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Field Music have been slowly creeping into the public consciousness since the release of their self-titled debut album last year. Gigwise duly caught up with the Sunderland lads shortly before a special gig at Lancaster Library…
For those not in the know, Field Music are a trio of Sunderland lads - brothers Peter and David Brewis and old school mate Andrew Moore. All come across as intensely passionate about the business of making music. ‘Intense’ just about covers the slightly tense atmosphere that clouds the first round of questions. Dave explains that he feels not many people are on their wavelength at the moment: “That’s how it seems, but one thing I do feel about the single is it’ll kind of wet the appetites a little bit for the people who are looking forward to the album. And that was the idea all along really. And I know that people are looking forward to hearing the album now”.
In fact, Peter adds that they’re happy in their position of perennial outsiders: “We’re really not very cool, or fashionable, so when people come to our gigs and expect that sort of vibe, for want of a better word, they’re probably better off just going home”.
Sat in a coffee shop twiddling their empty cups, Gigwise tests the water about their feelings about the radio play they’ve been getting lately, and whether getting onto Radio 1 is still important. Dave starts off: “I don’t listen to radio at all, basically it’s like a weird surprise… eeergh, almost what have we done wrong!” Peter chips in: “We could sit down and right, we are going to write an indie-rock hit and get it on the radio. And we’d be basically trying to fool people into listening to the rest of our music. Whereas we don’t have any music that we could put it out there and fool people into liking us under false pretences, so whatever it gets played on, or however it gets out there its like fair game”.
The banter moves back and forth between the two brothers, with one taking up the reigns of the conversation, running with it and passing it on. The discussion moves onto how others see their music, the particular phrase being ‘crystalline pop’. This is put down, by Dave to the fact that “We do harmonies, and there’s no reverb, just distorted guitars”
Comparisons to new wave and The Beach Boys are skirted around until we move onto Peter’s involvement as a drummer for fellow Sunderland band The Futureheads and the impact this has had on their music. Peter comments: “I don’t mind us being compared to The Futureheads, but actually I think there’s lots of interesting things about the similarities and differences in how we approach music. And for me that’s interesting because of knowing where we all started from. For me it seems absurd to lump The Futureheads in with Editors for instance, so then for us to be compared to Editors. It just doesn’t make sense and I feel so far away from it, and that’s like any association which has invented itself. I don’t really like indie music I don’t listen to indie music, I don’t consider The Futureheads to be indie music. I think they make good rock music”.
In terms of creating a scene, Field Music are linked to a group consisting of themselves, The Futureheads and Maximo Park. Peter sums this up saying, “I think as far as a North East scene goes I don’t really know whether there really is one”.
How about their new album have they felt compelled to go on a different tangent, have they let themselves loosen up a bit? Dave jokes: “Well we’ve put reverb on so no-one would say it sounded like crystalline pop,” before Peter adds: “Probably in terms of how people describe the style I don’t think it has veered off drastically, because basically we’re still coming up with a lot of the same reference points. In a way we I think we fixed a lot of the things which we felt were lacking in the first album. Which was a lack of performance and, it was so painstakingly done the first album that I think certain elements like fun and of our personalities didn’t really come across enough”.
Andy finally pipes up: “What were we listening to when we were recording our last lot of stuff. I was listening to a lot of Peter Gabriel”. Dave adds: “I ripped off Prince, I was listening to a lot of Prince and Fleetwood Mac, a lot of Tusk”.
Peter says: “It seems absurd really that any band now would say well I am influenced by Arctic Monkeys. They represent such a tiny amount of the music that’s been created and even I only listen to music that is recorded during its own lifetime. So I’ve been only really listening to, like a century of music, but still its a century of music, loads and loads of ideas there which where hinted at and never taken on a bit and you want to like find them all because that where exciting things happen”.
Finally Gigwise is keen to find out, just what is Field Music? When Googled it appears to be a type of American Military band, this apparently had no bearing on their choice. Dave: “We’re not a band really, we make records and when we play live we have to relearn how we played it. Most of these songs we probably each had to play like a couple of different instruments at some point. We did two shows in America and Andy played bass. Then we finished the songs and realised, Andy, your going to have to play the keyboard parts, as well. He actually plays all the music in the band, and we just stand there. He’s the powerhouse, the maestro, Andy ‘The Powerhouse’ Moore.”
Whatever the future holds, Field Music’s self deprecating attitude looks set to carry them through, while their slightly off-kilter style sees that they will continue to make the kind of music, they want, their way.
