Messed!Up
Every generation since the birth of rock has had its musical punks; the rockabilly roughnecks and the bowl-cut fuzz demons, the safety pin New Wavers and the mohawk moshers. When British rockers invaded the United States in the 19s, youths responded by growing long hair and playing electrified music in suburban garages. Garage rock was born and has from that invasion grown from a hobby of the rebellious to a cultural statement.
Garage rock may have originated as a strictly teenage phenomenon in the sixties, but it has refused to die and instead become one of the most timeless genres of music in existence. The heavy layers of fuzzed guitar riffs and bawling basslines appeal strongly to an anesthetic point that it’s dream inducing.
The modern sound of garage rock has been shaped shaped by a new generation of hard-hitting and fuzz-heavy rock bands combining garage rock, indie rock and bits and pieces of grunge into “fuzzy grunge pop”, at least if you ask Calva Louise.
Growing up in Venezuela but moving to France in her teens, frontman Jess Allanic meet up with bassist Alizon Taho, and they both shared the same visions about the future: being musicians. We don’t know about the garage rock scene in France but apparently most great bands on their vinyl player were from the UK and to follow the same path as their role model bands, Jess and Alizon decided to move across the canal to make it happen. Just short after the move they met up with New Zealand born drummer Ben Parker and the band was born.
Being constantly on tour last year with Spring King, The Blinders, Strange Bones and Hunter & The Bear, routinely ripping up venues nationwide with their “fuzzy grunge pop”, the band is just about to release their debut album “Rhinoceros” [Tomorrow, February 1st !] on one of the hottest indie labels in the UK at the moment, Modern Sky.
When Alizon, Ben and Jess made a stopover at Molotow’s Mücke bei die Fische Festival we sat down with the band to talk about being influenced by absurd plays, why the album comes with a comic book and constantly being on tour.
The interview takes off in a summary of an amazing 2018 and some great new friendships with bands they’ve supported.
Gigography 2018: “One hundred and a bit”
I know the story how you, Jess, moved from Venezuela to France in your teens and met Alizon but what was the reason to move to London?
Jess: Music! It was all about starting a band.
Alizon: From the day Jess and I met it was clear that we both had in mind to be musicians and that was all we wanted to do, and the music we were listening to mostly came from the UK so we thought “Let’s move over there”. That’s what we kind of identified with, the music scene over there.
Jess: And we met Ben when Alizon and I were doing open mics and were going to a lot of gigs; Ben was at one of them and we asked him if he wanted to do some demos with us, and that’s how it started.
Last year it seems like you had an amazing gig year and played a bit of everywhere in the UK and gained quite a following.
Alizon: We were very lucky to support many bands – many great bands – and did a lot of tour support which allowed us to play great venues everywhere in the UK, venues we wouldn’t have done by ourselves.
We started with Spring King and then it was The Blinders, Strange Bones and Hunter & The Bear, and Rascalton back in December 2017.
How much has it helped you to get a push into the scene by playing all these support tours?
Jess: It’s always great because all these bands are friends, so it feels like going on a trip with friends. It also helps a lot because we learn from them, and when we play we see that the audience is open-minded and is like “Ok, I’m not here to see this band but maybe they have something”, and it feels like our music kind of connect with the audience of those great bands we’ve supported.
For example, the audiences of Strange Bones, The Blinders and Spring King they’re not like “Ah, who are they?” but more like “Oh, they’re friends with the band I’m here to see, let’s give them a chance”.
Just by taking a glance at your gig list last year I realize that you’ve hardly had any time to be home and record the album. I counted it to at least 55 gigs and then I’m quite sure not all are on the lists you find online. Tell us a bit about your gig strategy?
Alizon: No, we made one hundred and a bit (laughs). The reason why we do everything else is to be able to play live, that’s the reason for recording an album or doing videos – it’s just to get on stage.
Ben: That’s the crux of it, that’s when the three of us come together and deliver it to people.
Alizon: For us that’s the final product, to be on stage and to connect to everyone there. It doesn’t matter if it’s five people in the room or two hundred, we love to be on stage and would love to do shows as much as possible, and one hundred gigs is not even enough.
Jess: We try to say something to people and the best way to say it is to play live. We’re musicians and want to be in a band and being on stage is the best feeling you can get in your life, that’s what drives you and motivates you to do this. I don’t know any better feeling.
You said that all bands you’re on with are your friends and it sounds to me like you’re a just one big happy family and there’s no competitive environment surrounding bands today.
Jess: No, it’s nothing like that, not at all. There’s nothing worse than that, but it’s not needed because all bands are so different and there is space for everyone. You don’t go to a gig and not talk to the other band playing. I want us all to be friends because we’re doing the same thing.
Ben: We’re all on the same path, that’s what it felt like with all the bands we toured with. Everyone knew that we’re trying go the same way so we’re all in it together, and we have this sense of camaraderie that’s there by itself.
Jess: It was a great opportunity for us to play these amazing venues thanks to these bands, but it was also a great opportunity to hang out with people that are awesome at every level. Like with Spring King; Tarek was so nice to us and gave us some advice. He could just been like “I’m in my dressing room, don’t bother me” but he was not like that at all.
Alizon: He’s very busy himself and got many things to do and it’s just so nice that he took time for us.
Jess: Time to talk about music, talk about songs. And with The Blinders and Strange Bones; we did like a little band and jammed together, created stuff together, and it’s fun because we’re huge fans of what they do, those are my favorite bands – it’s just a perfect situation (laughs).
Debut album: More about rhinos than Smashing Pumpkins
Since 2017 the band have released four singles and gained lots of attention for their “infectious surf romp that joyously combines fuzzy chords, hissing cymbals and howled vocals” presented with an incredibly energetic stage presence. Messed!Up got completely stuck in their latest two singles “Outrageous” and “Tug of War”.
Calva Louise’s strength is to be found in some great song-writing skills combined with Jess’ sometimes bright pop vocals, sometimes aggressive screams, all covered in noisy layers of fuzz guitars.
However, what really caught our attention was the title of their debut album. As a manic Smashing Pumpkins fan in the nineties “Rhinoceros” can just refer to one thing – but nothing is more wrong. And the explanation is “absurd”.
Quite soon you will release your debut album ”Rhinoceros” and I just have to ask if the title is a tribute to a) The Smashing Pumpkins, or b) rhinoceros?
(laughs)
Alizon: We haven’t got that one yet, about Smashing Pumpkins, no one mentioned that. It’s interesting but it’s not (laughs).
Jess: It’s rhinoceros from the play “Rhinoceros” by Eugène Ionesco, The “Absurd” play [“The Theatre of the Absurd”] writer who is half-French, half-Romanian. He wrote this play in the late fifties and it’s just absurd – it’s all about absurdity.
We don’t need to get into details but we all read it, it was part of our studies in school, and personally it just got stuck. It’s all about finding out who you are in this world of absurdity (laughs). “Calva Louise” comes from that writer as well, from “The Bald Soprano”.
And about rhinoceros; in the book people turn into rhinoceros, they are losing their identity and become rhinoceroses, and at first everyone is like “Oh my god, that’s horrible” but later say “Is it that horrible to become a rhinoceros?”. The main character is the only one in the end that refuses to lose himself. That’s what rhinoceros kind of is, it’s a quest of finding an identity for us.
But the book is not only about that, it got a lot of political content in there as well but we took inspiration from the part which is about to not lose who you really are just to follow the mass. That’s why the album is called “Rhinoceros” because the songs have these common theme of identity.
I really need to admit that my knowledge about plays is not the best but it’s interesting when you have this influence from a different creative field. Is this a major inspiration when you write lyrics, come up with song titles and other things in the band?
Jess: Yes it is! We take a lot of influence not only from music but from films, from books or anything that we really like, that inspires us and stays with us where we become like “Oh, this is a very interesting concept”, but in the end it’s more about the meaning of the concept than where it comes from.
What can we expect in terms of sound on the album? You have this raw fuzz sound with garage rock influences and lots of punk attitude on songs as “Outrageous” and “I Heard A Cry” but you also show a poppy side in “Getting Closer” and latest single “Tug of War”. Will there be this kind of mix on the album?
Jess: Yes it will be that kind of mix on the album (laughs). But how to explain this? I have to be clear (laughs)! It’s going to be abstract, just so you know.
I write the songs and then we perform them all together. The band started from a concept and it’s all a story that started before we began to make songs, and the music is the tool we use to tell that story. And it happened to be with music because that’s what we love to do most, to play music; if we wanted to do film we would have been film makers. The drive is however more about what we want to say.
All these songs in the rhinoceros concept have been brewing for years and when we finally met and said “Let’s start a band” we already had a lot of songs, like “I’m Gonna Do Well” which is two years old, but there’s also a lot of new songs that basically repeat the concept. Now the album is done, the comic book is done, what we wanted to say has been said and that’s it! That’s what we wanted to do, get something out.
Now we’re starting on a new thing where we have started to write something in a completely new direction, a new chapter of mindset.
That means that the album is a story where the songs and how they’re organized on the album are part of the narrative of the band?
Jess: Yes, but it’s not like it happened consciously like “Alright, let’s do a concept album” because it’s not, but the songs are in a specific order and related to the chapters in the comic book. It’s very abstract and it’s definitely open for interpretation but it’s not a concept album because that takes a lot of time thinking about things and we just had a couple of months to get the album done; we signed in February and had to deliver it in April – and we did!
I wrote five songs and worked night and day just to try to finish it, so we didn’t really had time to create something that has a really obvious concept. It’s just a normal album but if you dig deep into it, like in the lyrics, you may discover some sort of a narrative, especially when you have the comic book to the music.
I was going to ask about the “Rhinoceros” comic book. What’s that about?
Jess: It’s great for merch, I’m not going to lie (laughs), but I both thought about it and drew it before the band even started. I started drawing it four years ago and finished it three months ago, it obviously took a lot of time (laughs).
As I said, the storyline, which is not very clear because I’m not a comic book writer, is very abstract, but it fits just like a piece of puzzle into the wholeness of the album. If you have the album and the comic book, although they are completely separate products, and put them together it makes more sense.
It’s the same with our videos as well, like we wanted to tell the stories individually but you can put them together to a bigger context.
And you call it “Volume 1” meaning that there must be several more books coming out?
(laughs)
Jess: I only started you know!
Ben: And it says “To be continued” at the end (laughs).
Jess: Yeah, but it can be continued in ten years! Or no, I’m actually working on it.
You’ve also signed to Modern Sky, one of the hottest indie labels there is at this point and we’ve had a few of their bands for interviews, like The Slow Readers Club. How did you end up on Modern Sky?
Jess: We were recording with this producer Margo Broom, and she and our manager Steven are involved with other bands at the label. Modern Sky saw that we were working really hard and just said “Do you want to do an album?” and I was like “Are we ready to do an album?” (laughs), but why wouldn’t we? They believe in the music, let’s go onboard with it.
Alizon: But it was a little bit scary at first, we need to admit that.
But you wanted to have a label and not try to do everything on your own which quite many bands today prefer?
Jess: The thing is that we don’t have any resources. We could never ever record an album, press an album or promote the album if we wouldn’t have Modern Sky. They just give us the opportunity to make it happen. But I don’t want it to sound like a compromise, we really like Modern Sky, but we also have a lot of control over what we create.
Alizon: Modern Sky let us be in charge of a lot of things like social media and stuff, we have a lot of freedom so they’ve been great with that. They’re really good to work with and just give us the support to do things in a way that we get a little bit more out of it.
Ben: Just taking it to another level, to step it up a little bit.
Near future: A call for new gear
If you don’t have 10 000 euros stuffed in your mattress, you’ll probably realize quite soon that you’re rather limited in the start of your music career. Most bands spend hours repairing and fortifying gear that it wouldn’t break that easy when you toss the guitar across the stage just to make that impression of awesomeness that’ll earn you new fans every time you do it.
Touring as frequently as Calva Louise do takes its toll on the gear and one of their biggest wishes this year is to get their hands on fully functional gear that don’t need constant repairs.
Most UK bands have Glastonbury as their goal in the future. Every band from the UK we interviewed last year pointed out Glastonbury as their number one festival. But you’re an international band considering your different backgrounds and may have other priorities?
Ben: The world! And play new countries, meet new crowds.
Jess: I want to play in the Sonoran Desert (laughs).
Alizon: We definitely want to play outside the UK, like this gig in Germany.
Jess: But it doesn’t really matter – ok, we would love to play Glastonbury (laughs) – but we’re not setting our goals for that. We would love to do every festival out there but it doesn’t matter really where, because we just want to play.
And Pyramid Stage at Glastonbury is a great idea (laughs). I’m not going to say no to that! Right now I want to play Molotow (laughs).
Alizon: Also, sometimes the best experience you have is when you’re not expecting it, so setting the goal like “I want to play this gig, I want to play that festival” can make you lose the feeling of what’s going on at the moment and where you’re at.
Of course we want to play bigger stages in front of more people but we have to connect to those people, otherwise there’s no point. We’re not going to play to ten thousand people who don’t really care. What’s the point, we’re not going to get anything out of that.
Jess: If we reach out to one person in the crowd, that’s enough for us. At least one person gets it (laughs).
2019 has just started and I guess you will go on a huge tour in the UK with the album. Is this year all about being on tour and go around as much as possible?
Jess: A huge tour is nice to say (laughs).
Ben: We have a headline tour.
Jess: But we’ll see, it’s a test, but when you get the opportunity you’re not going to say no. We’re like “Let’s not think about how many tickets we can sell, let’s do as good as we can” just to get people out and want to come to the shows. But we don’t know what’s going to happen; what we do know is that we’re working really hard.
Last year was a great year in terms of gigs, that’s for sure. What’s the overall ambition for this year?
Jess: I would love if we would get a bit more gear like amps, because we’ve been touring with the same amp the whole time and it doesn’t work that well (laughs) and we need to fix it in between every tour. Alizon built the pedal boards, we made the cables as well and Ben has really broken cymbals. So, to have nice gear would be really great for us.
But just like Alizon said, to go out of the UK and play. This is the first gig outside the UK for us and we’re grateful for the opportunity to play here and in Belgium, Amsterdam and Paris as well. It just feels like another step where we push it little by a little; and I think it’s good to go by little by little because then you’re prepared and understand what touring is.
We would love to go to America, that’s a really big dream – why not a US tour if we’re offered it? It would be great to travel a lot and discover new places; that for sure would be a very rich experience to have.
*****
The interview is over and Alizon, Ben and Jess get ready for a gig later in the evening. Messed!Up cross the street for a few coffees before the show and discuss whether it makes sense to read the “Rhinoceros” comic book backwards because the editor have a tendency to listen to albums from the end to the start. Let’s wait until tomorrow and he’ll find out.
Photographer: ©Teresa Enhiak Nanni
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