to-Dot Festival 2010, Nottingham


Illustration by Yelena Bryksenkova

Animal Bandido are a fashion label with a difference. They’re totally anti-establishment and detest the omniprescent multi-national fashion empires that exploit workers and fabrics, price case and are on a mission to create a renaissance for struggling manufacturers who cannot compete with the big boys.

Their collections range from the vibrant to the downright whacky; weird and wonderful creations which illustrate fruits and other objects make up there range, pharm which includes knitwear, fabulous graphic prints and casual basics with a twist. Viewing their collections draws comparisons to Jean Charles de Castelbajac, nutty nu-raver Carri Mundane and knitwear brand Sibling. I caught up with Zosen and Claudia, aka Animal Bandido, to find out what’s behind this fresh new label…

What made you guys team up and create the street-wear label Animal Bandido?
Claudia: We started to talk about this project in September 2007. I finished studying fashion design a year before that. I was designing my own collections, doing super-limited editions that I sewed on my own.
At the beginning I was sceptical because I had collaborated on projects before, and most of the time it’s very difficult to agree with the ideas of other people. I thought I’d give this one a go because our backgrounds are different, each of us bringing different ideas and ways of working.
Zosen: I printed my designs on t-shirts for years and I collaborated with fashion designers, but I wanted to go forward producing other garments and control the process. Animal Bandido was born to make something in collaboration and use different techniques; Claudia brings her experience with the patterns and fashion design and I with the graphics and design in general.
But, day-to-day, we both take part in every process.


Spring/Summer 2009

What does the label represent for you?
The label represents other way to create pieces and to show our stuff to as many people possible.

Zosen, you are a well known urban artist in Barcelona. What made you move into fashion?
After the zero tolerance law against street art in Barcelona, I decided to use another techniques to spread the word. Using my graphics and colours on clothes, it’s another way to have a presence on the street and give the message to the street’s citizens.
Also, it’s interesting for me to experiment with other media and other people – it’s a great way to learn.


Autumn/Winter 2010

Claudia, tell us more about your background, in fashion?
I studied a degree in Fashion Design in Barcelona and then studied millinery at Central Saint Martins in London, followed by jewellery workshops at Casa Espiral, Barcelona.
I interned with Alberto Tous for his fashion show for Barcelona Fashion Week, and then began designing my own collections and selling them in little shops in Barcelona and Berlin.

What makes you different to big fashion corporations?
Well, there’s only two of us! There are no hierarchies; we work together and are both involved in everything, all the time. We produce everything locally, we pay worthy salaries, and we keep our manufacturing quantities reasonable to avoid waste.


Illustration by Natsuki Otani

Do you think your label is art or fashion led?
Our clothes are fashion, but treated as small pieces of art. We don’t follow the trends or encourage throwaway fashion, as the corporate giants do. We create and manufacture to order (for shops and customers) again to reduce waste.

Do you usually agree on everything? How easy is it to compromise when working as a creative partnership?
Claudia: It depends on the project, normally we just discuss everything thoroughly, allowing both of us to express our point of view. Sometimes Zosen is forced agree with me when we are talking about patterns and shapes or different ways of finishing a garment, but he controls more in graphic and web design!
We always try to be equally satisfied with everything related to the brand.


Autumn/Winter 2010

Do you experiment with anything else apart from clothes?
Zosen: Oh yes! We do many things, the most recent thing being a sculpture to present the new collection, that we installed in our studio to photograph the collection against.
It’s huge and gives so much new life to our studio that we are hoping to relocate it to some public space.
Claudia: Zosen always has a million and one projects on the go: a giant mural for the people on walls in London, an exhibition of customised records in Rome…
Now I’m coming up with a few surprises for September for Animal Bandido.


Illustration by Yuann Shen

What does Animal Bandido support?
We support the national textile industry in Spain, as opposed to the over-production and the exploitation of the third world. We pay people fairly. We’re behind a renaissance of the companies that became obsolete as a result of insurmountable production levels in third world countries; we want to give the possibility of growth to small companies so it’s not just the yucky multinationals that dominate the local market.

What makes Animal Bandido unique?
Our fabrics have our own original and unique designs printed on them. We make no more than 100 items per piece, so they are truly limited edition. When you consider that we now sell in Basel, New York, Barcelona, Madrid, Seville, Zaragoza, Sweden and Nottingham and our pieces are divided between those places, there aren’t many per country.


Autumn/Winter 2010

What’s up next for Animal Bandido?
For the summer we’re launching printed bikinis and swimwear; lightweight hoodies using prints from the collection and a new, retro-inspired one. We’re also looking at launching accessories.

Another year, seek another bank holiday at the start of the summer, sale and another edition of the Dot-to-Dot Festival, sickness a sprawling mess of bands and audience occupying venues and bars in cities up and down the land. This year sees it spread from birthplace Nottingham and second city Bristol to Manchester, taking in three regional centres that, it could be argued, have long lacked massive centrally-located indie festivals to call their own and to ground their musical calendars.

Thanks to a snail-paced jam on the M1 we missed the first band of the day (Frontiers, in Rock City’s main hall) – instead, the day began for us in Rescue Rooms with the lads of The Cheek, who sadly failed to sparkle in the mood of the glorious sun twinkling down outside. Their name may bring to mind something skinny and sharp from the late 70s but the lead singer’s suit certainly didn’t. It looked like he’d borrowed it from his dad. Their poppy punk sound came across like a sort of watered-down Suede, which held my interest for all of ten minutes before I headed out for a wander.

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Trent SU, the second-largest of the venues at the festival, had what seemed to be the most appealing consistency in acts, even if it meant foregoing Blood Red Shoes and Wild Beasts (both bands having appeared at previous editions of the festival, however, and both bands were, inevitably, awesome – also, it illustrates just how frequently Dot-to-Dot manages to pick out the next big bands mere months before they break).

Small Black were gracing the stage as we arrived – hailing from Long Island, they’re something of a blog darling in corners of the web and I can completely see why. Their music is a very carefully crafted pop that bears a resemblance to geographical cousins like Beach Fossils and Memory Tapes, bands that specialise in a kind of laid-back, fuzzy sort of sound. It’s instantly unlike anything specific that you’ll have heard before, but equally, instantly recognisable. The four lads manage to balance melancholy, longing, joy and ecstasy in a way last seen regularly in the films of John Hughes.

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Upstairs in the bar, Islet were going through their usual routine of tearing up the stage. I’ve been an ardent fan of theirs since their lead singer screamed in my face back in March when they supported Los Campesinos! at the Koko in Camden – their bizarre mélange music, all drum circles and hollering and ambient noise and funk grooves and… oh, why bother with a description when I can offer a demonstration:

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Back downstairs, and Washed Out (or, rather, New York resident Ernest Green) has taken to the stage with his tripped-out ambient house and his friends (and geographic neighbours) in Small Black join him, adding extra layers to his sound. The clash with Blood Red Shoes appeared to have left the audience numbers a touch low, but nobody there regretted their decision – there’s something of the madchester in Washed Out’s sound, like a chilled-out evening at the Haçienda (or at least how that would seem in my mind). A case could also be made for saying it sounds like Chicago house played on a tape player with low battery. The results, regardless, are wonderful.

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The second of my 50-50 choices then arrived, as Liars won out over Wild Beasts – but can you blame me? The American art-punk band has doggedly refused to stick to any kind of consistent style, with their latest release, Sisterworld, yet another masterful addition to their discography. Lead singer Angus Andrews cuts a demented figure on stage, strutting and preening like a preaching Mick Jagger – his voice, the drawl of a doorstep drunk at 4am, smitten with violence, joyfully spitting the lyrics to ‘Scissor’ like some kind of mental declaration of war. Proper, proper good.

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It is then, unfortunately, something of a timetabling error to follow this violent display with Beach House, a delicate washed-out band that would have sat much more comfortably next to, well, Washed Out. The audience, still somewhat full of bloodlust, is quickly bored and begins to dissipate, which is a terrible shame considering just how brilliant Victoria Legrand and Alex Scully’s sultry Kate-Bush-meets-a-shoegaze dreamscapes are.

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I’ve written at length about how much I love Los Campesinos!, so for some of you it will be no surprise that I’m going to say that their set headlining at Trent SU was something of a triumph. I’m not being biased here, though, in all honesty – this really was a magnificent performance. The crowd, who all day had looked a little bit sun-frazzled and unable to conjure up much more than the occasional whoop (even during Liars there were visible signs of struggle during the rounds of applause), suddenly sparked into life. Jumping! Singing along! Gareth couldn’t have looked happier, and his usually awful singing was merely average. A definite peak for the day.

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Had to take a quick break here, because at this point it had been something like 8 hours of standing up with neither break nor sustenance – I grabbed some a sandwich in the still-open Lee Rosy’s Tea Room, a wonderful establishment that’s at the heart of Nottingham’s alternative music and arts scene. Somewhat a shame, then, that this year it isn’t hosting the acoustic acts – Primavera Sound, held on the same weekend, appears to have snapped up many of the bands and artists who usually make it here, leaving us with a smaller-than-usual Dot-to-Dot. It is inescapable, too, to note that the festival is far from sold out. Usually leaving a venue for another is something of a risk – in previous years it has been impossible to see the headliners on any stage without waiting through several hours’ worth of bands beforehand. The breathing space is a welcome change, but the lack of people inevitably means that the festival feels less like a party.

Yuck took to the stage of the Bodega after midnight, looking every bit like they’d been enjoying the £3 pints of 7% cider in the bar downstairs for the past few hours. Already something of a convert to their cause, having seen them several times around London over the past few months, I’d been waxing lyrical to friends all day about their brand of borrowed-from-the-90s slacker rock. Their stage banter was a little dry, and their response to a call from an audience member for their closest thing to a hit, ‘Georgia’, was met with a deliberate omission of the song from the setlist, meaning that this was not exactly their most friendly appearance, but nevertheless it proved a decent gig.

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Dot-to-Dot ends with Stealth putting on the last of the shows as the night turns slowly into early morning, and after fighting my way inside for the end of Casiokids’ brittle dance set I realised that my day (and my feet) were done. Another excellent bank holiday weekend festival – despite the smaller crowds and slightly smaller lineup, it’s still proving itself one of the most important festivals in the regions that host it, and it also provides an excellent way of kick-starting the festival season.

Categories ,Alternative, ,Annual, ,beach fossils, ,Beach House, ,Blood Red Shoes, ,bristol, ,casiokids, ,Chillwave, ,Dot to Dot, ,festival, ,Frontiers, ,Indie, ,islet, ,liars, ,Los Campesinos, ,manchester, ,Memory Tapes, ,nottingham, ,punk, ,small black, ,The Cheek, ,Washed Out, ,Wild Beasts, ,yuck

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Amelia’s Magazine | An interview with Fairewell and review of debut album Poor, Poor Grendel

Fairewell by Jacqueline Valencia
Fairewell by Jacqueline Valencia.

The debut album from Fairewell starts with the beauteous tones of Grendel, after which the album is named. It’s the soporific sounds of a thousand voices, electronic rustlings gradually underpinning the sampled loops as the whole comes to life before abruptly cutting to the jangly indie pop of Others Of Us. This is a record where seemingly random influences rub shoulders and dance along together in the Faraway World of Fairewell… a fairytale land full of half recognised tunes to lull you towards a beautiful haven. But I’ll let Johnny himself explain what lies behind the dreamy sounds of his first long player.

Fairewell window
Fairewell is Johnny White – where does the quaint sounding name come from? 
I like the word a lot. It’s a reference to the song Farewell, Farewell by Fairport Convention and also I suppose to the song Farewell by Boris. Putting the ‘i’ in it makes it a really long word which I like for some reason or another. 

Fairewell illustration by Laura Ellen Anderson
Fairewell illustration by Laura Ellen Anderson.

Who is the Grendel character after which the album is named? Can you tell us plebs a bit more about him and why you were attracted to him?
Grendel is the monster from the poem Beowulf. I don’t mind admitting, in fact I take great pleasure in stating, that I only really became aware of him because of the cartoon of it that came out a few years ago (the one with Ray Winstone in it). There was something about the way he screamed that made me feel an affinity with him which is hard to explain. I don’t make a huge amount of noise or anything so I’m not sure why the screaming was such a big thing it just sounded really great. Anyhow after watching the film I read the poem and also the John Gardner novel Grendel, which is really amazing and I recommend if you like that sort of thing. It’s John Gardner’s Grendel which was really the thing that inspired the album name. Obviously Grendel is me in some way or another so the ‘poor, poor’ is slightly sarcastic, although I do genuinely like him a lot as a character feel this closeness with him. I don’t really know why, I could give you a different answer every hour on the hour for the next week. I suppose I’ve felt very alone at times, we all do of course, and Grendel is that side of me. Also it’s lamenting the fate of Grendel himself. 

Fairewell_COVER_Jo Coates
Speaking of which, who painted the album cover (featuring yourself as Grendel) and how did you hook up with the artist?
My friend and longtime collaborator Jo Coates did the painting. I just had a vague idea for this image and she brought it to life. I’m very happy with it, it even has my blue coat on!

Fairewell illustration by Calamus Ying Ying Chan
Fairewell illustration by Calamus Ying Ying Chan.

Why did you move down to London from Sheffield, and has it been everything you imagined it to be? 
Sheffield is a lovely place but I also hate it in a way. It’s hard to explain. People in Sheffield can be very smug, especially when it comes to moving to London. I think I was probably like that when I was younger. Obviously Sheffield can get rough but a lot of the city is really nice, I’m from and was born in and around the student bit, Broomhill, which is just lovely, really peaceful and green. Then you move to London and people from round there get funny about it. It’s ridiculous really. I went to the pub with some sheffield people in London last year and they were getting funny because I’d left my card behind the bar (which I’d done as there was a ten pound minimum). They played this part like they were simple god fearing northerners and I was an aristocratic playboy or something. It was just stupid really, it’s just an easy way of feeling a little bit superior to someone for no reason whatsoever – Sheffield seems to induce that inclination. The daftest thing was that I’d been borrowing money off of Wonga.com that morning. Anyhow London’s nice, I like it. I find it relaxing being in a huge place. 

fairewell johnny
Any recommendations for the best hidden places to hang out? You’ve got a bit of an obsession with supermarkets, but where else could we find you?
It’s not really an obsession with supermarkets, I just like them, I don’t see why I have to hate them. I was having a conversation with someone who said they were ‘soulless’. I just don’t see them like that. I like it that they’re the same every time and I like the feeling that I’ve got a clear objective when I’m in them. I like the lights in them. I wouldn’t really miss them if they were wiped out, I’d just go somewhere else. When I sing about supermarkets in the songs it’s also just a device to say ‘I am here, Fairewell exists in real life‘. I’m not saying ‘accept and venerate the mundanity of your existence’ because I don’t think any of it’s mundane, mundane implies I understand it all but half the time I don’t know what’s happening. Like the experience of shopping, I really have no idea what’s happening in my head when I’m shopping. Things are interesting to me. It’s better that way though isn’t it?  Other places you can find me include my flat, Big Red (on Holloway Road), other peoples flats, London’s fashionable east end, etc. I lived in Muswell Hill for a year and I became really attached to that area: I was more towards Wood Green. Wood Green is amazing, if I was ever feeling depressed I’d go down to the high street in Wood Green and feel better. 

Born Under a Bad Sign

Your music has a very dreamy and otherworldly feel not dissimilar to the current flurry of chillwave acts. What type of music inspires you? Do you mind being aligned with this genre, and what are your current favourite contemporary music acts?
I slightly mind, although I’m wary of making too much of a fuss about it that can have an effect like struggling in quicksand and ultimately it doesn’t really matter all that much. That said (!), I don’t think it’s similar to a lot of that stuff. I’ve only heard Washed Out once in my lifetime and that was only after people kept telling me it was similar, I’d never heard of them before. I’m not hugely fussed with most chillwave stuff I hear, although I’m not saying I hate it, I’m just genuinely unaware of it. In terms of musical influences I would say that metal has always been a big influence. Far, far more then anything on the indie spectrum, although I’m aware that that’s where MY music probably falls. That doesn’t seem weird to me, I think it’s better that way. It’s always better to channel one thing into another rather than just rehash something. Something like the Lurker Of Chalice album is a big influence for me. It’s hard to say really. Here’s a way of explaining it. Max Cavalera from Sepultura once said that he had a heavy guitar sound in his head and what he was doing with his music was trying to get to that sound. Well that’s what I’m doing, although with a different sound. I have this thing in my head that encompasses it all: Christmas Carols, Lurker, the score from Candyman, Fairport Convention, Simeon Ten Holt, Heart The Size of A Horse by Black Hearts Procession, all of that plus this imaginary music which I get a feeling about sometimes. When I was a kid I used to really like pushing a standard lamp with my foot because it would come back and I could repeat the action. Then I worked out how to loop things on Windows Sound Recorder, and I knew that there was something about repetition that I liked. So I have always had this kind of pseudo-minimalism in my head but minimalism with romantic harmony, similar to Simeon Ten Holt although more insistent and less pretty. That’s a big influence, trying to reach these points. The other thing is that music is often not the main influence for the music, which sounds odd, although if you just think of music as art then it seems normal. 

In terms of my favourite contemporary bands, I don’t know really. From recently I really liked the Actress album and I bought the Locrian album The Crystal World, which is intense. I am in official unofficial extra member of London (post)punk band Hygiene, so a lot of what I hear is punk although this doesn’t really influence my own stuff. In fact I wrote and recorded the Hygiene christmas single, which hopefully I’ll have to sell at my album launch. Anyhow I’m getting wildly off topic. In summation I don’t really mind about the Chillwave tag it just feels a bit like being told you have a strong accent from a region you’ve never really been to. Randall Dunn (Sunn O))) and Wolves In The Throne Room producer) said that Honey Street sounded like Dennis Wilson, which is possibly the coolest thing anyone’s ever said about my music! 

Fairewell tv
What inspires your lyrics and are there any key subjects that you keep returning to?
The lyrics always happen very quickly. I normally write and record them in one go in a daze/panic. Others Of Us was slightly different, I had that in my head for a long time. I’ve always felt like there was a version of myself that lives on trains and I activate that version when I go on the train. That’s what that’s about, but it’s maybe not a key theme. There aren’t a huge amount of lyrics on the album. Most of them deal with some kind of loneliness, not necessarily a really bad kind. I’ve spent so much time on my own walking through city centres, and that inspires lyrics. And this feeling of magic when I think about being a really young child. I feel like growing up was like coming out of a dream. I was born in the dream, and over the years I slowly woke up and I sometimes think I’ll go back to the dream after death. There’s this bit in Enid Blyton’s The Faraway Tree where they visit some land and it’s by the coast and one of them’s in a bed and the weather’s really hot or something… I don’t really remember the specifics but I have this really powerful feeling that there’s somewhere I can never go back to but that I’m so familiar with that it’s embedded in my senses. That feeling is probably the main inspiration for the songs. How badly am I explaining this on a scale of 9 to 10? 

Born Under a Bad Sign (free download)

Your first live gig is coming up… is that daunting and which bit are you most looking forward to?
Yes it’s daunting. To be perfectly honest I’m so nervous about it that I’d rather not talk about it in case I jinx it. I think it’ll be good though. I’m most looking forward to hearing the songs with an audience in the room. This will be a total first.

Poor, Poor Grendel is released by Sonic Cathedral on 5th December and the album launch party takes place on 6th December at The Shacklewell Arms.

Categories ,Actress, ,Beowulf, ,Big Red, ,Black Hearts Procession, ,Boris, ,Born Under a Bad Sign, ,Broomhill, ,Calamus Ying Ying Chan, ,Candyman, ,Chillwave, ,Dennis Wilson, ,Enid Blyton, ,Fairewell, ,fairport convention, ,Farewell, ,Grendel, ,Heart The Size of A Horse, ,Heavy Metal, ,Holloway Road, ,Honey Street, ,Hygiene, ,Jacqueline Valencia, ,Jo Coates, ,John Gardner, ,Johnny White, ,Laura Ellen Anderson, ,Locrian, ,Max Cavalera, ,Muswell Hill, ,Others Of Us, ,Poor Poor Grendel, ,Post Punk, ,Randall Dunn, ,review, ,Sepultura, ,sheffield, ,Simeon Ten Holt, ,Sonic Cathedral, ,Sunn O))), ,The Crystal World, ,The Faraway Tree, ,The Shacklewell Arms, ,Wolves In The Throne Room, ,Wood Green

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Amelia’s Magazine | An interview with Terracotta Blue: talking new album Takoma Park

TERRACOTTA-BLUE-HEALER-BY-GEO-LAW
Healer by Terracotta Blue. Illustration by Geo Law.

From the enigmatic thump of Arcade to the Japanese inflected strings of Healer, murmuring beats of Lake Autumn and blissed out vocals of White Cloud, Terracotta Blue impresses with new album Takoma Park. Read on to find out more about the enigmatic Jay…

Arcade

Who is Terracotta Blue, and what does the project encompass? I understand that Terracotta Blue is just one of 5 aliases – what else do you do?


I would say that Terracotta Blue is an outlet for my more melancholy, electro-inspired endeavours. And there’s absolutely no back story or special meaning to the name; I just thought it sounded cool! 

I dabble in all sorts of genres – essentially anything that has alot of samples, synths, and hard drums. Yes, I release music under four other aliases (which includes Electronic Dance Music and hip-hop), but I’ll keep that under wraps… at least for now. I can say with certainty is Terracotta Blue is not a side project of any popular superproducer/DJ. I’m just a guy trying to make a living off of his music like countless others out there. The anonymity thing just adds to the mystique.


Terracotta Blue by Gareth A Hopkins
Terracotta Blue by Gareth A Hopkins.

You’ve drawn comparisons to the oh so trendy chillwave trend as well as ambient, synth-pop and hip hop, what do you think best describes your music?
I’m a fan and listener of everything you just listed, but I would say that hip-hop is the one constant that ties everything together. From the use of sampling to the grittiness you hear in many of my tracks, the hip-hop influence is undeniable. I’m also fascinated by the inherent freedom electronic music allows me, in all its forms. So I’d best describe my music as sample-based, hiphop-tinged, electro chill music. Hopefully people will just regard it as good music.

Healer

Terracotta Blue - Healer by Rukmunal Hakim
Terracotta Blue – Healer by Rukmunal Hakim.


How did you get into music, and where did you learn how to play?
I played the saxophone and trumpet in the 4th and 5th grades, respectively. But it wasn’t until I tape recorded myself playing on this Radio Shack keyboard that I became truly fascinated by the synthesis of sounds. I eventually started experimenting by pause-mixing beats on karaoke machines and then recording drums machines and samples on 4-track recorders. I bought my first ‘real’ piece of equipment—the MPC2000XL—in 2000. Then in 2005 I was introduced to Reason and FL Studio software—I’ve used the same programs ever since.


Terracotta Blue - Takoma Park cover
What inspired the creation of new album Takoma Park? What were you doing at the time, and what subjects and ideas suffuse the songs?


My music reflects the changing of the seasons, and it’s been like that for as far back as I can remember. I’m thankful to be living in an area of the states where there’s so much contrast between the seasons. Takoma Park was definitely inspired by the sights and sounds of my favorite time of the year—autumn. There was nothing particularly interesting happening in my life during the making of that album; I just wanted to present the sounds I was hearing in my head at the time.

Lake Autumn

Terracotta Blue_Equinox by Jacqueline Valencia
Terracotta Blue – Equinox by Jacqueline Valencia.

Where did you grow up and where do you live now? What have your roots brought to your music?
I grew up right outside of Washington, D.C., in Silver Spring, Maryland—that’s where I live now. D.C. is known for its percussion-heavy funk music called go-go, but I was honestly never really into it growing up. I was that kid sitting quietly in the corner bobbing his head with big headphones on and a backpack full of hip-hop cassettes and CDs.

terracotta blue Arcade Healing3
What next for Terracotta Blue? Any special releases or free downloads that you would like to share with my readers? Have you thought about how to get your music on itunes?
I just released my new single Arcade b/w Healer, available for free download on my bandcamp page, where you’ll also find One Million Sunsets and Takoma Park. I’ll probably release another free EP in the spring and aim for an iTunes full length release in late summer, early autumn. I would also love to collaborate with more artists in the near future, so hopefully I can make that happen in 2012!

White Cloud

Categories ,Arcade b/w Healer, ,Chillwave, ,Electronic Dance Music, ,FL Studio, ,Gareth A Hopkins, ,Geo Law, ,Healer, ,Hip-hop, ,interview, ,Jacqueline Valencia, ,Lake Autumn, ,Maryland, ,MPC2000XL, ,One Million Sunsets, ,Radio Shack, ,Reason, ,Rukmunal Hakim, ,Silver Spring, ,Takoma Park, ,Terracotta Blue, ,White Cloud

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