Von Shakes Interview 12/04/11

Von Shakes were the most recent band to take part in the SU Sessions at NUIG. I caught up with them afterwards and asked them a few questions J

 First off, the name of the band – Where did that come from?

Paddy: We actually always get this question. One morning after a gig we weren’t feeling the best having breakfast, we all had the shakes from the night out and we thought ‘The Shakes’ would be a good name, but then we thought there are so many bands with ‘the’ like The Strokes, The Thrills, and then Masty (Aaron) said why don’t we put ‘Von’ in front and we said yeah. No big mystery to it! Mind you, we’d been struggling with a name for a year.

Hugh: And we weren’t even sure of it but then one of our friends who is pretty big in Germany offered us a chance to come over and play a gig with him and when we saw the name on the site, ‘Von Shakes’ we thought it looked really cool. It’s stuck ever since!

You’re all from Dublin. How did the band get started in the first place?

Hugh: We all went to the same school. The two lads (Paddy and Aaron) were the year ahead of us (Hugh and Killian).

Killian: We started jamming when we were younger.

Hugh: Then we all finished school and we’ve been serious for the last two years or so.

Do you all come from musical backgrounds?

Killian: I think so yeah. All the classics, The Eagles and Hendrix and everyone were kind of bred into us when we were kids, and we kind of moved on from there. All our parents would have played an instrument at some stage as well.

Paddy: Yeah, it’s the same with myself, and Masty’s dad was a drummer.

Aaron: Yeah, I stole his drum kit and there we go. The rest is history!

Paddy: My mum is a singer as well so that’s where we get it from.

Hugh: His uncle is also our manager; he used to be in a big band back in the eighties, toured with U2 and stuff.

Paddy: Google him. He’s still bigger than we are! 20 years later.

And since you’ve started the band, where has been the best place you’ve played?

Unison: Galway! Obviously!

Paddy: All of them.

Hugh: The best venue in my opinion is The Academy up in Dublin. I love playing that.

Killian: We played in Russia a bit and it is absolutely nuts over there, the people are absolutely crazy.

Getting gigs in Ireland – Easy or hard?

Aaron: Easy to get gigs, hard to get good ones!

Killian: Yeah, there are so many gigs and so many bands going around but to get good slots is tough.

Hugh: Last year when we had the album out we did something like fifty gigs, and about thirty to thirty-five of them were absolutely shite. Then there were some that were absolutely unbelievable and a few in-between that were great as well. This year then we’re kind of picking and choosing much better. We’ve done a lot of good gigs.

Killian: At the start, it was any way to get our name out there and now its stop doing shit gigs basically!

That album, ‘The Routine’ was released last year.

Paddy: Yeah, this time last year.

And do you have anything new coming up?

Killian: We just released the single last Wednesday, ‘My Side’. It’s on iTunes, and it’s a completely new direction.

Paddy: Not a completely new direction but we’ve kind of honed in on a certain area because the album was a load of different influences.

Hugh: A scattered album! Our new set now is kind of a little more to the point.

Killian: It’s gone triple platinum in a week so you can’t complain!

Hugh: It’s got more of a distinct sound to it we think anyway so hopefully everybody else thinks the same.

How did you find the whole process of being in a studio recording?

Hugh: I found there was a lot of sleeping going on. That couch!

Killian: Yeah, we were spending maybe twelve to fourteen hours a day in the studio sometimes.

Paddy: I found it kind of stressful, it’s expensive, and we tried to rush an album in two weeks and kind of felt that time was always limited. That was always in the back of my mind.

Hugh: We had to make sure to get this certain part done on this day and we were compromising you know?

Paddy: There’s not much improvisation in the album at all, it’s all parts really.

Killian: We didn’t have time really to put anything extra in it.

I also saw on your YouTube account that you held a mystery tour for your fans. How did that come about?

Paddy: We basically wanted to pay back all the people who had been good to us over the year and kind of supported us. So we hired a bus, loaded it with booze and sent the first 50 people to email us on a mystery tour! Out to Johnny Fox’s then back into town followed by an after party. It was just wild.

Hugh: It was mental.

Now for a few quick questions!

Any of you give something up for Lent?

Killian: Same thing as I gave up last year… Nothing!

Favorite song on the radio right now?

Paddy: That Marmaduke song. I’m lovin’ it.

Hugh: That was out last year wasn’t it?

Paddy: Was it?

Killian: The new Strokes tune is good.

Paddy: Yeah, ‘Machu Picchu’.

Killian: Whenever that comes on, brilliant.

Paddy: I like that tune by Royseven as well, ‘We Should Be Lovers’.

Killian: ‘My Side’ by Von Shakes. It gets me every time!

The first, and the last album you bought?

Killian: First album I bought, embarrassingly enough, was Will Smith.

Hugh: The first album I bought, I think, was Jimmy Hendrix, ‘BBC Sessions’ and the last album I bought was The Foals, ‘Total Life Forever’. Great album! It’s probably one of my favorite albums.

Paddy: Craig David was the first I bought. It’s actually a great album. The last I bought would be The Strokes new album, which is great as well.

Killian: Yeah, that’s a great album.

Aaron: My first one was like Sum 41 or something like that, and my last one was Kanye West.

Cat or Dog?

Unison: DOG.

Aaron: Cats are creepy.

Hugh: We’re a loyal family!

Maltesers or Minstrels?

Hugh: Maltesers.

Killian: Maltesers I think, yeah.

Hugh: Maltesers or popcorn!

Aaron: Maltesers are mainstream whereas Minstrels are more of a guilty pleasure!

Killian: Listen to this guy!

Paddy: Yeah, Minstrels if you really want to impress the girl at the cinema. It’s all about the Minstrels! As long as she bought the tickets…

Finally, what is up next for Von Shakes?

Aaron: We’ve got the Button Factory on the 18^th then we’re playing a charity gig on the 28th at The Village.

Killian: We’ve also got Vantastival on April 30th.

Paddy: Then we’re moving to America! For three months, leaving on June 1^st.

Hugh: Yeah, New York. Can’t wait for that.

Extra Question: Any advice for musicians just starting out, looking for gigs etc.?

Paddy: Gig as much as you can.

Killian: Yeah, gig as much as you can and don’t let shit gigs stop you! Everyone starting off plays bad gigs.

Hugh: Never give up. Just keep going. A ninety thousand seated arena, think of the big picture.

Paddy: If you’re playing to two people, close your eyes and imagine you’re on stage at Oxegen. I had to do that a lot.

Aaron: Oxegen main stage!

Paddy: With every gig you do, you grow tighter, you gain confidence, and you’re going to learn what works live… There’s so many things to actual gigging, so many more positives than negatives.

Check out the band’s website for more info: http://www.vonshakes.com/

‘My Side’ is available to buy on iTunes right now!

Bipolar Empire Interview 05/04/11

Bipolar Empire were the most recent band to play at NUIG.

I got a chance to speak with them afterwards and asked all about their upcoming album....

This all began at Oxegen 2007 right?

Shane: Yeah, that’s where Bipolar Empire began. Joe and me had been doing something before and then we ran into Callum, he was just a madman you know? It just seemed like real fun so we decided to have a practice and then it kind of fell on from there really. We started doing gigs and stuff like that.

And where did the name come from?

Callum: We had a couple of different ideas, like Bipolar Enemy came up but we weren’t really sure about that because one, there’s another band called Bipolar Enemy and two, it could be like we’re attacking people you know? So then I thought of empire. We all have different meanings to what the name is but my personal meaning is, you know we’re never all in the same mood so it kind of falls into the same category, we’re always killing each other, then we’re great so it’s kind of like mood swings between ourselves, but then the empire comes in because we’re always still a unit, we always work together for the greater good or the bigger picture rather than just ourselves. 

Do you think it’s hard for Irish bands starting off to get support here in Ireland?

Mark: To a certain extent it is. There really are a lot of great bands out there and you kind of have to be lucky in one sense and you have to be prepared to have good songs and all that as well I think. But you do have to have a lot of luck to kind of meet the right manager or promoter or anyone. Big companies like MCD and all them who look after most of it so once you get in with that sort of crowd you do end up getting a lot of good gigs and if you’re not in it you miss out on a lot of good things. So it depends on what kind of crowd you fall in with. It is hard.

How did you end up in America?

Joe: Our manager knew this producer, Pat McCarthy (REM, Madonna, U2), and he loved our music. We had basically sent him over a demo of a couple of tracks we recorded in my room, just basic acoustic voice, and he loved it! He was kind of dreading it because producers are always getting material but he actually loved it and he wanted to work with us and record us. It all just seemed so surreal, packing up and moving over there for three months. We recorded basically the bones of the album. It was a great opportunity to go over there and record.

While you were there you ended up playing in some pretty famous clubs too…

Joe: Yeah, the producer had a few contacts over in Austin so we rented an RV and travelled across. It was great.

Callum: Whiskey A Go-Go

Mark: It’s a good place to play; it’s a historic venue you know?

Shane: Exactly.

2010 seems to have been a big year for you guys…

Mark: Yeah, 2010 is basically the year we kind of went from one standard up to the next. Oxegen kind of signifies the whole year. When you play there, it kind of gives you certain recognition and you go to another level. So that helped us out with getting better gigs around the country. We started trying to play around Ireland as best we could and we played another couple of festivals like the Temple House Festival. And this year then it’s even gone a bit further with the likes of the Late Late Show which is kind of another level again so we’re hoping to just keep building on that. I wonder what the next level is!

It must have been strange to go from being in the crowd at Oxegen to on the stage!

Joe: Yeah, we’ve been at Oxegen the last four, five years.

Callum: The weird thing is you go as a punter and you’re hanging about, watching all these bands. You’re always thinking I’d love to play that stage and then to get there, to be playing Oxegen and being backstage with Vampire Weekend there, and everyone just having a beer. It’s just more a surreal environment to what you’re used to.

You took a break after that and are back now with your new single ‘Feel That You Own It’.

Shane: Yeah, there’s a big distance between that and the last one but it’s been worth the wait I think. We’ve got it out now, along with the video, and it’s also the name of the album. So there’s not much distance between this single and the album release, which is about three weeks away.

About the music video, it featured Irish boxer Katie Taylor. How did that happen?

Callum: Yeah, Katie Taylor. It was a ‘friend of a friend’ situation, we kind of just sent her the track to see what she thought because we wanted to get a strong female for the video and she loved it. She came on board, and punched the feck out of a big massive wall. She’s a lovely girl!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHXSw0RMnuo

And the album comes out April 29^th.

Shane: Yes, the 29^th of April. We’re playing our launch gig for the album on the 28^th. 

Mark: We’re eager for everyone to hear the album now.

Shane: We also played with the base player from Muse! Chris Wolstenholme. Our manager kind of knows and works a little with him.

Mark: He came on stage with us, which is brilliant, he played the guitar for the last single we released and he also played along on ‘Feel That You Own It’. It was just mad to see this famous person playing beside you!

Do you have any spoilers about the album?

Shane: I think it varies, definitely. There are a lot of different songs on it which is something that we always wanted to establish ourselves as, an artist that can kind of surprise people, that isn’t ‘pigeon holed’ in one genre. I think there’s somehow a link between the songs as well. There are ballads in there, fast paced dance songs, and there are songs that are kind of head-boppers, I guess you could call them.

Mark: And when you look at bands that have lasted they’ve done that. Like U2, they have these blues type songs, then pop songs and then they have slow ballads and things like that. If you do put yourself into one sort of category you have to repeat that every time and people expect it so that’s what we tried not to do so much.

Now for a few quick questions!

What is your favorite band and/or singer right now?

Callum: My favorite band at the minute is The National.

Joe: Too hard. Queen. Actually no, The Beatles. And singer would be..

Mark: At the moment.

Joe: Oh, hang on, at the moment? 

Mark: Mine would definitely be Hal, they’re a great Irish band.

Joe: I thought you meant favorite band of all time! Mine would be….

Mark: Shh. Your turn is over! My favorite singer is Shane at the moment! I heard him sing just a minute ago, so it’s fresh in my head.

Your favorite YouTube video?

Callum: I know my one, the drunkest man ever. Where he walks into the shop and he starts swinging around the door, and he can’t get up off the ground. That would be my favorite one.

Mark: Mine is a video called ‘The Amazing Ass Spanking’. It’s a guy getting hit with a belt and it’s just hilarious.

Joe: Willie Bum Bum.

Mark: It’s a real thing.

Callum: After you watch that video you won’t eat or sleep for days.

Shane: YouTube video… Mikey X Factor!

Mark: That is good.

Maltesers or Minstrels?

Callum: Minstrels. Maltesers get stuck in my teeth and it really hurts.

Mark: Yeah, Minstrels as well.

Joe: I think Munchies actually. I love Munchies.

Callum: The question is to choose between either Maltesers or Minstrels! You can’t make up your own answer.

Shane: I’m actually going to go with Maltesers because I love Maltesers.

Mark: Joe! Give an answer!

Joe: Minstrels, No wait…

Mark: It’s not that hard!

Joe: M&Ms! Am…

Mark: Pick one! It’s quick fire like.

Callum: It’s quick fire, just give an answer!

Joe: Yeah, Minstrels.

Last one, Cat or Dog?

Callum: Dog.

Joe: Dog.

Mark: Dog as well.

Shane: Dog

To finish, what is up next for Bipolar Empire?

Callum: Kill Joe.

Mark: And after we kill Joe, the album launch is the big thing, which is April 28th in the Workmans Club, Dublin. And the album release is the 29^th.

Shane: And hopefully world domination!

For more information, check out: http://www.bipolarempire.com/

Don’t forget to buy the new album ‘Feel That You Own It’, out April 29^th.

NUIG Rock Society to host the Irish Premiere of 'Bob and the Monster'

I recently spoke to committee members Jane and Graham about this big event....

Jane: The documentary is about Bob Forrest who was the first roadie for The Red Hot Chili Peppers, huge in the music scene in LA in the seventies, eighties, nineties, even now. He’s worked with every artist from Josh Klinghoffer to John Waits. A real ‘man behind the curtain’, he always had beautiful women around him and always had the musicians but never quite made it there himself, through drug use and all that kind of thing. The documentary is about his battle with drug addiction and his life in the music scene. There are a lot of different artists speaking in the documentary like Courtney Love and Anthony Kiedis about the influence that Bob had on their lives and their families and just all the things that he’s done for them.

Bob himself is even coming over for this screening and Sean Wheelers and Zander Schloss are going to perform. We really are very excited and at the moment we’re trying to get a special guest performer too.

Graham: Nothing has been ruled out. We’ve been talking to the director and one of the producers of the documentary and there are three options at the moment, Josh Klinghoffer, John Frusciante or Courtney Love.

Jane: It is pretty insane but also quite difficult when we are publicising the event and we’re mentioning these names and people don’t’ recognize them but once you explain it to them they realize how huge this is for the society and for NUIG.

Graham: And as a provisional society we will be relying on the ticket sales to fund this. As we are inexperienced to a degree, this is a learning curve for us and we really want it to happen so we want people to realize how major an event this is, it is no small deal for what is definitely going to be the Irish, if not the European premiere of the documentary.  It’s going into the Galway Film Fleadh too and hopefully we will get some more media attention as time goes by.

Jane: A member of a dedication site to John Frusciante who lives in the States emailed me yesterday and told me he’s booked his ticket to come here for the screening.

 I don’t think people realize what an opportunity this actually is.

Graham: It is a piece of history that’s going to happen right here on campus. It’s the first time the Bailey Allen is going to hold a rock concert and hopefully it won’t be the last! If this goes well, other people may be enticed to come over; this is where it should start. 

'Bob and the Monster' - NUIG Bailey Allen Hall - July 8th

Keywest Interview 23/03/11

Keywest recently played in NUIG as part of the SU Sessions.

After the gig, I got a chance to speak with lead singer and co-songwriter of the band Andrew (Andy) Kavanagh.

Katy: This is not Keywest’s first time playing in NUIG.

Andy: No, it isn’t. We were down in Galway one day for a gig, a year and a half ago I’d say, and while we were there two of the lads in the band went busking. They didn’t do very well on their own and so we started playing with them that day and got a great response. That’s why we’ve been asked to NUIG so many times I guess, just from busking.

Katy: You seem to have a very loyal (and large) fan base here in Galway too.

Andy: Certainly. We were absolutely shocked to see anybody here. We’ve played in NUIG three times in total, the first time it was pretty empty, the second one was moderately full and then today it was amazing! It’s brilliant. We’re delighted.

Katy: To go back to the Keywest roots for a minute, was music a big deal in your families growing up?

Andy: Yeah, with everyone in the band. I’m from an entire family of singers, my grandmother and her seven sisters. They were all kind of somewhat famous on the cabaret scene back in the day so I’m the first one to sort of take that up as the male in the family. With the rest of the boys it’s the same thing. I’ve been to Performing Arts and Glover (Andrew Glover) was one of the top classical piano players in the country so we kind of stole him! For a long time his mother actually hated me, it’s a true story, for taking him away from classical piano. He was the number one guy, he finished all his piano grades at twelve and he had started at six years old. He’s a monster of a musician! It’s absolutely staggering what he can do. But yeah, his mom for a very long time, until she kind of came around to the idea, really didn’t like me. She saw us on the Late Late Show and that won her over.

Katy: To go from practicing music as a child, to having a producer like Mark Needham, who is responsible for The Killer’s ‘Mr. Brightside’, taking an interest in working with the band. Must have been quite the change for all of you!

Andy: It’s phenomenal, yeah. You know, Mark does that, he develops bands, there’s a new band out called Neon Trees at the moment and they have a massive song on the radio called ‘Animal’ right now. He set them up the same way he did with us. They went to him, he helped developed them, he helped get them working with people. So we spent the last two years developing, taking trips over, recording this album and this particular album we’re putting out here is only going to be put out in Ireland. It’s not going to see the light of day anywhere else because it’s what we’ve been writing over the course of the last two years but the album in the US is a bunch of co-writes so that will be album two in Ireland. We’re excited about this first one because we’ve written it for so long and we feel it’s brilliant, it’s a real personal expression of what we had to do so we’re putting it out anyway. 

Katy: And it was after meeting Mark that you released your first single, ‘Miss You Most’.

Andy: Yeah, we were a completely different band back then. We had R ‘n’ B elements and because we were songwriters first, we didn’t know what we wanted to do. We’re from very different backgrounds in music and we had this one song ‘Miss You Most’. Mark said that he loved that and that he didn’t really like the other avenue so his input started to develop us and re-route our direction. I started listening to U2 and Snow Patrol and Kings of Leon because I’ve always traditionally listened to soul and R’ n ’B acts and because myself and Glover would be the primary writers in the band, I had to get out and make some different kind of music. So now the album has that, it’s a mixture of all those bands!

Katy: And the busking, where does that come in?

Andy: It was a necessity initially. Sam (Marder) and James (Lock) had moved over from England and at that time everything was pretty bad. We were trying to just get by and pay the rent while still devoting enough time to keep the momentum of the band going. They were trying to busk as a two piece in Dublin and, as I said, we just happened to busk one day in Galway and we got such a good response that we’ve been busking ever since. Gigging as well. We don’t want to do pub gigs and become known as a cover band, so we’re trying to limit that down. That’s why on the street we get to tell our side of the story and explain we’re not a cover band, but we don’t mind playing them for your entertainment.

Katy: So then what was it like to go from busking on the street to making an album in an L.A. studio?

Andy: It was ridiculous, such a contrast. Mind-blowing. We were taking limos and we had a house with a Jacuzzi and a pool. Mind you, all those kind of extras weren’t paid by the busking, obviously, that was all to do with the publishing companies and the labels we were dealing with. Busking paid for the flights, living expenses and that kind of stuff for the month. It was absolutely amazing. And the people we got to meet and work with too. One particular time I found myself out at a party, and we were amongst all these people and I was chatting away to this guy called Quentin or something like that. Then, as I got drunker I was like, “Are you Taio Cruz?” And the man was like, “Yeah”. Embarrassing. I think he’s great so I was like, “oh. Howya!” That happened more than once! The lads got to rehearse with all sorts of bands in the rehearsal studios and you know, got to jam with them. Some being the big rock stars of our days like Bon Jovi and New York Dolls. It was just amazing.

Katy: On the subject of famous musicians, you recently met Paulo Nutini.

Andy: He’s a bit mad. He’s just wired from the moment you meet him to the moment he leaves. He arrived singing, that’s no joke. In the back area he was just mad, just ready for action! He’s great craic.

Katy: To focus on Keywest again, your upcoming album is called “The Message” and is out in September 2011,

Andy: We’re going to open it with our first big headline act in Dublin.

Katy: Any spoilers you can give me?

Andy: There are twelve, possibly thirteen songs on it. We’re still debating one. We’re definitely thinking quality, not quantity so, as I’ve said, we’ve written it for two years and have a ton of songs to choose from. There’s sort of a religious theme going through it but it’s not about religion. It’s more about our own personal experiences so there’s a song on there called ‘Absolute’ and one called ‘Road To Damnation’. So that runs through it. It’s great, I’m delighted with how it’s turned out and as I said it’s the perfect expression of the experiences we’ve had over the many years we’ve known each other.  So please God other people will see it that way!

Katy: Great. Now, a few quick questions! First CD/Tape you ever bought.

Andy: This is going to be embarrassing. I think the first CD I bought was Boys II Men and I think the album was called ‘Two’. I was a huge Boys II Men fan and they released ‘End of the Road’ over the film Boomerang in 1990 and I was just a nipper at that point. My auntie was a big fan and it was her influence that put me on to soul music so that was my first. I think I was about three or four or something like that?

Katy: Your favorite song on the radio right now?

Andy: I’m trying to think what’s on the radio right now. I’d probably say ‘Animal’ by Neon Trees. I like that song or Adele’s new song is very good. She’s a great story, to see her talent coming through despite all the critics initially.

Katy: You were writing songs yourself at a very young age. Would you have any advice for people who want to start writing their own songs?

Andy: You have to start young and you have to just keep on writing. It takes such a long time to get good at it, it really does. You look back on your old songs and go, “What were you thinking? How did that happen?” You just have to keep writing song after song after song and don’t expect each song to be your hit. Just write it for the sake of writing it and then hopefully one day you will write something that will get you where you want to go.

Katy: Maltesers or Minstrels?

Andy: Minstrels. I like dark chocolate.

Katy: Finally, is there anything you’d like to say to all your Galway fans?

Andy: Well the single’s out soon and we have the support of i102, as far as I know, so if they want to help us out they can inundate them with requests. That would certainly move things along!

For more information on the band check out: http://www.keywestofficial.com/