Ben
you mentioned about the band growing, would you say that 'Wild
Things'
is a sign of the band's growth?
"We certainly saw this album as a fresh start because we
learnt so much from the first two albums. 'The Wild Things',
charted terribly, going nowhere where anyone thought it would
go. There was a problem with distribution, with loads of column
inches given to new bands like ourselves who have been nominated
for the Mercury Prize, which people much preferred to write
about. Music journalism is all about the new buzz on the street
and if you're a band who has been around for three and a half
years whose releasing their third record, it can't
be a press lead project. We have struggled; the gigs are really
what are driving us now. We've made a brilliant record and now
we're doing the gigs which are getting better and better. I
just want to play gigs and have people going way thinking 'that
was brilliant'. We just work hard. We're not trying to be brand
new and mind blowing to anyone. We just want to do what we love
doing. I think you can't argue with that and we're just doing
it as sincerely as we can. The press are letting us be who we
are more than they used to. Before we had loads of labels thrown
at us, you know 'Jeff Buckley meets an acoustic guitar shop'.
That's fine but now they're referring to us as a going concern,
which has already got momentum, which needs to be treated as
something individual, which is brilliant. However because of
that most are feeling sorry for us wondering why we haven't
had the success that Turin Brakes & David Gray has had."
"It's because we arrived too early," announces Jason
"we prematurely ejaculated didn't we? 1999 - 'Hello', 2000
- 'Emoticons'. Also in 2000 - Tom Macrae's album, the Kings
of Convenience, Kathryn's 'Copper Black Music' and everyone's
going "acoustic music great" and you get this Roadworks
tour but we go (gestures trying to get people's attention)...
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