Workshop interview #2: The Only Way to Write A Song (and at least 10 other ways to do it)

Name: Colin Clary

Title of workshop: The Only Way to Write a Song (and at least 10 other ways to do it)

A little bit about Colin:
Colin Clary plays and sings with The Smittens, Let’s Whisper, and on his own and loves to make up songs and help other folks figure out how to make up songs, too.

Description of your workshop:
I will answer questions and try to facilitate discussion on various approaches to writing a song and offer quick tips and tricks and methods for getting song ideas to flow in a fun and natural way. If we are lucky, we will make up a song together or make up a number of songs. If you’ve never written a song, or if you’ve written loads of them, or just want to pick someone’s brain about the process or want to collaborate on making up a song today, you are welcome and encouraged to come.

If you can sing, or have an instrument, or an idea or an open mind, this could be a fun way to spend part of a sunny day. This will hopefully be a constructive and non-intimidating experience and maybe we can even make up a song together to sing around the campfire or on the train platform.

What are you looking forward to the most at Indietracks?
Well, I’ve never seen Camera Obscura live before, so that is sure to be a highlight! Honestly, though, I’m pretty much looking forward to ALL of Indietracks – last year’s fest was such a magical experience and I can’t wait to see some of the folks I met there last year and to be surprised by bands I haven’t seen yet. I am interested in seeing the MLS acoustic set and Gordon Mcintyre’s solo set and Northern Portrait and Tender Trap and Butcher Boy, too!

(Colin then goes on to list practically every band playing the festival, we get the picture Colin!)

I’m also psyched to play on the train with Let’s Whisper and on the big stage with the Smittens!

Do you have any camping tips?
Drink some water before you go to sleep!

Have you been to the festival before? Do you have any Indietracks stories/gossip you'd care to divulge?
Last year’s fest was the highlight of my summer! I don’t think I know any gossip.

We think Colin is hiding something there, we hear he was the centre of all the campsite rages last year!

Colin's workshop will take place at 12.30pm on Saturday, in the Workshop Wigwam.

Dance the night away at Indietracks!

Indietracks isn’t just for bands y’know! It’s also about donning your fanciest clothes and pulling the swankiest shapes you can manage after a hard day of band-watching, real ale-drinking and llama-petting!

We know that you like to dance along to the widest range of tunes possible so, each night after the bands finish, there will be a choice of two wonderful discos for your delectation. The usual massive dancealong in the loco shed and, for those who fancy shimmying in more intimate surroundings, a smaller disco in the workshop marquee.

The discos will start around 10pm and finish at about midnight, so don’t forget to bring your best dancing shoes. We’ll meet you in the middle of the dancefloor!

FRIDAY

Shed - Lipstick On Your Collar

Lipstick On Your Collar is a club night in Bristol, UK. It's a celebration of the female voice, playing damn good records by girls and grrrls through the decades. Everything from Banarama to Bikini Kill, Camera Obscura to The Crystals and Shampoo to Sugababes.

Marquee - P!O!P kombinat berlin

P!O!P Kombinat Berlin is a DJ-Team from Berlin, Germany. Formed in November last year, they grab a lot of attention by playing Twee -“Lieblingsmusik” and putting on small and new indiepop bands who usually don't make it to perform live in Germany, including The Pains of Being Pure At Heart in June. They're very much looking forward to their first ever DJ set at Indietracks!

SATURDAY

Shed - Bonnie and Clyde

Aleix and Marta are a pop DJ duo from Barcelona, better known as Bonnie & Clyde.
They DJ in one of the most popular indie clubs in Barcelona, the Razzmatazz, where they are residents in one of the rooms, the 'pop bar'. As the name suggests, they play pop in every kind of way. They have DJed almost in every pop club in Barcelona, as well as festivals such as Benicassim and Summecase - and now Indietracks. Let's hope they bring some of the summery Spanish weather with them!

Marquee - How Does It Feel To Be Loved?
How Does It Feel To Be Loved? is a London night club. Thei set at Indietracks will be a sixties and soul special with hip-shaking soul, hand-clapping rock 'n' roll and footstomping go-go power! They will be playing girl groups, Motown, northern sould, Stax, Atlantic and much, more more.

SUNDAY
Shed - DJ Polar (Luis from Elefant)
DJ Polar is one of those DJs who absolutely personifies pop music. Also known as Luis Calvo, founder of this year's main stage hosts Elefant Records, he lives pop music with the same passion that drives him to delight us with choruses and melodies as he turns up the volume from the mixing table.

Marquee - Songs For Children
Songs for Children is an indiepop night in Hong Kong. Run by husband-and-wife team Mike Mystery and Jane Blondel, they have promised us they'll be giving out lots of free badges - yay!
You can never have enough free badges in our opinion!

Workshop interview #1: How Not To Run a Record Label

It's now less than a month until the festival, so we thought what better time to start telling you about the workshops that are happening across the Saturday and Sunday. So here goes!

Name: Sean

Name of workshop: How not to run a record label

A little bit about you?
I’m Either "the grumpiest man in indiepop" (Jimmy Tassos, Matinee Records) or "one crazy man" (Marianthi Makra, Atomic Beat), take your pick. I run a record label called Fortuna POP! By my conservative estimates I've lost a six figure sum over 13 years.

Description of your workshop:
I'll be telling people how not to manufacture records, how not to get them distributed and how not to promote them. Let's face it, the "here's three chords bit now go and form a band" bit is the easy part, getting the music into the world is the difficult part.

What are you looking forward to the most at Indietracks?
Hanging out with Luis and Montse from Elefant, two people who actually know how to run a record label and are the nicest people you'll ever meet to boot.

Do you have any camping tips?
Have a poo before you leave home.

Er...thanks for that Sean! Looking forward to the workshop.

You can catch Sean's workshop at 5pm on Saturday, in the Workshop Wigwam.

http://www.fortunapop.com/

Indietracks interview # 16: Camera Obscura

Today’s the first day of July, which means that the festival is taking place this month! It seems like forever ago when we announced back in February that Camera Obscura would be one of this year’s headliners, so it’s brilliant that we only have to wait another few more weeks to see them play as the sun sets on the Saturday night.

Camera Obscura have become such household names that on a recent trip to the US, we found a feature on them in every newspaper we looked at (here's Tracyanne on the cover of the Boston Metro!). The band were formed in 1996 by Tracyanne Campbell, John Henderson, and Gavin Dunbar, and have since received high acclaim for their sophisticated, melancholic and uplifting pop songs. They released their debut album Biggest Bluest Hi-Fi in 2001, and a second album, Underachievers Please Try Harder, on Elefant Records the following year.

In 2006, the band released Let’s Get out of This Country, produced by Jari Haapalainen and again released on Elefant Records. The album appeared high up in many critical lists of the ‘best albums of 2006’ and featured the classic floor-filling pop anthem Lloyd, I’m Ready To Be Heartbroken. In February 2009, it was announced that Camera Obscura had signed to the legendary indie label 4AD, who released their fourth album, called My Maudlin Career, in April 2009.

Gavin Dunbar, the band’s bassist (and guest DJ at a 2007 Indietracks Christmas event!), joins us for today’s interview.

Hi Gavin, Elefant Records are curating a stage at this year's festival. What was it like being part of the Elefant family?
We felt very lucky when we signed to Elefant, they were big fans of our first record, having licensed it for Spain, and welcomed us into the label. They became good friends of ours. It is inspiring to see people so genuinely enthusiastic about music and the bands they release records by. They put in so much effort to what they do, and you can tell that from the artwork of the releases and packaging to they way they keep in touch with the fans of the label. It really is like a family there.

How did you approach the recording of the new album, following the success of Let's Get Out Of This Country?
We knew we'd made a substantial jump forward with Let's Get Out Of This Country, being the first time we'd made a whole album with a producer, and feeling that we'd progressed a fair bit both as a band and as players. The basic approach was the same as it usually is, getting a collection of songs we're happy with together and rehearsing them up to the point where we feel ready to go into a studio. We knew we wanted to work with Jari the producer again, partly because we felt he brought out the best in us, and partly because we knew he wouldn't want to just make another record the same as the last. We worked away on the songs in Glasgow and then Jari came over a few times for pre-production work in rehearsals, and suggested a few things, then it was off to Sweden to record over a fairly intense two week period. We've always basically recorded live, and then added a few overdubs if they were required, so we're quite used to going in and getting the basic tracks down as live takes, including the vocals. It seems the best way to work for us, you can tell fairly quickly when you get a take with the best feel for the song.

You're very active Tweeters! Has the relationship between the band and its fans changed as a result?
I think we've always been quite good at trying to keep in touch with the folk who come and see us or buy the records. I guess as ways to keep fans up to date with what you're up to evolve, it’s nice to be on top of them. We do like to have active myspace, facebook and twitter things going on as well as the band website. And for those people not keen on technology, we still keep the snail mail PO Box alive so folk can correspond to us in the old fashioned way.

We hear the band have recently given up their jobs to pursue the band full-time. How easy has it been to adapt to being a full-time band?
It’s been great for us. We've been through long period of basically being full-time, but also trying to juggle full and part-time jobs on top of the band, that’s the hard thing. Being full-time with the band and not having to fit in another job on top is fantastic. We actually get to sleep sometimes now.

What music are you enjoying at the moment?
The new M Ward album has been enjoyed by the band. We're loving playing with Agent Ribbons who have been supporting us in the States this tour, we'd highly recommend checking them out, and we're looking forward to playing with Anni Rossi on the second leg of the trip, we really enjoyed playing with her recently in New York.

What attracted the band to play the Indietracks festival?
It’s such a great grassroots festival, organized by people who have a real love of the bands they ask to play, and the people that go to the festival are real music fans, the atmosphere is relaxed and friendly plus you get a go on the steam trains. Who wouldn't want to play. We were disappointed not to have been able to play the last couple of years, but band weddings and pre-booked Spanish festivals meant we weren't able to. I did come down to DJ at the Christmas event in 2007, which was great fun. We're really looking forward to getting down and having a hang about.

Do you approach playing at festivals in a different way to other gigs?
I guess you have to a wee bit. I think we've got better at festival sets over the past couple of years, you don't want it to be all upbeat fast pop songs, you like a bit of variety, but it makes sense at festivals to build a set round the songs you know the people who like you really want to hear, and people who maybe don't know are going to enjoy hearing for the first time.

What's the most unusual place you've played a gig in the past?
It’s got to be the venue we played in Mexico City in 2007, the Polyforum. We played inside the world's largest mural, which was pretty amazing as a backdrop all round us, and we hadn't really known what to expect when we arrived, and the place was rammed to the rafters, so a fantastic night was had by all.

Thanks Gavin – look forward to seeing you at the festival!

Workshop Wigwam!

We're excited to announce that this year at Indietracks we will be having a new tent, the 'Workshop Wigwam'.

The tent will host various workshops and events, so as well as watching some tip-top bands over the weekend, you can write a song with The Smittens’ Colin Clary, get crafty with the Craft Guerrillas and The Bunty Collective, find out about making your own clothes with Eithne Farry, and win some serious prizes in the poptastic pop quiz! We are particularly excited about having our favourite jewellers Tatty Devine involved because in addition to running a workshop they have also designed special limited edition Indietracks jewellery for us!

This is what we have planned for the weekend…

Saturday
- Bunting Making Party - The Bunty Collective
- The Only Way to Write a Song (and at least 10 other ways to do it) – Colin Clary of The Smittens
- Make Your Own Souvenir Jewellery - Tatty Devine
- Hey Ho Lets Sew - Eithne Farry
- How not to run a record label – Sean Fortuna POP!

Sunday
- Pop quiz - with quizmaster Bob Brown
- DIY fanzines! - Twee as F*ck
- 'Crafternoon' - a DIY Craft Event with hosts Craft Guerilla
- Buttons for Eyes - Faye Cooke and Leonna O'Neill

We've asked our workshop organisers a few questions so you festival goers can find out a lil bit more about them and we'll be posting these interviews on the blog over the coming weeks, so keep your eyes peeled! More details about the workshops and the people who are running them will also appear on the website in the next couple of days.

Indietracks interview #15: Wake The President

Wake The President singer Erik Sandberg’s lyrics are inspired by the characters of Glasgow; to him the old men propping up bars or wandering the streets are the lifeblood of the city. The songs he sings, melancholic reminiscences of blonde girls from the past, tales of the deceit and debauchery of the West End, resonate with the slurred poetry of these men, philosophising over whisky water at the Ben Nevis. Bjorn, his quieter twin, provides the parchment upon which Erik's commentary is scrawled, his guitar-playing channelling the clang of C86, the fury of Josef K and the jangle of Johnny Marr. Wake the President have some high-profile supporters, including BBC Radio 2 DJs Stuart Maconie and Mark Radcliffe. Both of the bands 2008 singles, ‘Remember Fun?’ and ‘You Can’t Change That Boy’, were voted single of the week on their show and soon after, they invited the band in for an on-air session. In-between all this, Wake the President have spent time on the dole, sold fruit (and chimpanzee meat, if you asked nicely enough) on Dalston market and whiled away many hours being bed-sit pop dreamers. The band’s debut album ‘You Can’t Change That Boy’ was released in March 2009.

Hi Erik, tell us a little bit about the band

We're all football fans, half of the band are Celtic fans and the other (good half) support Rangers.

What music are you enjoying at the moment?

I'm currently involved in a musical called 'A Time and a Place', It's a comedy about a Glasgow band who strike it rich in Spain. It's the most inspiring piece I've had the pleasure of conducting.

Tell us about an unusual place you've played a gig in the past

I played at a Municipal building in Glasgow recently, James Kirk even came along... It was our album launch, I was sober for a change.

Do you have any exciting plans for the rest of the year?
Putting the album out in the States and going there to perform. There's a label in Portland called Magic Marker who we managed to con into taking us on. We've also got some deals in Japan, the Philippines and Australia.

Do any band members have any particular skills, hobbies or claims to fame you wish to share?I'm good at playing with my hair. My general interests are time-wasting and avoiding 'the world of work' at any cost. I've not paid a gas or electricity bill in about 6 years, mainly due to the fact that I've been living in Glasgow gangsters' flats in the west-end.

What's going to be on your compilation tapes as you travel down to Indietracks?

Tim Buckley, Scott Walker, Felt, The Champagne Socialists, Peter Parker, Prefab Sprout, Apres Ski, Spiritualized, Je Suis Animal, The Sexual Objects, The Carrots, Depeche Mode.

Do you have any surprises planned for the Indietracks festival?

Not to get drunk.

What attracted you to play the Indietracks festival?

I enjoy bumping into Sean Pop! for a gin or two, and Stuart is just the champion. I think I'll pinch his bum when I see him this year. Sean - are you going to buy me a gin? It has to be Hendricks Gin, though. With a slice of cucumber.

Who are you most looking forward to seeing at the Indietracks festival, and why?

The Carrots, but I hear they're not playing any more. Zoey van Goey were my highlight last year, and Je Suis Animal – f**k me, they're the dog’s b*llocks.

Thanks Erik – see you there!

Indietracks interview #14: Mighty Mighty

Mighty Mighty were formed in the early 80s by Mick Geoghegan and Hugh Harkin out of their shared love of soul music, Postcard Records, The Velvet Underground and Socialist Worker Party politics. By 1985 the band had settled with the line-up of Mick (guitar and lyrics), Hugh (vocals), Russell Burton (bass and backing vocals), David “H” Hennessy (drums) and Pete Geoghegan (Vox organ and guitar).The band recorded their first single (‘Everybody Knows The Monkey’/’You’re On My Mind’) for the princely sum of £40 and released it in 1986 on their own Girlie Records. This was followed by ‘Is There Anyone Out There’ (4 track 12”). Around the same time, they also featured on the NME's C86 compilation tape.

The band then signed to Chapter 22 Records, releasing a string of well-received singles and the album Sharks in 1988. Continuing interest in the band saw the reissue of Sharks in 2000, the release of a compilation of BBC session tracks in 2001, and two compilations of singles and unreleased tracks in 2000 and 2001.Today we’re joined by Russell and Mick from the band.

Tell us a little bit about yourselves
Russell: Older (clearly), but just as groovy if not groovier.

Mick: I'd much rather stay aloof and mysterious.

What music are you enjoying at the moment?
Russell: I keep coming back to Laura Nyro (New York Tendaberry) which I recently 'discovered', but best recent pop single I thought was 'The Promise' by Girls Aloud.
Mick: I'm listening to a lot of American songwriters, mainly country/folk - Jolie Holland, Handsome Family, Lucinda Williams, Ryan Adams, Joanna Newsom, Joan As Policewoman, Bonnie Prince Billy. Also love the new Yeah Yeah Yeahs. There isn't much new British music that I'm into. The likes of Bat For Lashes and Laura Marlow seem like second rate versions of the 'real thing' from the States. I'm looking forward to the second Victorian English Gentlemen's Club album and anything from Radiohead and the Arctic Monkeys.

Tell us about an unusual place you've played a gig in the past

Russell: I suppose The Thekla in Bristol in 1985 (our first 'out-of-town' gig) was unusual - on a boat - but maybe on a lorry by the perimeter fence at Aldermaston at a CND rally beats that.

Do you have any exciting plans for the rest of the year?
Russell: To play Indietracks of course!
Mick: Me too (really, really genuinely!) I'm going to New York on Friday! My first time to the States. For my daughter's 16th birthday last week I did her a compilation of songs about NY and/or by New Yorkers:

Yeah New York - Yeah Yeah Yeahs

Manhattan - Ella Fitzgerald

Native New Yorker - Odyssey

The Boy From New York City - The Ad Libs

Walk On The Wildside - Lou Reed

Dance Like A Monkey - New York Dolls

Rockaway Beach - The Ramones

Up On The Roof - Carole King

Harlem Shuffle - Bob And Marcia

In The Flesh - Blondie

Summer In The City - The Lovin' Spoonful

Baby, I Love You - The Ronettes

Run Run Run - The Velvet Underground

Bring The Noise - Public Enemy

Last Night - The Strokes

Theme From New York, New York - Frank Sinatra

And we're going to the Notting Hill Carnival in August.

Do any band members have any particular skills, hobbies or claims to fame you wish to share?

Russell: Hugh is Grade 8 on the Haitian Nose Flute.
Mick: Russell is Mr Memory - that's why he was tasked with the biog on our MySpace.

What's going to be on your compilation tapes as you travel down to Indietracks?
Russell: I've just done a 'mixtape' CD which I’ll still be listening to in July as follows:

Yvonne Elliman, Vicky Leandros, Todd Rundgren, Anne-Marie David, Jamiroqui, Shed Seven, Sterephonics, Julian Cope, David Bowie, Human League, Clifford T Ward, Don MacLean, Ronan Keating, Spice Girls, Elvis Presley, Glenn Tilbrook, Go-Betweens.
Mick: I'm pretty much alone in my household with my love of country and dub reggae, so it will be a compromise. We all like the Clash, 70s/80s disco and soul, the Smiths (my son insists they ripped us off), Echo and the Bunnymen, Dizzie Rascal.

Do you have any surprises planned for the Indietracks festival?
Mick: We start rehearsing this week so who knows what we might come up with. I don't suppose it will be much of a surprise that we are balder and fatter than we used to be.

What attracted you to play the Indietracks festival?
Russell: It's something that our children can come and see (that's if they want to come) and if they don't like the music they can look at the trains!
Mick: My kids have never seen us play, so this is ideal for them.

Who are you most looking forward to seeing at the Indietracks festival, and why?
Mick: I'm just looking forward to seeing new bands and hopefully finding my next favourite band.

Thanks Russell and Mick – look forward to seeing you at the festival!

Indietracks interview #13: Cola Jet Set

Formed in 2001 from the ashes of the cult Spanish combo Los Fresones Rebeldes, Cola Jet Set is an endearing band from Barcelona, driven by a bubblegum vs mod vs surf pop sound, mainly supported by sun-filled hispano-female voices. Their second album, ‘Guitarras y tambores’ shows more than ever their profound love of pop music in all its forms and incarnations: it's an album of guitars and tambourines, and is definitively how they themselves would define classic pop - direct and effective.

Tell us a little bit about yourselves
We are insignificant individuals which unite as crusaders for love and classic pop in our spare time.

What music are you enjoying at the moment?
Fitness Forever, Cooper, Camera Obscura, La Casa Azul, The School, Tender Trap… You can tell we are so happy to play at Indietracks. We had a myspace look on all the artists playing and it’s like fishing in a fishbowl. I swear we mean it, we don’t say this to flatter anyone, Indietracks is a distillation of what we like. Besides, we regret The Timebox and Simon Dupree don’t exist anymore so they can’t play with us there, but you can’t have it all, can you?

Tell us about an unusual place you've played a gig in the past
A cavern in Tarragona which opened as a bar for Roman soldiers some 2000 years ago, really! And The Cavern in Liverpool, the closest we’ve been to The Beatles, and we try!

Do you have any exciting plans for the rest of the year?
We are playing a week after Indietracks in London with Squire, Paul Bevoir and Invisible Lead Soup. I can’t think of a more exciting week this year so far.

Do any band members have any particular skills, hobbies or claims to fame you wish to share?
Some are breeding children, some are breeding dogs. There’s a music teacher, a lazy civil servant, a window dresser, a stage machinist and a money inspector. We get on together quite well, and that’s no mean feat.

What's going to be on your compilation tapes as you travel down to Indietracks?
Fitness Forever, some Northern Soul, Joe Bataan, Shangri Las...

Do you have any surprises planned for the Indietracks festival?
If our Cristina appears in time that would be a fair surprise.

What attracted you to play the Indietracks festival?
Your kind request, the artists playing there, and a need for country holidays where we are not recognised and stopped every minute.

Who are you most looking forward to seeing at the Indietracks festival, and why?
We’ll arrive on Saturday evening so anybody we can see playing then and on Sunday will be great. If we say Tender Trap, they’ll probably play before we arrive so we’d better not name anybody.

Thanks! And the band have kindly left a free MP3 for you to download: El sueño de mi vida

Indietracks interview #12: The Manhattan Love Suicides

The MLS are the perfect band for anyone who loves fuzzed up guitar assaults, feedback, hit and run 10 minute gigs, female vocals, melodic pop, and ear-splitting minimalist noise… The band formed in 2006 in Leeds and have several releases under their belts, including the 27 (twenty-seven!) track CD album ‘Burnt Out Landscapes’, which was released on Squirrel Records and Magic Marker Records in 2008. The band will be playing a special acoustic set on one of the trains at this year’s festival.

Today we’re joined by Darren from the MLS for a few questions:

Hi Darren, what music are you enjoying at the moment?
There's quite a few good bands out there right now. Usually, I listen to a lot of old stuff but recently I've found myself enjoying Crystal Stilts a lot. Adam and Rachel are really loving the bands Ponytail and Women right now. Not sure about Caroline, she listens to Leonard Cohen quite often.

Where have you played an unusual gig recently?
Not really an unusual place as such, but we just got back from SXSW where we played in the yard of a small art gallery in the middle of a residential neighbourhood. There was free beer from a keg and a dog walking around the stage while we were playing. Some guy rode past the place on his bike and then just came in and started dancing with everyone.

What's going to be on your mixtapes on your journey down to Indietracks?
All the usual. Jesus And Mary Chain, Shangri Las, Guided By Voices, Black Tambourine, some Flying Nun stuff like The Verlaines and The Clean, early Flaming Lips, Modern Lovers, Buzzcocks. And it'll be the same kind of thing all the way back home too.

Do you have any surprises lined up for the festival?
The fact we're playing an acoustic set on the train is enough of a surprise I think. Don't get the wrong idea though about us....we don't plan on switching off the fuzz pedals anytime soon.

Thanks Darren!

Arrange a liftshare to and from Indietracks!

Well, it's just over a month to go til the festival (eek!) and some of you are probably starting to think about how to get there and back. While Indietracks is well connected for public transport, with both Derby and Nottingham train stations close by and lots of buses (see the transport page on the website for details), there is another option!

For those of you who would rather travel on the open road, why not arrange a liftshare instead? Not only will you travel in style (er, probably), it's also more environmentally friendly to share, cheaper, and you could even make some new friends!

To help you with this, we now have our very own page set up over at Freewheelers, the website which makes it easy to see who from your area is driving to and from the festival. It's easy to use - just head over to the Indietracks page and enter your details, whether you are looking for passengers to fill your car, or just looking for a ride.

Happy travels!