Interview with James Graham from Twilight Sad

Scotland, despite what its well-intended tourist board may say, is full of miserable bastards. Being a Scot and being a miserable bastard, I’m in the fairly comfortable position of being honest about this state of affairs without running the risk of a doin' by a parochial gaggle of tartan-painted internet activists. But let’s face it, wallowing in doom, gloom and glum-face morbidity is, quite simply, what we do best as a nation.

In recent years, the country has excelled at turning this miserablism into extraordinary music. Bands like Arab Strap, Mogwai and Frightened Rabbit have turned their graveyard dispositions into sounds that connect with punters across the globe. Their guttural tides of woe clicking with an increasingly disillusioned and disaffected western world.

Sitting atop this Saltire-swinging seething heap of musicians is Kilsyth melancholy-merchants The Twilight Sad. Led by gallows-humoured frontman James Graham, the band is renowned for its ear-pillaging guitars and tombstone lyricism. Their inaugural release, Fourteen Autumns and Fifteen Winters, stormed through the American underground, garnering praise for its bleak, gargantuan stacks of sound. Album number two, Forget the Night Ahead, offered more of the same, espousing hope-bereft tales of solitude and prostitutes.

This week, The Twilight Sad released their third longplayer, No One Can Ever Know. Styled in synths and ladled with industrialism, the record finds the band angling towardsa surprising trajectory. It’s still, unmistakably The Twilight Sad, but there’s more urgency, more ambition than ever before. So, in the build up to the release, I caught up with James Graham to find out what spurred the new direction, how working with Andy Weatherall is a breeze and what it takes to be the next Craig David…

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So James, here you are staring at album number three. You guys are becoming old hands at this. Is it fair to say you are at your creative peak right now?

James Graham [JG]: I don’t know. To be honest since we got signed and went off and did our first record everything has been a bit of a whirlwind. It’s never really seemed to stop. I’ve never really had the chance to sit back and think about everything. It’s just been a case of keeping on writing, releasing and touring. It’s a never ending cycle.

Is that a rhythm you’re getting used to?

JG: It’s a weird one. The way we started was pretty strange, as in we did two gigs in two years and on our third gig Fat Cat came and signed us and sent us off to America to mix a record and play some gigs. We hadn’t even played Edinburgh yet. We weren’t even used to being in a band at that point, we’d written nine songs on the first album and they were the first songs we’d ever written. So being in a band - going away and playing gigs - was all pretty alien to us, it felt like getting chucked in at the deep-end.

I remember speaking to people in the Scottish media when you guys were picked up Stateside. Everyone seemed mystified as to where you’d come from and how they’d failed to pick up on you. It was a bit of a strange beginning for the band, wasn’t it?

JG: Yes. Every Sunday we’d play in New York when we were mixing the album and I think we were playing to 100 people or something. It was probably because it was a Fat Cat showcase. Then we’d come home to Scotland and end up playing to just our family and friends.

Do you ever wish you’d done it differently?

JG:I’m quite glad we did do it. If we had to play around Scotland and all the different venues we’d probably have got quite frustrated as we’re quite lazy, to be honest. I suppose in some ways it would have been better to do it because we would have been ready for going out and touring, having an album out there and promoting.

When you only play two gigs before you record your first album, it’s weird. I suppose in a way it was good to be quite naïve. That probably helped in the studio and that’s what helped the first album happen. But, at the same time, when you’re out playing live people are pretty brutal and they’ll tell you exactly what they think of you. So it might have been good in that way.

The last time we spoke was just after the launch of Forget the Night Ahead and you seemed under a lot of pressure. Has that changed for you in this album?

JG: I think I put the pressure on myself. I’m trying to stay away from what anyone is saying on the outside. It’s not that good for me. Ultimately I’ve been happy with everything we’ve released, I wouldn’t have released it otherwise. But I think we put a lot of pressure on ourselves. There’s no doubt about it, there are a mix of emotions coming through with the run up of the album. I’m happy, I’m excited, I’m shitting myself. I’m just everything you can go through.

I’d be lying to say ‘I’m confident this is the best thing ever’. You just don’t know what people are going to say. We’ve learned that with the first two albums. Everyone has different tastes. I think the main thing to begin with is that you’re happy with it and you’re proud of it. I don’t think we could have done any better with this album at all. We’ve done ourselves justice on it. It’s definitely a pretty nerve wracking thing.

Is it more nerve wracking because of the overhaul in sound on this record?

JG: I suppose we were known for a certain thing before, in the first two albums. I think the majority of what we’re known for is still on the new record. It’s still us. When you’re in a band and you’re releasing new material you’re damned if you do and you’re damned if you don’t. I’m not going to say that every single person who likes our band at this point is going to like the new record. But at the same time I’d like to think that on this album the songs and song-writing are better. I think song-writing is one of our strong points and that’s still there with the album.

I wouldn’t have wanted to hear a Fourteen Autumns and Fifteen Winters Part 2 or a Forget the Night Ahead Part 2. If you want to listen to those albums go back and listening to them. Any band I like, I want to see them try new things and develop and that’s what we’ve tried to do. So, I’d say there was a slight excitement about the new album because of this change in direction. I wouldn’t even say it was that big a change of direction really, although I can see why others might think it would be.

I’d say it still sounds like a Twilight Sad record, but moving on in a more natural direction. In an odd sense - despite it’s heavy gothic tints - it seems to be the most immediate record you’ve released so far.

JG:Yes, totally. That’s exactly what I wanted to hear. It was natural, there was no point where any of us sat back and said ‘we need to change, we need to do this’. We just sat down and wrote the songs. Nobody started questioning what we were doing. It wasn’t a case of ‘change this, change that’. We used what was interesting to us and what was exciting us. The album is a case of us moving on and trying new things. I don’t want to hear us doing the same thing. We would get bored ourselves. If we’d produced something like the last albums we’d probably be calling it a day. It’s boring and not the point of this band. We want to try and get better with every release and that’s what we’ve been doing.

There are a lot of reference points to gothically-tinged, propulsive acts in the press release, was that what you were listening to when making the record?

JG: I think that is what Andy [Macfarlane - guitarist] was listening to. I’ve not done anything different to be honest. Andy gave me the music and I added lyrics to that. There’s a slight change in what I’m writing about on every album, but it’s still about friends, family, personal things. But Andy was definitely listening to that kind of stuff when he was writing. I think he’d been to Berlin on holiday a few times.. I suppose what you’re listening to always sub-consciously comes through into the music you write.

So was it a case of Andy rocking up with some new sounds and you guys taking his steer?

JG: Andy sent over the rough guitar parts to me and I wrote the songs towards them and he just built them up. It was like previous releases, but he just used synths this time. Then Mark [Devine - drums] works his parts on his own as well. There was no point when it was like ‘Andy what the fuck are you doing? Where’s the mental guitars? What’s happening?’ We just kept going with it. We could have put noisy massive guitars in this production, but I think it would have spoiled the songs. Andy’s guitars are still there on the tracks but he’s just done it in a different way. It’s a brave decision on his part, to be honest, because that’s what he was known for. If you go see Andy play live, he fucking blows your head off - my ears are fucked from it that’s for sure.

I can imagine - I don’t fancy having that sound blasting through my head every night. With the change in musical direction then, has your song-writing changed to fit in with the music?

JG: A lot of the stuff I do is pretty subconscious and I write what I write. There was definitely a them running through the album. I hope this doesn’t sound wanky in anyway, but I see it as every song is a chapter in the over all theme and that’s why I think the album needs to be listened to as a whole. Does that sound wanky? [laughs] I’d hate to come across like a total prick.

But there’s definitely a theme running through the record. It wasn’t challenging at all, I just did what came naturally. I think that’s the one good thing about the band; we’re not trying to be anything we’re not. Our music is pretty honest, there’s no bullshit with us. It’s just five guys who are making music and want to make it in a certain way. There’s no airs or graces about it, we just do what comes naturally and if it comes out good that’s brilliant.

I was a bit concerned the album might end up with Andy Weatherall’s pawprints all over it, but it still comes out sounding like a Twilight Sad album. How much input did he have in its creation?

JG: When we were doing the demos we were thinking about having a producer in for the first time. Even though we knew what we were doing, it would have been nice to have someone to help guide us along. We gave it to certain people who were interested and Andrew [Weatherall] was one of them. We met him and he gave us a mix tape of the sounds and songs he thought we could use - his musical knowledge is off the scale.

Andy and Mark had done a shitload of pre-production before we went down to London to make sure we didn’t waste any time. Once we got in the studio, Andrew came in and said ‘you’ve done everything I would have told you to do’, so he was there to help guide us and bounce ideas off him. All the song structures were set before we got down there. He was there as a reference point, telling us we were doing the right thing. He worked on some of the vocal sounds and things like that, so I’m glad he was there. He was more like an anti-producer.

As a record it doesn’t feel particularly Scottish, there’s more of a grimy industrial city style sound to it than anything else. Is that what you were going for?

JG: We’ve never been ones for waving the Saltire flag around. I suppose, like everything we do, we never really think about that. On the first few albums I guess you could get a definite Scottish feel, but aye I definitely see where you are coming from. Someone was telling me they were listening it on a train the other day and it sounded great.

Exactly. It’s more industrial, almost urban - but clearly not in the ‘urban’ sense like, er, Craig David or someone like that.

JG: I’d be pretty happy if we sold as many records as Craig David.

You might need a bit more of an optimistic outlook for that James

JG: Aye, we’re fucked then aren’t we?

Possibly. But I’d not worry about it, just ask yourself where is he now and feel smug as fuck. As a Scottish band, Twilight Sad are one of the few in recent times that have ‘made it’ beyond the Scottish borders. What makes you so different?

JG: Ultimately we don’t want to be liked just in Scotland. The whole ambition of the band is to try and see how far it can go. I don’t want to just be popular in Scotland, even though I definitely do want to be popular in Scotland, it’s where I live and I love it. But you can’t make a career out of that. I want this band to go to different countries, play to different crowds. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve got no delusions of grandeur. I can never see us being a massive band. I just want out music to be as big as possible so we can keep doing it. That’s the one thing these days, it’s pretty hard to be in a band financially. The one hope we have of this album is that it allows us to make another album.

Is that sense of sustainability the ambition for the band then?

JG: Yeah, we’re not looking too far ahead. We love doing this, it’s great. It’s not as easy as I thought it would be. I’m not too sure what else I would do, I’m rubbish at everything else. People might say I’m rubbish at this as well, but that’s up to them. I always saw the band as a work in progress and it was always going to take time for us to get any where. We were never going to blow up to be a big band on any album, it was just going to be a steady grower. We looked at bands like Mogwai and how their career went. If we could get half as far as they have, I’d be happy with that. The way their career has went is very natural and that’s the way I want it.

I think the significant reduction in the size of the track titles compared to those on the previous records is quite an interesting move. Has that got anything to do with your head space at the time of writing or is it a reflection of the band’s newish direction?

JG: I think it’s a mixture of stuff. I don’t think those kind of titles would have worked on this album. It definitely worked on this album and made sense in the whole of context. It wasn’t subconscious, but it was one of those things that we all went ‘this is what the song is called and everyone said aye cool’. I definitely think it would have been wrong to try and call it some massive book-type title. But, aye, the song titles definitely getting smaller. I think it’s maybe where we are as people as well.

The song titles may be smaller, but they are still pretty dark. What kind of frame of mind were you in when you wrote the songs?

JG: [Laughs] I was happy-go-lucky, I’d like to say. As people we’re pretty normal. I know a lot of people think we’re the most miserable bastards going, but I enjoy writing about the darker side of life, rather than somebody bashing on about how great their life is and how everything is bright because obviously that’s just not true.

You’re never going to make the next Craig David with that attitude.

JG: Nah, there’s no way. I cannae see me doing my version of 'Seven Days'. Although my version of 'Seven Days' would be pretty good, actually. I could definitely alter those lyrics a wee bit… But I’m definitely in a better head space than the second record. That record was pretty much the depths of despair for me. It was a pretty hard time. That’s why I wrote that. I only write when I’ve got something moan about. And believe me I’ve got lots of stuff to moan about. I'm a moany bastard. I’ve got piles of stuff I want to write about.

So is lyric writing is cathartic for you?

JG: Pretty much, yeah. A lot of what I’m writing about is subconscious as well. That song 'Days From The Birdhouse', I had an inkling about what it was about. Then one night when we were playing it, it completely clicked with me. It was really weird. That happened with Nil on this album. My dad had listened to it and he mentioned a lyric in the song and said ‘y’know who said that don’t you? That was so and so from ages ago’. And I didn’t realise. I surprised myself with that. I must be writing subconsciously in some ways, even though I know what I’m writing about, there must be other wee things in the back of my head that come out for some reason.

Maybe not take that to a psychologist to get that checked out.

JG: They’ll definitely say I’m a weirdo. But I knew that anyway.

Talking of weirdos. You’ve taken up Twitter with some enthusiasm

JG: I was quite hesitant to get involved in that world to be honest. No one really knows much about us, I don’t think. I find it quite a good way to talk to people who like your music. I’ve stated talking to people I would never have talked to.

So you see it as a useful way of cutting out the middle man, i.e. me?

JG: [Laughs] I find that 905% of the internet is negative. It’s a fucking harsh world out there. So I like to keep it positive. I looked at what I wrote the other day and 90% of it was pish, but at the same time 90% of it was positive. I don’t like going about saying that people are shite. The only person I like saying is shite is Aidan Moffatt when he’s in his house drinking and watching the music telly.

I was just about to ask what you thought of Aidan’s 140 character escapades

JG: I think it’s amazing. It’s what Twitter is made for. He’s basically saying what everyone else is afraid to say. I think I’ve called a few folks dicks on it, but they’ve deserved it. I’m trying to make myself a bit more positive than my music might suggest

10 tracks of 2010

So, that’s Christmas done then. Presents opened; meat devoured; copious volumes of wine skulled. With 2011 now looming forebodingly on the horizon, I thought I’d take a look back through my musical catalogue to pick out my ten favoured tracks of the last 12 months.

All in all, it’s been a bulbous musical year. My eardrums seem to have been drowning in glitchy electro that’s incites languid head nods rather than dancefloor limb-flinging. Despite this penchant for mother-board made bleeps and blips, there’s was a deluge of staple guitar-based bands that produced the musical goods, particularly from north of the border.

Anyway, enough procrastinating. Here are the ten tracks that stuck their pistols to my temples and demanded repeat listening in 2010 (click each title for videos)…

Honestly The Beast – John Knox Sex Club

The locally concocted hype that enshrouds Scottish bands can be as off-putting as it is intriguing. So, there was something admirable about a band like John Knox Sex Club quietly stepping into the spotlight with debut LP Blud Rins Cauld. Part demonic throb, part melancholic weep, Honestly The Beast perfectly cross-sections the band’s uncompromising tendencies. The weep of violin juxtaposed against a wild-eyed scree of post-rock is an astonishing rumble that places this thrilling Glasgow outfit amidst the creamy crop of 2010’s best.

Aidy’s Girl Is a Computer – Darkstar

I fell hard for effects board wizardry in 2010. Seriously, I spent most of the year slavering like a doe-eyed teen over any beard-sporting, Macbook-slinging electro-cat that purred its way into my lugholes. Undoubtedly, Darkstar’s North was the head pickling delight of the year’s rhythmically slinky records; a careful concoction of textured soundscapes and emotive songwriting that uncovered fresh rewards on every listen . Oddly, standout number Aidy’s Girl Is A Computer was a strange anomaly on the record’s luscious musical pasture. Awash with textured electronica, the track’s voiceless sprawl of beat-fed repetition creates a hypnotising glare of pinball machine melody that’s impossible to shake.

He Would Have Laughed – Deerhunter

Even if it wasn’t written as a tribute to the sadly departed Jay Retread, He Would Have Laughed would still moisten the most hardened tear ducts. Immersed in a tide of cascading percussion and chiming guitar, Bradley Cox’s strained intone barely breathes amongst the opening notes of this transcendental haze. But as the track’s layers slowly peel away, his pleading crow begs its way to the fore as a wallow of self-pity that gnarls away at any remaining heart-strings. It’s a stunning arrangement that deserves wider airing, but considering how unappreciated much of Cox’s work is (partly down to his own relentless output), this will likely go down as another masterful effort that gets filed away without much notice.

Rachel & Cali – Damien Jurado

Picking a track from Jurado’s masterful LP Saint Bartlett was a tough call, but the ghostly aesthetic of Rachel & Cali just about scrapes it. Built on skeletal acoustic rhythm and Jurado’s echoic, agonised vocal, this shimmering cut is testament to pure songwriting – something 2010 has strangely lacked. Jurado’s always been skilled in picking at the bones of his past and a fug of personal retrospect blankets this lushly composed lament. As tear-jerkers go, you’re unlikely to have heard anything as brittle or honest in 2010.

I Built Myself A Metal Bird – Thee Silver Mt Zion Memorial Orchestra

A rampaging blast of Fugazi-like guitar, this was the stand out cut from Thee Silver Mt. Zion...’s widely overlooked Kollaps Tradixionales. Admittedly, Efrim Menuck’s jarring wail is an acquired, possibly unlovable, taste but here his ear-bleeding wail falls perfectly into place amongst the rapacious whirlwind of violin, riff and percussion. What he’s warbling on about, it’s impossible to say, but this is a serrated affair that cuts its way deep through your nervous system.

The Splendour – Pantha Du Prince

Another electro-bending hypnotist who flooded my ear drums this year was German-based producer Hendrik Weber. Riding under the moniker Pantha Du Prince, Weber’s third full-length, Black Noise, was a remarkably amphibian affair. The Splendour’s arid soundscape may not seem like the most immediate number on a record that contains the infectious Noah Lennox collaboration ‘Stick To My Side’, but unravel its endless layers and you’ll find yourself embedded in a gloriously rich velodrome of perpendicular rhythm.

New Ruin – Meursault

Despite the slavering attention it received elsewhere, All Creatures Will Make Merry (ACWMM) never really clicked with me. Live, Meursault are a formidable beast; yet for some reason that bombast never truly washed through their second full LP. Perhaps my expectations were too high, but ACWMM felt more like a step to the side than a step forward. But embedded within the album was a track that underscored Meursault’s live opulence. Built around a breathtaking framework of pulsing drum and cavernous effects, New Ruin strides airwaves like a gargantuan, massive in both sound and ambition. Carry on like this and Meursault could be frightening.

Girl Named Hello - Of Montreal

Let’s face it Of Montreal are a band made for fornication. Wriggling, pulsing, scratching, writhing, they frequently hit the G-spot of unbridled aural thrills. Girl Named Hello is no different. Trembling like the knees of an ageing sex pest in a backstreet brothel, this slickly coined dancefloor shuffler finds Kevin Barnes in curiously reflective mood. Sure, “If I treated someone else the way I treat myself, I’d be in jail” my not be the most intellectually stimulating line you’ve heard this year, but fed by a gyrating thrust of ass-slapping bass it’s probably the sexiest.

The Wrong Car – Twilight Sad

Where this came from, who knows. If Forget The Night Ahead was an unfocused affair, then these seven minutes see The Twilight Sad re-honing their lens with bombastic aplomb. The thing its, it’s not a new formula; Andy Macfarlane’s glum-pussed guitar still brawls alongside James Graham’s inimitable crow. But instead of churning out the same cave-friendly tumult of 14 Autumns…, this is a driving, seething affair that lacerates your synapses like a Buckfast-swilling barber.

Mexico Wax Solvent – The Fall

Led by the festering oscillations of 2010’s dirtiest guitar riff, this violent urban fuck of a track bears its teeth with typical Mark E Smith rabidity. The stand out on this year’s remarkable Our Future Your Clutter, Mexico Wax Solvent is the most obviously polished gem in the album’s cliff face of jagged, knuckle grating cuts. Not that it’s done The Fall any chart favours, mind; with Smith maniacally quavering about barbiturates, making rice with screwdrivers and governmental coups it was never likely to chime with the lightweight swarms. Still, this is one of the most exalting thumps of industrial post-punk clatter to detonate its way through my speakers in years.

Interview with the Twilight Sad's James Graham

It’s been a long year in the life of The Twilight Sad. Album number two, Forget the Night Ahead, may have been released just over 12 months ago, but since then the band have lost bassist Craig Orzel, toured relentlessly and released one of 2010’s most remarkable EPs, 'The Wrong Car'.

On the back of their final shows of the year with fellow Scots Errors, we interrupted singer James Graham’s post-tour recuperation to talk new album, morbid lyrics and a possible career in Hip Hop...

How’s it going James, you recovered from the tour with Errors?

James Graham [JG]: I’m good thanks. Just coming down after the tour. Glad to be back home and not have anything planned until next year, gigging-wise, to be honest. It was only a couple of weeks but I think in my head I just want to get on with the new stuff and get the new album done and recorded.

I really enjoyed the tour, it was great to play. But when you know you’ve got songs that are really different from that last album it’s quite strange going from one head space when you’re writing new songs and then playing all the old ones on stage. It was a good laugh and we really enjoyed it and I think both bands did really well out of it.

Musically, you’re quite a different band from Errors – how did it come about?

JG: It was one of those ideas that came from being in the pub drinking and the next day you think ‘actually that was pretty good’ – unlike most ideas that come from the pub. I suppose it was on the back of them remixing us and us remixing them, so we thought it seemed a good idea. And because we are quite different, it did make it a different sort of night.

The contrasting styles worked quite well didn’t they?

JG: Yeah, when you’ve got co-headlining bands you’ll always tend to get some people there for one band over the other. But it seemed like most people were there to hear both bands, even though we are kind of different.

The Edinburgh gig was really strong – it’s probably the best I’ve ever seen you.

JG: Yeah but I saw a few reviews that were basically saying it was too loud for them. At one point there was a girl down the front who was greetin’ – I kinda hope it was to do with it being too loud, rather than the songs being rubbish.

Actually our photographer did mention there was someone down the front who looked like she’d been crying.

JG: Me and Andy [McFarlane] had an acoustic set at Oran Mor and there was a girl down the front singing every lyric a beat out of time. I actually had to stop mid-way through and say ‘Look, I don’t know what you’re doin’ but it’s no actually what am doin’. Can you stop this?’ I’m pretty sure I saw her at the Edinburgh gig so it could possibly have been her.

But I can never tell if it was a good gig or not. We’re not exactly the kind of band that interact with the crowd or anything like that.

Sound-wise you seemed a lot more direct than previous shows. Was that intentional?

JG: Aye, we don’t really take a breath and we just hammer away at it. I’m definitely not someone who likes talking to the crowd, anyway. I would rather just play the songs, then that’s it done. I think it will be completely different from the next time you see us again. We are going for something completely different.



Is this more in line with the remixes you’ve done with Errors and Mogwai?

JG: We’re not full on Basshunter style. It’s quite hard to say just now because it’s just demos but there’s definitely a lot more space in the songs. There’s not a lot of guitars, which is quite strange for a band that’s always used a lot of guitars. But everybody who’s heard the demos have reacted really well to it. The label [Fat Cat Records] are pretty excited about it too.

For us, it’s just time to try something different. There’re parts that are still us: you can’t really change my stupid voice and the song writing is always going to be done the way we’ve been doing it, but the instrumentation side has definitely changed.

So are you saying we can expect a more pop direction from the Twilight Sad?

JG: [Laughs] I wouldnae say Pop. It’s quite hard to describe at the moment but it’s a conscious thing we’re doing. We cannae just replicate the same things we’ve been doing – there’d be no point in doing the album if we were going to do that.

It’s been a tough year for you guys. The last album didn’t really resonate with the public like Fourteen Autumns... did and you lost your bassist Craig. Has this change of direction stemmed from that?

JG: The weird thing is that people who liked the second album didn’t like the first album and there were a lot of people who liked the first but didn’t like the second. As soon as we went into the recording studio, Paul Savage [co-producer] said ‘Just before I hear anything you’ve done, you should know for a fact people are going to say it’s not as good as the first one’. It happens with every single band. But we were really happy with the way it came out.

In America it took us to the next level. I never thought we’d be a band who could play to 1,300 people. I never really thought we’d be able to get to those kind of stages. Even in New York, we played the Bowery Ballroom. Different magazines seemed to take notice of us and that’s got us bigger audiences in different places

With Craig leaving, the whole album campaign was kind of jilted and we had problems with booking agents. There was definitely a stunted album campaign, whereas with this one we’re hoping it goes a lot more smoothly. We’re still friends with Craig. He just decided he wanted to live a normal life.

You mean it’s not a normal life in The Twilight Sad?

JG: [Laughs] Nah. I think he got fed up with the travelling and Craig didn’t write the songs. I think he found it a bit frustrating but that’s the way we write and there’s nothing we can change about that. Touring’s not for everybody, to be honest a lot of the time I just cannae stand it, but sometimes its can be the best thing.

Now you’re finished touring the record, what are you’re plans for the rest of the year?

JG: We’re just finishing off the demos and are talking to producers right now. Basically we’re just finding out where and when we’re doing it. This time we’ll be using a producer instead of Andy just producing it. We want some sort of outside influence, someone we definitely trust and respect. We’ve got that Mogwai tour in February and the record definitely needs to be finished by then. Then it’s back into the whole cycle again.

Touring and touring and touring?

JG: Yep, touring and damaging our livers, falling out and nearly breaking up. All the joys of being in a band.



So do you think the new record will be the next step up for you? Perhaps you're the next Snow Patrol?

JG: Eh…no. I was listening to the demos the other day and, again, the subject matter is still quite dark - it’s not going to be happy-go-lucky. Some of it’s quite brutal – listening back I was thinking ‘F***, people are going to think I’m a weirdo’ but people already probably think that so I don’t think it matters.

Has the inspiration for your lyrics changed as the band’s evolved?

JG: I put it not quite so elegantly the other day: The first one was about other people being dicks. The second one was about me being a pure dick. And the third one is ‘we’re all dicks’.

With every album we’ve always started on the lyrics and know what way it’s going. This time it’s more like the first one, where it’s focusing in on other people and relationships between people. The second one needed to be about me going through a bad space because that’s what was happening and it made the songs more honest. For this one, it’s about other people – and not in a good way.

There’s never really going to be a happy song with this band. I’ve got a lot of people that I think are dicks. There are too many dicks in the world for me not to. In fact, that’s what the album should be called: ‘There’s too many dicks in the world’.

You were recently named by a certain Radar hack as his favourite Glasgow band of the last ten years. How does it feel now people are speaking of you in the same breath as Mogwai and Arab Strap?

JG: It’s very strange, very strange. It’s even stranger now that we’re friends with these people as well. I still think of these bands in that way, so it’s pretty amazing to be classed in the same category as these guys - especially as I looked up to them when I was growing up. It’s probably one of the biggest compliments we could have.

Do you feel like you have a responsibility to help new bands out, now you’ve ‘made it’?

JG: Honestly, I don’t really know any. I’m not someone who goes to gigs and says ‘alright guys, how you doin’?’. I prefer to float in the background, watch them and maybe say to someone that I like them. I’m too busy sorting out our band at the moment. I can’t really imagine us being nurturers – we’d probably be quite a bad influence.

One thing that people can take from what we’ve done is that we’ve done it our own way. We’ve always stuck to our guns and we’re not a band that’s been on the front of magazines or on the telly. We are where we are right now through a lot of hard work.



What do you want to achieve with the next record then?

JG: Just the same as we’ve done before, really. If things happen they happen, if they don’t then there’s nothing we can do about. Now we’re kind of making a living out of it - don’t get me wrong we’re not rich or anything, but we’re getting by. As long as it’s still interesting to us and we’re making music we’re all really proud of we’ll keep going.

I don’t want to be the nearly men where we’ve put so much hard work into it and just fall flat at the last minute.

That suggests you have an idea of where you want to be?

JG: If we’re going around the world and selling out venues of 200 people that’s cool for me. I just want to be able to keep doing it and know that what we’re doing is good and not just completely self-righteous. I always look at Mogwai and see how they’ve done their career. They’re big everywhere they go, sell out gigs and are well respected. That’s probably a good place to aim for.

Your crowds are definitely increasing with every album, maybe fame and fortune isn’t that far away?

JG: I don’t think we’ll ever blow up, but if we can slowly build our fan-base and still be thinking we’re pushing what we’re doing musically I’ll be happy. Then after that I’ll start my Hip-Hop/R&B solo career.

Is that the career path we can expect from a content James Graham?

JG: Definitely. When I’ve found the happy side in me. I’m actually quite a happy guy but I just focus on the dark side for some reason. If you look at all the best Scottish bands, they’re definitely not The Fratellis anyway. Aye, one day maybe I’ll write a pop classic. I’ll have to get someone else to sing it. I can’t imagine a pop classic with my voice.

LIVE REVIEW: Twilight Sad, Errors @ Liquid Rooms, Edinburgh 13 October

Despite clashing with Scotland’s efforts at upstaging football’s reigning world champions, Edinburgh’s Liquid Room is rammed with pale-faced indie urchins tonight. The reason? Two of the country’s most intense acts are moments away from plying their hearing-aid busting trade in the venue’s freshly re-constructed stage.

Billed as a duel between a duo of amply busted blondes, the titillating pre-gig posters prove disappointingly off-kilter. Still, when you’re talking about a pairing as cacophonous as The Twilight Sad and Errors, it’s difficult to quibble over misleading marketing. In fact, there’s a tinge of a relief it’s a lingerie-free show.

After two weeks on the road, Errors are struggling to shake off the tour bus cramps. The slow methodical opening notes of 'Bridge or Cloud?' filter out wearily, like the aspirin-seeking fumble induced by a morning after. But once the mechanics of their idiosyncratic machine get going, the Rock Action-signed quartet shift into a frenetic pace.

Although difficult to pin down on record, Errors live are a much more transparent experience. Math dalliances run down the band’s spine and educated time signatures noodle through every number. Simon Ward’s inter-song bouts of laconic self-deprecation may suggest they’re all too ready to play the fool, but this is a band that demands to be taken seriously.

Tonight’s action is spellbinding; rattling to the sound of discordant, cowbell-stained cuts while drummer James Hamilton pummels skins with marathon man ambitions. At times the retrograde synths float dangerously close to hands-to-the-heavens dancefloor cheese, but when the brazenly ambitious 'Mr Milk' is bruised into the mix such annoyances are easy to forgive.

Swaying together in krautrock hypnosis, Errors’ patchwork of guitar, effects and drum tighten to the point of rigor mortis, setting limbs in an epileptic trance to 'Salut France!' and 'Toes'. As this perspiring pit of a venue will testify, it’s the sound of a band pushing to its peak.

You could argue The Twilight Sad are making their descent from Errors’ destination. Forget The Night Ahead, last year’s follow up to the much lauded Fourteen Autumns & Fifteen Winters, failed to click with the music buying droves and their troubles were compounded by bassist Craig Orzel’s sudden departure. Suddenly a sullen band just got morbid.

But the Kilsyth quartet are a resilient mob and new songs 'The Wrong Car' and 'Throw Yourselves Into The Water Again' prove there’s enough fuel to light their excruciatingly loud furnace. And by firing into the former with the violence of a midnight mugging, James Graham is hell bent on denying eager obituary writers their ‘should have been so much more’ soundbites.

Tonight, The Twilight Sad are merciless: deafening in volume and unnervingly precise in execution. As Graham’s aggressive, often indecipherable, intone growls its way around 'I Became A Prostitute' and the absorbing 'That Summer At Home I Had Become The Invisible Boy', a congealed mass of noise shudders behind, quickly making its way through the floorboards.

The problem with Graham’s demented stage-prowling is that the band’s vastly improved musical ear tends to be overlooked. Instead of pulverising venues straight down the middle, they’ve added an all-consuming air to their performance; as if they’ve finally mastered the art of filling a room. Of course, this is still gargantuan, ear-raping stuff, but now it’s executed with steely purpose.

While few numbers here are drawn from album number two, tonight’s roaring reawakening suggests a more fitting long-player may not be far off. Closing with a ferocious, claustrophobic rendition of 'And She Would Darken The Memory', The Twilight Sad are becoming what we always thought they could be: a band to be scared of.

Photos: Su Anderson

Interview: Frightened Rabbit & The Twilight Sad

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