Not Many Experts

Not completely sure I should have run such a provocatively-named article when, in all honesty, I should be grovelling at your feet and begging for repentance after 2-3 weeks of complete, exam induced silence…. Oh well! Here are the goods – a multi blog interview with electro noise mongers Does It Offend You, Yeah? Many thanks to Nathan, Stoney Roads, Ears of The Beholder, Battery In Your Leg and the bands, who are (time for a shameless plug? oooh yeeeah!) gracing the fantastically curated Wireless Festival on 4th July in London’s expansive environs of Hyde Park. And when I say “fantastic curation”, what I mean is that a sane human being has put together the bill; leading to a strangely cogent line up. Clearly not the same person who booked Deadmau5, Vitalic, MSTRKRFT and Chase & Status (all fine) along with Master Shortie, Lady Sovereign and 3OH!3 for Leeds festival’s Dance Stage… Anyhow – on with the interview before I work myself up too much! My questions are highlighted in blue.

1. Does It Offend You, Yeah? Really do defy a lot of genres in using a range of electronic and classic instruments, where do you think you guys fit in or do you potentially slide across a range? Should the current trend of ‘genre-making’ come into play?

Dan: I think the last album was rather schizophrenic, so people may find us hard to pigeon-hole, I don’t necessarily think that’s a bad thing, but I think when you hear the new album you’ll be able to get more of a feel of our "electronic" backbone. We’re not out to make our own genre with it, but definitely define our own sound.

j. when we sat down to do the 1st record, we really didn’t want to do a full on electro record, not even a full on dance record. we wanted to make a point. we didn’t want to be up in the ”dance, remix,club” thing. so we though all our cards up into the air and hoped some jokers would land face up.

2. I could imagine producing, recording and playing would take up a majority of time from your daily lives. How does your family or girlfriends/boyfriends respond to this routine you put yourselves through? Will there a time when you have to move on from music?

Dan: When we came off tour we gave ourselves two weeks holiday then got straight into the studio, and that’s where we’ve been pretty much everyday for the past 6 months. It can be very hard on relationships, but luckily we get a lot of support from our families and friends. I’m sure if we start making mega-bucks, we’ll bring our significant others with us a lot more. Hopefully we’ll get there before we call it a day!

j. it can be hard sometimes. like i have a 2 year old girl. when we got back off tour she had no idea who i was. so yeah, it can suck sometimes. so when I see us getting slagged off by some people i feel like finding them and kicking them in the arse. they don’t know what i have to give up to do music.

3. You guys wake up one morning and there stands a shiny brand new time machine (Delorean optional), what dates would you guys dial in and whyyyy?

Dan: Personally I’d like to see the last days of the Earth, I’d like to know whether it’s the human race that destroys the planet, or whether a disaster totally out of our hands causes our destruction. Either that, or go back in time and freak people out with my Blackberry or something.

j. about 5 years from now, to see if we ever got to play reading fest. if we haven’t, then i would go back in time and redo the 1st album and this one. or!! even better i would go back to 1990 and play everyone prodigy’s music a month before they put it out, but say its ours. that would freak them out.

From Stoney Roads 

4. How would you describe your music to a deaf person reading this interview?

Dan: I’d just put their hands on a speaker and let them experience it themselves, as I think it would be too hard by communicating by just sign language.

J. i would walk up to the nearest person and slap them in the face, then kick them in the balls. then give them a nice hug.

5. What are three words to explain what’s different about your next album and when can we expect it?

Dan: We’re just in the final stages of finishing it now, so I can’t really answer that!

J.hmm not sure. emo? folk? gabba?

6. What is your favorite music festival moment so far and why?

Dan: Either playing Coachella in LA or Summer Sonic in Japan, as those two festivals are amazing. I think the main festival dream we aspire to, is to play the main stage at Reading, as we’ve been going since we were small since it’s our home town.

J. reading. full stop!

From Ears of the Beholder 

7. Apart from Wireless & Global Gathering, you seem to be playing a lot of more obscure European festivals this year – was this a conscious decision to get out and do something new?

Dan: We’ve already done Reading and Leeds for the past two years running, and Glastonbury last year was quite an experience. However we didn’t make a conscious choice to do more obscure European festivals, we just spent a lot longer on finishing the new album than we thought we were going to take, so we missed putting ourselves forward for a few of the main ones, but it’s definitely a bonus as we get to play in countries we’ve never been to before and we’ll stop getting annoyed messages on myspace asking us why we never come to certain countries.. I think by spreading our wings we’ll extend our fan base too! We’ll be touring all over the world after July though.

8. Obviously, your songs and remixes get a lot of coverage on internet sites and blogs that often give away the files for free – what’s your take on the internet & how easy it is to download music for free?

Dan: I think obviously you can’t stop it happening, so it’s up to bands to just tour more to make their money, and just treat your album as a promotion for the tour. Hopefully a happier medium will happen soon, and record shops will stay open, and bands can keep their heads above water.

9. The music industry has changed significantly in recent years, and people are scrabbling around trying to reinvent the current model, with innovations like Spotify and Radiohead giving away music for free. What do you think is the future of music distribution?

Dan: Spotify is amazing, I use it every day when I wake up in the morning, Hopefully one day I’ll be able to have a Spotify car stereo, or be able to access it on my phone. Maybe they should have a "trial an album" option where if you listen to a song more than 5 times they make you pay 99p for it or something!?

j. Spotify is it. when they get that onto phones. its party time.

From Not Many Experts 

10. Your album contained a wide range of styles & sounds from song to song – who would you say are your primary influences?

Dan: I think we wore our influences on our sleeves on that album, anyone from Daft Punk, to The Cure  or Rage Against The Machine

j. yeah, you can hear who we like in that album. its a bit harder on this one, there are a 1 or 2 moments. but they are only really nods to the bands we like, not whole songs or anything.

11. When are we likely to hear material from the new record?

Dan:As soon as we’re ready to give it to our label!

and for James specifically:

12. What was it like working with Prodigy on their new record? 

well, its always great when you get to work with a hero of yours. when i got to work with Rich Costey i was freaked out. like i was not worthy to be in the same room!! so when liam got hold of my that spun me out. i in fact thought one of my band makes were playing a trick on me. but no. i never got in the studio with him, wich was a shame. we were touring in the US at the time. so we were emailing each other bits. it was good fun to do it. i mean i had been trying to rip Liams sound for years, so when i had the chance to do it legally i took full advantage.

From Battery In My Leg

Does It Offend You? Yeah will be appearing live at this year’s Wireless Festival, held in London’s Hyde Park on the 4th and 5th of July – for further information on the line-up and how you can get tickets please visit www.wirelessfestival.co.uk.

Does It Offend You, Yeah? – We Are Rockstars (Cold Blank Remix)

^ Sorry if above link runs out soon – was kicked off my file transfer service for being just far far too rock and roll for their liking. The things I do for you lot… I am going to have to cunningly deceive them by constructing an alter-ego and then try and behave myself a bit more. Until then… first 200 to the link above won’t be disappointed!