The Wombats talk "Beautiful People Will Ruin Your Life"
Since the English rock band, The Wombats, formed in Liverpool over a decade ago, they’ve sold over a million copies of their albums worldwide. Last week, they returned to Toronto to headline a show at the Danforth Music Hall, as they came to the North American end of their World Tour. I caught up with the boys after soundcheck to ask them some anticipated questions about their new album, just before they flew out to their moniker’s native land down under.
Amanda Tabone, Dan Haggis, Tord Øverland Knudsen, Danforth Music Hall, 10/27/18.
A: How’s it going?!
T: It’s going good, just coming to the end of a 5 week tour in the States and Canada!
A: That's great! Have you guys been to Toronto much before?
T: Yeah it was the first place we played outside of Europe.
D: We did North by North East in 2006. This was before we were signed or released any music. Yeah we just sent demos off to it and we got accepted to do some shows and then we won this songwriting charity fun thing to help young musicians in the UK, and we just spunked all the money coming here and having a great time.
T: We played the Cameron house if you know that.
A: Oh yeah of course, the Cameron house! Legendary
T: Yeah just in the back room there. And the Drake Hotel later and then we did another venue I can’t remember the name of it
A: So have you experienced a real Canadian winter then?
D: Well yeah that was it! It was freezing cold.
T: And I’m used to it because of the Norwegian climate or whatever. Well to be honest you don’t really get used to that kind of climate. It’s just cold, It’s nasty for anyone really.
D: Fucking hell last night we played in Montreal and there was a guy from Nova Scotia who had driven 12 hours to see us and he was wearing shorts and a T-shirt.
A: Okay so he’s crazy.
D: Yeah he wasn’t even shivering, it’s like, mate! He was like, oh yeah you know, Nova Scotia, just get on with it.
A: Canadians are a different species. So you’re from Liverpool or you just went to school there?
D: Yeah I’m from Liverpool yeah.
A: So how do you guys continue with the songwriting process when you guys all live in different countries?
D: We did it for the second and third albums a little bit.
T: Yeah apart from the first album we’ve always lived in separate cities.
D: But we spend so much time travelling it’s kind of good. When you’re back home and you kind of want to do music you can just do that on your own, and it’s so easy to send ideas to each other with the internet. Also having made so many songs together it’s actually nice sometimes to try and deliberately spice up the writing process. It’s like okay we haven’t seen each other for a few months let’s just go in and we’re not leaving until we make a song.
A: Yeah I like that, kind of puts the pressure on. So how would you guys say this album differentiates from your previous work? Like you guys have been together for over a decade!
D: Haha yeah 15 years basically!
T: It’s pretty ridiculous really.
A: Yeah really, even just your own personal growth.
D: Yeah I mean each album can’t help but reflect where you are at your life at that time, whether lyrically, with Murph being married now, or musically. And you know, musically you’re constantly taking influences from other areas.
T: Yeah listening back to the first album, and even the second album, everything’s just much faster, all the tempos, they’re like almost ADHD, super excited, and then everything now is kind of like, we’ve got songs that are fast but they’re much more like,
A: Mature?
T: yeah exactly! Even just from the tempo, it feels much more mature in a way.
D: If you compare it to when we first started, the first 5 years of the band we were all like, students gettin’ pissed all the time, just partying like you know, it’s that kind of pace of life that you have. You’re kind of just so hungry for everything, that burning energy.
T: Yeah like we WERE that excited.
D: It was almost the case of you know, we were trying to slow down sometimes because we’d start playing together and it was really punk and kinda just ahhh. And most gigs we had probably been drinkin’ and everything would just be a bit out of control, whereas when you get older you can't keep doing that. And you don't really want to, it just kind of mellows out a little bit.
A: Ah so no partying for Halloween this weekend! Cause I’m even realizing myself that I don’t want to do any of that anymore. People are asking me my costume and i'm like, my costume is my pyjamas because I'm going to bed early.
T: Haha yes!
D: I like that. In the UK its more of a kids thing really.
A: Oh really, because here’s it's like, party for sure.
D: Oh I know, we’re playing New York on the 30th, so we're going to do like, fancy dress, because when in Rome and all that.
A: Do you guys enjoy the same style of music? I'm always curious with bands of multiple musicians if you guys have different genres of music you enjoy and bring to the table? Like we were just saying the past 10 years my music preference has changed drastically.
D: That's interesting. Yeah I think all of us, like we have enough overlapping stuff, if you were to draw three circles there's enough of an area that overlaps. Like heavy riffing, Smashing Pumpkins, Weezer and Nirvana.
T: We grew up in the 90's so there's a lot of that. That kind of influence is there whether you hear it or not.
D: Old Beatles, Beach Boys, Niel Young. There's lots of older classic stuff. But then it's also like Motorpsycho, like this Norwegian band style.
T: I had loads of Scandinavian influence, but they were influenced by, you know, American music.
A: Kinda full circle.
T: Yeah it all kind of interlinks. And we can listen to electronic music, all three of us, at some sort of level.
D: I started off playing piano and flutes and he was playing cello and Murph did classical guitar. I feel like as musicians we play multiple instruments and like all different sides of the recording/writing process. But obviously I'm sure sometimes each of us without realizing it, pull a sound in a slightly different direction because you want it to be slightly heavier or whatever, or maybe I want it to rock on the drums.
T: Or it can reflect on something that you just listened to or inspired you or whatever. And that can really change, well sometimes it's physical restrictions that can make it sound like, talking about Pink Lemonade, Pink lemonade on the third album. Dan ran a half marathon just a couple of days before and couldn't play drums because his legs were fucked. So the sound for that one is more electric. So the whole reason for that wasn't because we necessarily wanted it, but it ended up being that we couldn't record live drums on it and it worked out so well.
A: That's really interesting, I've always liked that song a lot.
D: Yeah that's the thing we've been really happy with how it ended up as well.
A: You should run more marathons.
D: Hahah yeah! But that's also what's really cool with music, having that creative freedom or being like chilled with stuff and just going like, this is how it is. It doesn't matter. We don't have this like set idea that we have to be like this or that, you know? And often songs that we think maybe, like Greek Tragedy, when we had the music for that to start with we were like "oh I don't think this is going to be a Wombats song". We even played it to Murph and he was like "oh that's really cool, we should do something with that".
A: Greek Tragedy is one my favourites, because of the drumming especially, so i'm glad you brought that up.
T: haha yeah, it's that feel, it's that rhythm at the beginning.
A: 100%! so powerful.
D: That's the thing, we had that beginning and we had it for like 6 months and then played it to Murph because we were always thinking it could've been like an Eminem song, you know? Like a rapper on it.
A: Ah would you ever collab with a rapper? Get a little Cardi B?
T: Haha, if it was the right setting, right rapper, maybe.
D: I hate it when it's 'featured', just trying to sell more copies. I feel like there was a period when every single like top 10 song was "featuring" some big name.
T: That happens still like all the time.
D: Yeah because you can see that in a record company going like "hmm we can combine all our fans with their fans from a different genre - double harmony we sell! Great!"
So I do this but i'm also a high school music teacher, and i'm just curious, I always ask the bands I interview, did you guys take music in high school? Well I'm sure you did because you went to university for music, but do you feel like taking music in high school was something that helped flourish your passion? Or maybe deterred it?
T: Yeah, I did for the last 3 years of school, it was like a music directed school. I had to live away from home to go to it. It was a focus on music and you had to sing in a choir, conduct, learn about the baroque, you know? Some of it was fun and some of it was like eh.
A: So hard to keep it relevant.
T: Yeah it was quite conservative, very classic or jazz oriented. Well the only rock band that people rated was like Toto, but I wanted to listen to alternative rock, and that was frowned upon a little bit. I think it's good to have that kind of like, foundation, to know how you don't want to make music as well. Like sometimes you need to go there to try things and realize what you don't want to do as well.
A: Did you always know you wanted to pursue music?
T: Yeah, from a young age. From the moment I started playing bass, which was 12 probably. I did actually say this, real cringey or whatever, but I was only 12 but you know, "I'm going to be a Rockstar".
A: Haha yes!
T: Haha I did say that, it's just a stupid little thing, just a really ridiculous idea.
A: Well you are one.
T: Ah well maybe the closest to that version of, you know, what I wanted; to play music full time.
A: Dan have you always known too?
D: Yeah but I wouldn't say that it was school that helped me. Especially in the UK, it's really not great at all. I mean maybe it kind of depends on the school, but I spoke to Janice about this recently on BBC Radio and it was like, I just think they should be so much more focused on Music and the Arts and stuff in general. It should be so much more encouraged and it shouldn't fall to the parents to have the money to be able to pay for private lessons. Every kid should have the opportunity from a young age to try music. Like, it should be a part of playtime, you know?!
A: Totally agree.
D: I know it kind of is, you might get a little recorder or whatever, but i'm talkin' like structured playtime that they can just develop the Arts more and more. And everyone should get free lessons. Well, not even if they want them, they should just have to do it, like doing Maths. When I got to six or seven I started having flute lessons and I played flute in the Little Training Orchestra, and then I went into the main orchestra, and I always think that just instilled in me a love for playing music with other humans. Like just in a room that sounded like being a part of something that, you know, from stationary objects, we make this sound together, and I always loved that.
A: Now you're doing that!
D: Exactly. Now this excitement of doing a concert and that feeling of people watching and enjoying... like I remember always just loving that feeling. And then I think when I started getting into rock, so Dave Grohl, playing Nirvana, Smells Like Teen Spirit, and I was just like, oh my god. I don't know why I just went like, THAT's what I want to do. Of all the instruments I was just like, fuck yeah! And I just started pestering my parents to get a drum kit, started playing drums in the orchestra and then the rest is history. But it was nothing to do with school. I didn't do music GCSE, didn't do music A level. LIPA, the music school we went to, was quite conservative and I think there's a real big gap that needs to be for people who aren't necessarily that into the theory and all that kind of stuff. Because there are a lot of people who maybe academically with music aren't that great. I mean I could do it but it didn't inspire me, it almost put me off it.
A: Exactly, and that's the opposite of what it should be doing. So what advice would you give young students that want to follow in your footsteps? Because I do have students that say, like you when you were 12, I want to be a Rockstar! Would you say go for it? or not so much?
T: Haha, no you just need to like, if you love playing music and making music you should just continue doing that really. And get out there get some gigs, just try and get comfortable with being on the stage. Like we did so many shows where we played for nobody, in Liverpool we started playing around all the cities and towns and there was nobody there, but like that was basically how we crafted and delt with things. There was a point where we could deal with anything they'd throw at you.
D: ...Literally, a bottle.
T: Yeah, seriously. You just get on with it. So that's the kind of attitude you need to have, you need to be able to have there's a slightly thicker skin.
D: You've got so make sure you're doing it for you.
T: And not for the fame, not "to be a Rockstar". I mean you're allowed to dream, of course I'm not going to say don't do that, but it needs to be something that you want to do regardless of whether it does well or not because it needs to be something that you love.
A: For sure. The right reasons.
D: And even if you're not signed, you've just gotta make the music.
T: And then that doesn't mean that it's not good. That's also important because even we, like there was three years, basically of just no's no's, no's, or just no reply at all, which is even worse. And for quite a lot of that time we were playing like "Moving to New York" or "Lost in the Post", like loads of the songs that ended up on the first album. And we'd been playing those for those years, you know. It took a while for us to actually get picked up. It just takes one little radio DJ here that plays it, and then you go, oh. Or someone from LA goes oh hang on, like they think it's gonna make it, it's a lottery really.
A: So true.
T: You can do all sorts, whether it's like live videos or you know, just putting music on Spotify and everything
D: I'd just say keep practicing and keep writing and recording. And trying to get together with like minded people who want to play music and just see where you go. Have fun. Like there's nothing better than like hanging out with your mates, making some music. Even if you make just one rep for an hour, it's fucking great.
Catch the Wombats on tour in Europe and Australia: http://thewombats.co.uk/ Listen to their new album on Spotify and Apple Music: https://open.spotify.com/album/4kUbTSoTsbKP5MRdYMDBx1 https://itunes.apple.com/ca/album/beautiful-people-will-ruin-your-life/1298624249
Photographs by Shannon Tabone:
