21 January 2013

Interview with Mallory Knox

Mallory Knox are a darn talented band. Not only did they manage to storm up to the coveted  #1 position on the iTunes Rock Chart with their debut album Signals but they also managed to get #4 on the Albums Chart last time I checked. You have to admit, it's pretty impressive. So, as a way of bringing in more fans who may not have heard of them yet and to give their current fans what I hope will be an interesting read,
I did this interview with lead singer Mikey Chapman and bassist/ backing vocalist Sam Douglas. You can have a look at the official version of the interview here.



1. Firstly, describe your music in one word.

Sam: Powerful.

Mikey: That was what I was going to say.

Sam: Were you actually? There you go, powerful is the word.

Mike: Emotive.

2. Did you always want to be in a band or was there a defining experience that made you start wanting to be in one?

Mikey: That's a really good question actually. I think since we were very young we've been in bands. For me I think it was about 13. So we've always jammed but it was really an excuse to get out of lessons because we could actually go practice in the music room. It blossomed from there. I think  that we had done it for so long that I couldn't imagine doing anything else,  rather than being a defining moment. It was a progression.

Sam: I was about 13. I think that music was the first thing that ever made me go "I'd love to be able to do that." So I just bought a guitar and you never think that you'd get in a band that's successful so it's not like " I'm going to be in a band, I'm going to play Wembley Arena." You just play music for the love of it and whatever happens, happens. That's how I've always looked at it.

3. Why did you call your new album Signals?

Sam : When you think about album names, well for me anyway, I want it to be able to represent anything. All the songs we write are all different but I like to think that every song message is telling something that we want to talk about or is confronting something that is going on. That's how I look at it and that's what I wanted Signals to be but we never discussed why we wanted to call it Signals - we all just said that Signals is a really good name. I think the song Signals was a big part of why it was called that. That's probably the biggest song topic of the album, about how everything is not quite as it seems and how there's stuff going on that you can't control.

Mikey: I think signals as a word is quite ambiguous; it's got lots of meanings and lots of directions that you can go with the definition of it and I think that in itself is quite a cool thing and I think that reflects largely on the meanings behind a lot of the songs in the album.

Interviewer: So you want to leave yourself open to interpretation?

Mikey: Absolutely. Ambiguity is key; people can make of it what they will.

4. You guys recorded your album last January so why did you wait so long to release it, despite there being talk of releasing it last summer?

Sam: That was the original plan and then people far more intelligent than we are then said "You shouldn't release it then, let's  get you guys out there a little bit more,";  everything they've said has come to pass and it's been the best decision we've ever made in terms of sitting on this album. Where there might have been a core select of fans that really wanted the songs out in May, we've gained a hell of a lot more than we would have done releasing it back in May so in terms of Radio 1, Kerrang!, Scuzz, all the other radio channels and the tours that we've got under our belts, it's all been worth it and it's proved that the decision that was made was completely the correct one.  We've wanted to get it out and it's been frustrating as we've been playing the same five songs for the last two years. From a selfish point of view, we wanted to release it in May but the correct decision was to hold on, bide our time and then come out in the end.

Interviewer: Which is why you're bombarding fans with songs now - it's overwhelming!

Sam: We can't stop giving you songs!

Mikey: We're making up for lost time.

5. Some bands might have a mind-set that their old music becomes irrelevant when they release a new record. Do you agree with that?

Mikey: No, I don't at all. I see previous songs that you've brought out or had on album or an EP as your lineage, your timeline or the family tree of your musicianship as it were. It's a way to look back and see where you've come from; it's almost like a time capsule as you can see how you were feeling at the time and the things you were writing about then, whether they still affect you now and how has that album or EP, in particular for us, how has that influenced the new stuff and perhaps influence the next album.

Sam: That's the thing, you grow and you have to be writing what you think are better songs than you wrote before. I still love Pilot and I probably always will because we worked really hard on those songs but Signals had to be better and I like to think it is. I hope other people are going to agree when it comes out but we’ll never forget what Pilot is.

Mikey: At the same time, it’s nice to remember them because some of them genuinely, if I do say so myself, are really great songs. I listened to a girl on YouTube earlier today covering Oceans acoustically and it was beautiful, it really was beautiful. It made me see the song in a slightly different light because of the way she was interpreting the lyrics  and the meaning behind it and you know, that was written two or three years ago but it’s still a really great song.

Sam: I don’t think we’ll ever become a band that’s like “Not playing that song anymore because it bores me and I’ve been playing it for five years.” I don’t think we’ll ever do that but as long as people still want those songs to be in the set, they’ll be in the set.

6. Do you think that your different music tastes, which shapes how your music sounds, is a contributing factor to your success?

Sam: I don’t really know. We are all very different because Dave and Joe, well Joe listens to everything but Dave is very into his heavier stuff like Slipknot,  Dillinger, Underoath and Bring Me The Horizon but James is very into his pop- punk and Mikey is into his acoustic, folk stuff and I’m  like Joe, across the board, so it helps. I don’t think you’re going to get a song that sounds exactly like one another with us because of that and that might be why people are interested in us,  because I don’t think with us that every single song is the same. There’s a song on our album, 1949, that we could never have written two and a half years ago; it’s like a ballad, it sounds like it could be on a Bon Jovi record. We never quite know what we’re going to come up with so I guess that’s exciting - we don’t know what we’re going to do half the time in terms of song writing.

7. Talking about success, how did you manage to get the tour with Don Broco?

Sam: Dave had to do many, many favours for many different guys. Joke.
              
Mikey: We’ve been out all summer with them on various festivals and made really great friends. They’re really good guys and we’ve got links industry wise with them, the people that they work with work with us.

Sam: In a nutshell, they wanted to tour with us and we wanted to tour with them. With the year they had last year, we would have been crazy not to have said yes. The offer came in, we said yes.

8. What’s next for you guys?

Sam: Broco tour. (Laughs) We’re confirmed for Slam Dunk. There’s more going on in terms of festivals, we just have to see what happens. There will be a headline tour as I said, we just don’t know when. There will be more support tours, there’ll be another single with another video. Everything, there’s going to be more everything!

Mikey: We’re going to be as busy and in everyone’s faces as we possibly can be, the whole year if we can get away with it so expect plenty more.

9. Who are your heroes, musical or otherwise?

Sam: Mark Hoppus, Blink 182. Done.

Mikey: This is going to sound really cheesy but my dad is my hero. He really is. It’s cheesy as hell! He’s worked very hard and he’s supported me and my family through a lot just like everyone’s dad I guess but yeah, if I’m half the bloke he is.

Sam: I should have used that moment for some brownie points! Your dad will probably listen to this interview; Mark Hoppus is like probably not. So I should have said my mother. Or my dog.

10. What’s your most bizarre tour rider request?

Sam: We never request anything weird but once we got given toy soldiers.

Mikey: And 50 shades of grey. We got 50 shades of grey on a tour rider once. Yeah, I don’t actually know what happened to it.

Sam: Joe probably burnt it.

Mikey: No, Dave probably tucked it in his bag and has got it at home somewhere but  we’re not one for weird riders yet.

Interviewer: Well, that could change.

Mikey: Yeah, that’s it.

Sam: If we get to the point where our careers go up I’ll think of something.

11. One final question, what’s your favourite word?

Mikey: Favourite word? Oh, this is a sick question!
Sam: Mine would be genuinely; I say it all the time. “I genuinely believe” or “I genuinely think so”, like “Genuinely, I’m telling the truth.” It’s not my favourite word but I say it all the time.

Mikey: Mine is spatula.

Interviewer: Spatula. Any specific reason why?

Mikey: It’s just really fun to say, spatula.

Sam: We’ll name the next album that. Yeah, we’re going for “Genuinely Spatula”.







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