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In Clor’s madcap world, almost anything is possible. “Yeah, we’re doing a homecoming for me in Rochdale, we’ve hired out a big open top bus for our album’s release date that we’ve painted in Clor colours,” ponders curly-haired frontman Barry Dobbin. Of course, Bazza and guitarist/fellow crux member Luke Smith (a.k.a. ‘The Big Dada’… ahem, we’ll come to that later) may oft dip into the realm of fantasy - but in a parallel and wholly sane universe such a vision would be damn true. Undoubtedly, it’s this enlightened, unhinged kind of thinking that’s made Clor’s eponymous debut album so liberated and so bloody brilliant. Truly, it’s a work that demands your attention.
With ‘Clor’ freshly unleashed in stores, away from all the homecoming talk, Barry and Luke realise that now’s an extremely pivotal period in their lives, “It’s a critical time, when it’s all thrown out to the public and if they don’t like it, that’s it you’re dead in the water,” muses the ever affable Barry – a man who’s face looks as though it’s been permanently moulded by chomping on a few too many disco biscuits. Thankfully, judging by the way the pair talk about the album, it’s pretty clear that sinking into obscurity is something very far from their psyche. Barry enthuses “We’re really happy with it, I listened to it for the first time in three months and I was really, really pleased.” Sporting perhaps the best comb over in rock, Luke chirpily agrees in his London twang “We were surprised with how good it was. You need to get a little bit distanced from something you’re working on so you can get a different point of view.”
Aside from the startlingly good, kaleidoscopic music, another major plus point of ‘Clor’ is its sheer lyrical depth and scope. Recent single ‘Outlines’ being case in point - centering on the somewhat profound line “Each of us is special in our own unique way”. Rubbishing suggestions that he’s some kind of modern day commentator, Barry puzzles “The lyrics all come from me, they come from somewhere but I’m not sure where…” Interjecting, Luke laughs “He doesn’t quite understand himself; he’s sort of like a weird bean poet.” Gathering his thoughts, Barry elucidates “That’s not true, they all mean things, I just don’t want to write storytelling lyrics or anything like that, you just want to keep a level of ambiguity and a certain irony.”
Somewhat endearingly, Barry and Luke seen genuinely grateful for being in the position where they have a window to make and play their music – a refreshing change from all the egotistically frivolity displayed by some bands. Barry says “We’ve got a great opportunity making our living doing something we love doing. It’s kinda weird, we’re pretty much Average Joes who take it easy.” Luke concurs, “We’re just enjoying ourselves, anything else that happens is just a bonus.”
Asked whether such ‘enjoying’ themselves involves going on unending hedonistic binges, put politely they don’t quite deny it “We’ve got on the rock and roll horse and we’re gonna ride it out” quips Luke, before Barry adds “We’re living the dream. We’re not too reckless, but of course we’re quite reckless.” Interrogated further about their debauched antics, with his tongue wedged in his cheek Barry jokes: “I haven’t had any crazy or debauched moments, I’m professional and straight down the line” Sipping on his pint of Guinness Luke proclaims “We don’t drink, swear or anything.” Yeah, right lads.
Despite the fact Clor haven’t shifted an obscene amount of units quite yet, their fanbase has been steadily growing in both numbers and enthusiasm recently. For an ‘Average Joe’ like Luke, it’s naturally a bit bewildering “There are some people that are very keen, sometimes it can be a bit scary but ultimately it’s complimentary.” Barry substantiates, “They’re not really scary it’s just that we’re not used to having people that are devoted fans.” Sadly for them, they haven’t quite had a Tom Jones knicker-throwing incident yet, as Barry laments “We had some bottles thrown at us at the Exit festival in Serbia. All our equipment got lost in Vienna so we ended up borrowing stuff off a local school… we went on stage about three hours late in place of Serbia’s premier death metal, reggae band. It worked out alright in the end, there were some bottles thrown but luckily they were only plastic.” Ever the optimist, Luke asides “I quite liked it, I was hoping there’d be some more!”
Aside from the unfortunate Siberia incident, Clor’s vibrant live shows are generally showered in superlatives. Importantly, the lads take their aesthetics pretty damn seriously, whether it be the naff fluorescent light-bulbs, keyboardist Bob’s Kraftwerky suits, or Barry’s rather fetching and now infamous skin-tight red jeans – a subject that’s evoking jealousy within Luke “People never talk about my jeans, they sparkle as well, no-one gives me any credit.” Barry jokes “Yeah he’s getting jeans jealousy, I think my jeans are upstaging us all.”
To warm up for such shows, Barry reveals they have quite a unique pre-gig ritual, “We all tend to wrestling. I get less of a reaction than the others because I’m more of a classic American wrestler.” Luke excitedly adds “I’m the Big Dada!” A two minute conversation about wrestling ensues, in which Barry rues the implausibility of the outcome of the fights, “When they used to come to Rochdale Town Hall and put the wrestling on, I was certain in a fair fight Giant Haystacks would have beat Big Daddy. I can’t believe Big Daddy used to win...”
Er right, back to matters at hand then, and thankfully it seems that Clor nuts won’t have to wait too long for a second album, “We’ve been discussing the next album already which we’re going to start pretty much as soon as possible. We’ll definitely be more mature and change direction.” Barry adds “We’ve got too many ideas. Nothing’s concrete at the moment, there’s probably about 50 projects on the computer that we’re working on, which we still haven’t resolved yet.” Together with the new album, Barry’s also got big ideas about future, expanded live shows, “Our light engineer’s going to be dressed completely in black like a ninja, there’s going to be a monster while we’re playing, strobe lights and glitter in the air. The whole thing will be choreographed, it’ll probably be years in the making, Fischerspooner will be shitting themselves.”
Just before we go, it’s left to Gigwise to duly solve one nagging question that’s crippling all of us across the land… Is Barry’s hair a perm or naturally curly? Thankfully he fills us in, “It’s actually a demi-wave, kind of a quarter wave, it’s the only way to achieve this particular density of curls.” Luke adds: “Yeah he goes in for his perm and his back, sack and crack every fortnight.” Nice.
