The JCQ have been working hard getting album number two ready. Having checked out their live show earlier in the year at Hit The Deck we couldn't wait to hear what new offerings they had in store for us. "Mechanical Youth" was released earlier this week and the guys took time out ahead of the release to speak to us about recording in Sweden, playing shows and setting amps on fire with their riffs...
Heya guys. So you’re recently supported Arcane
Roots. Did you enjoy those shows?
Hi there! Yeah we've been enjoying playing the rock shows and
doing the rocking that we always rock!
We saw you at Hit The Deck earlier this year and you’re
playing Redfest; do you approach playing a festival any differently?
Not really, it's always harder because you're usually not on
tour so it can be harder to get into at first, but we love playing festivals so
we just try and enjoy them as much as possible.
You released “Ghosts Diffuse” as a
little teaser for the new record. Have you been dropping more new songs into
the live set yet?
We usually put 3 or 4 news songs in the set, and we've
actually just started ending with our own granny-smasher remix of the national
anthem. Make sure you stay to the end because it'll get ya.
 |
| The JCQ |
The album is ready to go, you’ve just
got to hold out until release day; are you nervous or just excited to get it
out there?
We are absolutely petrified of our album coming out in case
the drums have been thrown out of time at the CD burning plant or the printers
accidentally put a picture of Bobby Davro as the front cover. Fingers crossed
it'll all be ok though.
The crowd really gets involved at your
live shows. Are you looking forward to the release of the new album and people
going for it with the new songs?
As we said earlier, the over-riding emotion is pure fear so
it's hard to comprehend any other emotions at the moment! But hopefully crowds
will react the same way they do with our previous songs. We're always grateful
for crowd interaction; it's hard to enjoy a gig when there's hundreds of blank
expressions starring at you for half an hour...
 |
| "Mechanical Youth" the new album |
Thank you very much! Our aims were to amp some more things up
and just up the ampage on the whole album really. Some amps actually burst into
flames as soon as we played our guitars through them because they couldn't
handle the riffs. We wanted to make a heavier album but we couldn't afford to
break any more amplifiers. We just wanted to concentrate on writing big riffs,
big hooks and getting an identifiable tone and we're really pleased with the
outcome.
Did you feel under any pressure after
the success of “That Was Then, This Is Now” to step things up? Or was that just
put to the back of your mind?
I always file things in my mind alphabetically and T is
obviously after M so it was put at the back in that sense, but then everything
is realistically impossible to do under any circumstances. Pressure isn't
something we particularly take any notice of. We just get on with what we've
always done for the past 7 years, keep our heads down and work hard. Once you
start acknowledging the pressure I think that can be really detrimental to the
music as a whole, so it's best avoided at all costs.
And the title “Mechanical Young”...
The
album is named Mechanical Young as a reflection to the youth of today being
more like robots, force fed s**t from the industry rather than going out and
thinking for themselves. It makes it hard for bands that do anything
differently to get any sort of recognition, because people can't go "oh
that band sounds like another band I like, so now I like this other band".
You recorded it in Sweden
Pelle was great to work with. We only worked with Eskil on
the pre-production days but he was a pleasure to work with too. They really
brought out the best in our performance, concentrating on the balls of the
sounds.
I know you recorded
the album live using older amps. Did you feel it was important to get that live
feel across? Because your shows are so
energetic?
Yeah we did feel that was important, recording live
definitely gives a record a huge sense of real energy. Though it was more
important for us to capture the genuine sound of our band at that moment in
time. So many bands have such heavily processed albums nowadays, it just
removes any sense of soul and identity of the band. If I want to listen to
robotic music I put on a dance track. I don't understand why bands feel the
need to copy the clinical nature of synthesised music, that's one of the best
things about some of our favourite records, that there are mistakes left in and
not everything sounds 100% perfect, but that's where the real sense of the band
lies - in those mistakes.
How did you find Sweden
We were working pretty hard on the record from like 9am to
10pm every day with no days off, so we didn't get much time to explore, plus
where the studio was in Umea
And finally what else
have you guys got planned?
Release the album, slay the world.
Thanks guys!
"Mechanical Youth" is out now
