When I was a kid, growing up in a house with Cat Stevens, Neil Diamond, and Simon and Garfunkel, the first time I ever heard Kiss's "Detroit Rock City," it was a moment of musical epiphany. It was just so vicious, aggressive and mean. It changed the way I listened to music. I've had a few minor epiphany's since then, when you come across a band that just brings something new and revolutionary to your ears.
What have been your musical epiphany moments?
All music is new music if you haven’t heard it before: That chord on the front of A Hard Day’s Night, the bass in The Who’s The Real Me, the first time I heard Throwing Muses properly; their The Real Ramona LP I just thought ‘Wow; all those textures pulling in different directions’, John Peel playing PJ Harvey’s first single… I like music that has its own voice. Things that stand out and make you notice them.
Talk to us about the song-writing process for you. What comes first, the idea? A riff? The lyrics? How does it all fall into place?
I always start with the lyrics, let them form their own rhythms and once I’ve got a section verse/chorus/whichever I work from syllable count to match it up. Pretty much always I’ll already have the idea/sense of what I’m trying to say informally fairly well worked out. I find a bunch of chords that feel right for the song and demo it, sometimes in layered detail, sometimes just a single guitar & voice & take it to rehearsal, play through it, break it into sections and we work on it. The songs often change with the others input because we all listen to each other’s playing and respond. It becomes organically grown, and never stops evolving. What we record is more ‘how we did it today’ not a set in stone definitive thing. Music needs to live which involves change.
Who has influenced you the most?
There is a lot of Who in how I play guitar, but not necessarily what I play, the flow and structure of what we do probably comes from classical music and jazz, Beethoven was the first music I really tuned in to (LONG AGO before there even was punk…) artists on the German ECM jazz label too, its in there but not necessarily visible. It was Small Faces and The Chords that made me want to first pick up a guitar, not to sound like them but to actually play. They both had a definite and infectious vigour and zing in everything they did.
Where do you look for continuing inspiration? New ideas, new motivation?
I don’t need to look far, there is plenty out there that NEEDS to be written about and I need to write so… I keep notes in an actual book and that fills up with ideas, phrases, crazy rhymes, the odd sketch or diagram, whatever it happens to be and I let it all percolate in the subconscious. The actual writing tends to be in batches often with two or more in a day when they’re distilled and ready to come out. The odd one will be ‘instant’ lightbulb idea moments, but with most it is pre-processed.
We're all a product of our environment. Tell us about the band's hometown and how that reflects in the music?
Manchester. I’ve lived here since ’85 and nearby for another ten years before that; climate change has affected it. It isn’t the “rain grey town known for its sound” anymore, if the Industrial Revolution was happening now the cotton mills would all be somewhere else, its way drier than it used to be. There is a shadow of musical heritage over the city; Buzzcocks/Joy Division/Smiths/Stone Roses/Madchester/Oasis the same way Liverpool is corporatised around The Beatles, lazy! Aside from the copyist ‘wanna be my hero’ bands there is as still a really creative and diverse music underground here, I don’t think there is a ‘Manchester Sound’, at its best it is about individuality and standing out from the crowd. For the last three hundred years or so Manchester does seem to attract people that have their own ideas.
Long ago I was playing a really fast piece and looking at the amp, it struck me that how ever fast or slow you play the sound still travels at the same speed. All music is at the speed of sound.
You have one chance, what movie are you going to write the soundtrack for?
‘Checkpoint Charlie’ is the theme music to an imaginary cold war spy thriller, so if someone wanted to make that then the job is already done! But… there’s a lot of science fiction in the new album (it is spread thinner in the back catalogue but still there) and I’ve been listening to a lot of 60’s French psychedelia lately so… ‘Barbarella’?
You now write for a music publication (The Ripple Effect?). You're going to write a 1,000 word essay on one song. Which would it be and why?
I take it you don’t want an actual 1000 words now? Always have a reserve for the editor in case someone else has already done choice No.1 - Something truly groundbreaking like The Kinks ‘You Really Got Me’? Or something opaque and wordy like Cockney Rebel’s ‘Sebastien’? Or something that is already an essay like The Chords ‘The British Way Of Life’?
Come on, share with us a couple of your great, Spinal Tap, rock and roll moments?
I was being interviewed for the Manchester Fringe Festival YouTube channel and they asked about why we’d done the album on vinyl and I got myself into a pure Nigel Tufnel sequence about it being bigger, so the artwork is being bigger and easier to see because its bigger… ludicrously understated as all the best Tap moments are… it is still there online as far as I know. Nearly missing a soundcheck because a toilet door got stuck is up there too.
Tell us about playing live and the live experience for you and for your fans?
We like playing music, scales, practice, rehearsal, recording, live - we like it all. Performance is different from recording but rehearsal is a performance with no audience so pretty similar. Any chance to play the music is a chance to explore it again and see what it holds, we’re not a recital band. It is not the same every time we play it. Instrumental passages are improvised - not jammed! We have structure and shape!
We’ve never played the same set twice. Ever. In 32 years. There is always something different. We have to make it interesting. We’re fortunate in having a big sack of good songs to select from and every now and then we’ll throw a cover into the set, but we know we’re better at playing our own stuff than other peoples music. Most of the gigs we’ve played are decent length too, not just a 20 minute slot. So what people get when we play live is generally an hour or more of a unique event with a fair amount of harmony and melody to add to the energy. People say we float and crunch at the same time and different people said (after the same gig) that we sounded like The Stranglers and Jefferson Airplane. How can they both be right? There’s only one way to find out…
What makes a great song?
It has to grab you, but not just with energy; it has to be interesting! Sometimes a slow long one can out-kick a pogo-monster. Lyrics are important but it is all about sound and feel, which is why some songs work with a specific singer but not with others.
Dang! I listen to so much music… I like musicians I can learn from and I like freedom to explore, so if I read that as who would I most like to have played with? Voice-wise Etta James, Duty Springfield, musicians; guitar wise there’d not be space for another but switching to bass to play with Hendrix would probably have been an education, or Joni… and jazz… Miles Davis… yes… a Miles Davis album with Dusty please or the Herbie Hancock album with Joni Mitchell (seeing as that actually exists)
What piece of your music are particularly proud of?
I really like the chord sequence and voicing in 'The Changes’, it spirals down into oblivion and then takes off again, and there’s one on the new album called ‘Virtual Reality Part 2’ (spoiler alert!) where none of the verses have the same chords and each line in each verse is a different sequence, I really like the subtlety of that - as a casual listener it probably doesn’t show other than a mild sense that something is shifting all the time but yes that makes me think ‘nice job that!’
Who today, writes great songs? Who just kicks your ass? Why?
I really don’t listen to major label stuff, I’m not in places where it gets played and avoid commercial radio like its toxic so I’m not the best person to ask about that; however, aside from making music myself I also host a weekly radio show (Tuning Up on Mad Wasp Radio) best albums I’ve hear this year (so far!) include The Electric Stars, The Jujubes, Madysin Whajne, Sometimes Julie, Turner, they all sound individual they have retro elements but it is Their Sound. As for older stuff Joni Mitchell, Kristen Hersh, The Chords/Chords UK - they have a new one out in autumn which I’m looking forward to.
I really don’t understand why people expect the major labels to release interesting music. They won’t anymore. You have to look elsewhere to find it.
There’s four years of the radio show on Mixcloud and still growing every week so search and you’ll find it.
Vinyl, CD, or digital? What's your format of choice?
Vinyl for me please. Having said that what I like about CDs is you can actually have a CD player in every room of the house, that’s not very practical with a record player plus they’re good for when you have a long task to do and don’t want to have to get up every 19 minutes and 20 seconds or whatever. Digital has its place too, often because international postage is so ridiculously expensive and can be unreliable. Streaming should be for discovery/trying stuff out before buying it only. Renting your music is just plain wrong. It is like renting your lifestyle. It devalues it and makes stuff disposable and of course they pay artists a fraction of a pittance, the streamers value their ‘service’ way more than the music. Any pay works out like someone going into a supermarket and buying a can of beans but being charged for cat food and a sack of potatoes as well, with them taking the money instead of it all going to the peas. It makes no sense at all.
Whiskey or beer? And defend your choice
Whisky (Scotch); it’s more of an ‘experience’ than beer; the sensory sequence running through appearance, nose, palate and finish. I just wish they’d put more in the glass (so out doesn’t look empty before I’ve even had any) and not charge so much for it in bars.
We, at the Ripple Effect, are constantly looking for new music. What's your home town, and when we get there, what's the best record store to lose ourselves in?
Manchester UK still has some very good independent record shops! Outside the centre to the South there’s King Bee in Chorlton, Wilderness Records in Withington and Mr Sifter in Burnage, in the middle there’s Clampdown Records, Vinyl Resting Place and Vinyl Revival (all three of which stock The Speed Of Sound) plus Vinyl Exchange and Piccadilly Records. All are well worth a visit.
The new album is at the pressing plant as we speak release is in the autumn, the test pressings sound brilliant and we’re really looking forward to putting that out.
And then… until the pandemic interrupted everything we were already working on the one after that. We really want to get back to pushing the new songs into shape, there are another 24 at various work-in-progress stages with five that were already pretty much ready to record. It’s frustrating but it is what it is.
Any final comments or thoughts you'd like to share with our readers, the waveriders?
Thanks for letting me drop some pebbles in the pool! It’s good to chat. Hopefully see you out there when ‘this’ (insert grand operatic gesture) is all over; but meanwhile come and hang out on the internet. Thanks for being interested!
Website: thespeedofsounduk.com
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Bandcamp https://thespeedofsound.bandcamp.com
Apple Music
https://music.apple.com/gb/artist/the-speed-of-sound/380493172
Spotify
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