The Big Pink went from being a highly regarded underground act to one of the bands of the year with the commercial success of the single ‘Dominos’ and the critical acclaim for debut album ‘A Brief History of Love’. Meg.ie spoke with them about their upcoming appearance at Electric Picnic, future plans and Kevin Costner.
Looking forward to Electric Picnic? Have you enjoyed previous gigs over here?
We’ve played Dublin a couple of times in the past, which has been amazing. I have family in Ireland, so there’s always a good party afterwards. Last time we played Electric Picnic it was the our third festival of the weekend, we hadn’t slept and we weren’t great, so we want to right any wrongs from that.
Will your Electric Picnic appearance be a run through of ‘A Brief History..’ or are you road testing new material at the moment?
Essentially yeah, but we will play a work in progress and possibly a cover or two.
When you first came out you were referred to frequently as a ‘shoegaze’ band. Did you think this was accurate representation of your sound or would you use a different label, if any?
That always frustrated us, I think there are elements of shoegaze, but there are elements of electro, industrial and soul too. We always said we were stargazers anyhow.
Has the success of ‘Dominos’ brought in fans that mightn’t have previously been aware of you guys? Is that the aim, to reach people outside the ‘scene’?
I guess, we just wanna be as big or popular as we as The Big Pink can be, a bit like Field of Dreams with Kevin Costner; if you build it they will come.
You’ve done a lot of supporting slots with Muse, is that a band you’d like to emulate, going from small venues to arenas to stadiums?
No, I don’t think we would ever try and emulate anyone, not even the people we really admire like Ministry or the Stone Roses. But you gotta hand it to Muse they are the biggest band in the world and I think it suits them.
What are the plans for recording in the future, is there a deadline in your minds for the second album or are you keeping it flexible?
We wanna have everything written by December, record in January, have it out in the summer.
What can we expect from a future release that we may not have heard on the first album? Any new influences or styles you’re keen to tap into?
I think the first album was a muddle, there was no definitive sound, that was our difficult second record, we are writing our classic debut now.
How’s the label (Merok Records) going? Any new acts signed up? Is it difficult to keep that going alongside your band commitments?
Merok is great, we got some great weird dance coming up from ‘Teengirl Fantasy’ who soundtrack that 7am-moment-on-the-way-home-from-the-club perfectly. ‘Gatekeeper’ are a strange mix of John Carpenter soundtracks and Chigago House, but it works! Oh and we have ‘Divorce’, they’re an 80% girl punk group from Glasgow , their bassist is called Vic Strap On, how can they not be huge!
Finally, for Electric Picnic are there any covers or Irish songs you’ll be playing for the occasion?
Yeah maybe some Otis Redding, maybe some Beyonce. But I’d really like to cover ‘Ode to my Family’ by The Cranberries.
By: Kev Donnellan
