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Earlier this year,Manchester neo-grungers Nine Black Alps were labelled as “the band most likely to save rock music forever” by a certain section of the press. While it’s fair to say that the band may have failed to live up to such a billing (short of burning down every night-club in Watford and bringing us the heads of Nickleback on sticks, it’s hard to see how any band could), they have nevertheless had a searing 2005. It has seen them become the only British rock band of the last twelve months to drag anger, pop choruses, tasteful plaid and lashings of glorious feedback into the mainstream.
Gigwise is meeting the band in the very tasteful surroundings of their press office, at a table strewn with crisp packets and CDs (Sam gleefully writes ‘poo’ in the inlay of a Louis XIV album). Before we even turn our tape recorder on, guitarist David Jones takes a black marker and draws a cute stick-man group portrait: Sam (Forrest, singer) has an arrow through his head, Martin Cohen (bassist) wears what looks like a bowler hat and James Galley (drummer) has curly hair. As David writes below this rushed masterpiece: “Together they are Nine Black Alps!”
This year was always going to be momentous for the group, but what was their personal highlight? “Reading and Leeds festival” Sam immediately responds, despite the fact they missed their heroes Dinosaur JR owing to signing-tent commitments. “We’d been playing around tiny little venues in England all year. Some gigs were absolutely shit, some were good, and it finally all sort of came together for that weekend”“I remember watching The Von Bondies doing exactly the same stage time as us, like about two or three years ago and just being blown away and it was just madness to actually play it, it was just weird” David says, with puppy-dog enthusiasm.
It’s an experience that compares favourably with their other English festival of the year, the small matter of Glastonbury. Explains David: “Our van got stuck in the mud, and we didn’t have our backline. We had to borrow all our equipment off like Maximo Park and The Infadels. Literally going on stage, plugging your guitar into an amp you’d never used and just hoping for the best. I just remember looking out and we were so concerned with our equipment, we didn’t actually realise “oh shit we’re playing Glastonbury!” It turned out really well”
The main point of today’s chat is the imminent release of new single ‘Just Friends’ (Sam: “It’s about how to kill a relationship really fast”). It’s the fifth track to be lifted from their frankly awesome debut ‘Everything Is’, which with all respects brings to mind the words ‘milking’ and ‘it’, something Sam actually agrees with: “I think everybody that’s heard us by now has either decided they either like us or hate us so there’s not much point to over-expose ourselves”Produced by Beck and Elliot Smith cohort Rob Schnapf out in Los Angeles, ‘Everything Is’ is a swaggeringly confident and blistering collection, albeit one that knows when to calm down, doing so with a surprisingly restrained beauty on near-acoustic tracks such as ‘Behind Your Eyes’ and ‘Intermission’. Maybe hints at a future direction? “I don’t think we ever really think about what we’re doing too much. It’s just like, I prefer to build up a collection of like 50-odd songs, and then just sort of take my favourites and stuff” Sam counters, playing with his fringe.
“We’re doing an acoustic gig next week actually (June 13) for John Peel day, a gig in Manchester” adds David, his remark leading to an un-expected and touching moment of reminiscing about the great man. “It’s really weird ‘cos he played us two weeks before he died, over two shows he was playing ‘Shot Down’. I mean you grow up listening to it, and it’s…fuck sake it’s John Peel! Legend. Having heard so many bands through him it was kind of weird. He was one of those people you expected to live forever”
Looking to Nine Black Alps’ future, there’s the delicious prospect of their biggest tour yet, a thirteen-date sold-out nationwide trek (James: “We’re gonna rock the kids”), a trip to France in November and yet more promotional shenanigans such as this. “I just start getting tourettes with interviews. You just find yourself making up stuff” Sam says. Gigwise sits up. “This interview’s all true actually” he smiles.
It’s been, and will remain, a breathless yet exciting few months for Nine Black Alps. Though they eventually signed to Island (a major label with “a good mentality” according to David), at one point every A&R suit must’ve been knocking at their door. As there’s been a certain distance between those heady days of being un-signed and now, have the band had time to reflect, to look down and see if their feet are still grounded? "We never meant to be ‘rock stars’” Sam replies. How plans change.
As Gigwise gets up to leave, the band’s press officer enters the room with a question sent by e-mail from (their words) ‘World’s Greatest Newspaper’ the Daily Express: “What is your ideal night in?” A wicked grin spreads over Sam’s face, and he proceeds to fill the page with a lengthy, hilarious answer involving Ouija boards, guns, pig’s blood and the ghosts of Hendrix and Morrison. We wonder if it ever got printed.
