This week brings the publication of the final issue of the Plan B magazine. They’ve been fantastically supportive of our festival over the last couple of years, and really understood what we we’re trying to do, so we’re very sorry to see them go and wish everyone there all the best. The final issue even includes an Indietracks-related interview with our Saturday headliners Camera Obscura on the festival previews page!
And, coincidentally, the last issue of Plan B also carries an album review of today’s blog interviewees, The Lovely Eggs! David and Holly played their first ever gig in New York City about two years ago and since then have played across the UK, USA and Europe, including on the steam train at Indietracks in 2007. Their song "I Like Birds but I Like Other Animals Too" received airplay on some top BBC radio shows, including Huw Stephens, Steve Lamacq, Rob Da Bank and Marc Riley (who invited them down to record a live session).
Holly used to be in the all-girl indiepop band Angelica, who received massive acclaim for songs like "Teenage Girl Crush,", and who once recorded a session for John Peel. The Lovely Eggs’ debut CD album, If You Were Fruit, was released on Cherryade Records this week!
Hi, tell us a little bit about The Lovely Eggs
The Lovely Eggs are David and Holly. We started playing music together in Paris when we discovered a pigeon had laid two lovely eggs in an abandoned nest on Holly’s windowsill. When the eggs finally hatched, we travelled to live above a jewellery shop in Lancaster in the North West of England, where we formed The Lovely Eggs! We played our first ever gig in New York in 2006. David travels around with a unique drumcycle with handlebars on the front so he can drum and bike at the same time. He also plays the bicycle bell and squeaky horn and things like the glockenspiel, ukelele and slightly wonky recorders. Holly sings and plays the guitar. And sometimes she hits a drum with a wooden stick with wool tied around the end. David made it for her because he likes making things.Last year we released 2 vinyl EPs (one split called 'I Like Birds But I Like Other Animals Too' on Filthy Little Angels and one called 'Have You Ever Heard The Lovely Eggs?' on Cherryade Records.) We played quite a few gigs and drunk too much cider and then recovered and wrote and recorded a new album called 'If You Were Fruit' which came out on Cherryade Records at the start of June, where we will get back on the wheel all over again and go on tour and drink too much cider and torture our brains and make our ribs ache with laughing! Incidentally, we are both addicted in an unhealthy way to Garstang Blue cheese.
Tell us about an unusual place you've played a gig in the past
The most unusual place we have ever played is in a scrap yard in Los Angeles. We got asked to play this gig at a place called the Death Shack. Naturally we said yes, yes yes! To cut a long story short, when we arrived at the place it was like this big party in a scrap yard! There was junk all over the place like Steptoe's yard and we had to stop ourselves shouting 'ragbone!' all the time. They had a barbeque and there was shrimp tacos and it was dark like in a David Lynch film and then David went missing for like nearly and hour and I (Holly) was having kittens about where he was. I was having a cold sweat and having visions of him being murdered by those American serial killers of theirs who so often frequent american scrap yards called The Death Shack! But eventually I found him in a man's gem rock museum which was hidden away from the scrapyard in disguise! The man gave David a volcano bubble which he smashed and there was all these sparkly crystals inside and we had a yatter about dinosaurs and things of yore. Yes that gig was quite unusual that one was!
Do any band members have any particular skills, hobbies or claims to fame you wish to share?
Well David once went out with a girl who used to be in the St Winifred’s School Choir who did Grandma We Love You! and Holly can make her tongue go in the shape of a shamrock for good luck!
What attracted you to play the Indietracks festival?
Well we played the very first Indietracks fest. We think it was one of our first gigs when we were just hatching. We remember seeing it advertised and really, really liking the cut of its jib and wanting to play so we emailed Stuart and asked to play at short notice and the man from Del Monte said yes! And we ended up playing a little set on one of the steam trains. It was ace. We saw so many good bands playing there and the ambience was fan dabby dosey! We love drinking Strongbow on trains so it suited us down to the ground. We camped it up on the campsite down the road and met some lovely people, including a fab couple called Helen and Steve who we bonded with over a love of the Mike Leigh film Nuts in May. In fact Helen makes all our stuff for The Lovely Eggs Post Office. Last year we were away in America when the festival was happening but we made sure we were around for it this year. We suppose we just love the smallness of it and the music of course and the trains and its obscureness. We wouldn't miss it for two dozen corn on the cobs with red sauce on top!
Thanks very much - see you at the festival!
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