Posted on Jan 20, 2007 by jon

When you're playing in a local band, struggling to find headway in an industry full of sharks, living and breathing music, sometimes a band comes along which completely shifts the crux of what it means to be in a band and to be able to REALLY play. For Matt Gall (Adrenochrome) and Harry Bedder (Toybox Terror); and many others, SikTh are one of those bands. So it was with some trepidation, and a conscious effort not to come across as gushing fan-boys, that they prepared to meet Guitarist Dan Weller and Bassist James Leach...

So, you're currently in the middle of a nationwide tour, are you pipe and slippers on the tourbus types or television-throwing party animals on the road?

Dan Weller: Somewhere in between really.

James Leach: We sit and get wasted in the tourbus a lot.

Dan: Yeah and so then it becomes a really happening place to be. I can't speak for everyone, It's just about being able to do your own thing.

The new album sees you attacking the banality of popular music, was there any one album or artist who inspired you to break the shackles of this mediocrity?

Dan: The lyrical content of the album is very much Mikee's thing, but I think musically and collectively our only inspiration is the lack of quality music out there; and the feeling that we've got an opportunity to make great music. There are some albums we all love and we wanted to make an album that could stand up with the likes of Far Beyond Driven (Pantera), Justice For All and Master of Puppets (Metallica). And I think we have.

Your songs contain a lot of complex time signatures, tapping etc. What kind of a process leads to the creation of your songs and how long does it take you?

Dan: It takes a long time normally, but I mean all of our songs are different, it depends on how the song originated. Some songs come together quicker, the ones where we've collated a lot of material and there's an excess of parts, but normally we can manage to use them all. The ones that take longer tend to come from a simple concept that we need to build on and create material for, they tend to take longer but it does vary.

So James who do you think most influenced the way you play bass?

James: Hmm well...

Mikee Goodman(Deciding to join the interview having entered the room, pencil and ruler in hand, in order to draw out a chart for a Pro Evolution Soccer tournament raging between SikTh and tour-mates The Architects and Dead Man In Reno): Les Claypool?

James: Yeah! Well it's really a mixture of people. Definitely Mark King (Level 42) when I was young, fair play to him, he made a difference to the way I thought about the way bass should be in a band. He probably gave me the wrong idea because I thought it was a lead instrument. Yeah him and Les Claypool (Primus) had a massive affect on me, those two for the kind of tapping and slapping stuff. And then I got further influenced by John Paul Jones (Led Zepplin), Rex Brown from Pantera, just really great rock playing, so it's a mixture of those two things...

Dan: Pat Badger

James: Yeah Pat Badger from Extreme, he's a very underrated player, thank you for that Dan!

Are you able to talk about Gut Records?

Dan: Yeah go for it.

So last year you left Gut and signed to Beiler Bros. Records. Did you feel you were being held back by them?

Dan: We just didn't see eye to eye with Gut, it's the classic rock band story there's no point me adding a bitter twist to it. It just wasn't working and they shafted us politically y'know, put us in a position where we could take the money and be fucked over or walk away and have no money, which is what we did because our albums and our future is a lot more important than eighty grand or whatever. Plus we'd had a label in America who had been interested in us for a long time, so we saw the light really. It was a really tough thing for us to go through, any legal battle, be it a divorce or anything, its not nice, it takes its toll. It took a long time because Gut did everything they could to prolong the agony, for no apparent reason, just because the boss is a c--t.

There did seem to be a lot of wrangling before you were able to release this album...

Dan: When you don't have a positive outlet for the album...When you know you've got a record deal, you've got someone who wants to bring it out it's really inspiring to write because you know that when you finish it someone is going to put it out. But when you're in limbo and you don't know where your career is going it takes away all your inspiration and you can never relax. When we signed our new deal it kicked the second album off big-time, we wrote really fast, it was really inspiring.

It certainly seems like the right desicion, so many other bands take the other route...

Dan: So many other bands aren't in it for the right reasons. We're in it to make great albums and that's the only inspiration we need. I mean money's great and we could all do with a bit more of it, but that should never sway your desicion when you're talking about something with your name on it, you've got to protect your reputation first.

Much of the lyrical content of the first album seemed to deal with the conflict between the modern world and the natural world, was this a concept you were keen to see continue on to the new album, or is it a fundamentally different concept this time?

Mikee: What it is, is I usually use metaphors and talk about the modern world and the natural world, but if I'm talking about a tree it could be a metaphor for life or for a person, or any life form really. I like to write lyrics where people can look within, and make their own interpretation. Something that means something personal to me may mean something personal to someone else, but thats just the way I write lyrics really. I think my lyrics have got better, have got more mature, there's not so many jokey lyrics on the new album, it's on to more serious subject matters, its because we've grown up...collectively.

Dan: The music has gotten more serious, Mikee has got more serious. We've all just matured, the second album just compliments itself in that way.

Mikee: Everythings more mature than the first album I think.

You've also been to Japan, how did you find it?

Dan: I loved it, we all loved it, its a very interesting place. Everbody should go there once, even if you're not in a band, it's very unique.

James: It's different, that's obvious I guess but until you get out there you don't realise just how different it is. Not just the way it looks, everything is different.

Dan: It's the closest I've ever felt to being on a different planet, it totally feels like you are detached from the world, it's weird because we are very like Japan. We're very lucky being English, English is the international language, we can be quite complacent, like everybody has to speak English. But when you go to Japan, it's completely Japanese, most people can't chat to you in English, you have to point at everything. You find yourself feeling like a real alien over there, I think we all need a bit of that because we do get lazy, being English.

What were the fans over there like?

James: They were great, all really into it, all extremely polite. The weird thing is when you've finished a song, in the rest of the world you get people chatting, the general noise of the crowd but in Japan when we stopped they clapped then they all silently waited for the next song, 500 people just silent, waiting for the next song.

Dan: It was really freaky because you could just chat like this on stage...

James: And most people could probably hear it...

Dan: It was completely bizzarre, its their custom over there to be polite and respectful, they'll cheer, they'll clap, they'll appreciate it and then they'll shut up and let you prepare for the next song.

Do you have any plans to go back soon?

Dan: We're going back in January.

Mikee: We're not going any more.

Dan: (laughs) Oh yeah right, we're not going back in January now, we're waiting for the right tour really, the one we we're going to do up until a few seconds ago (laughs), it was an interesting bill but probably not the perfect bill for us so I'm not too bothered that we aren't doing it.

Paper or Plastic?

James: Paper

Dan: Paper

Dog Or Cat?

James: Cat

Dan: Dog

Red Dwarf or Star Trek?

Dan and James: Red Dwarf, every time.

Dan: Definitely not Star Trek, I hate it.

Steve Vai or Frank Zappa?

James: Without Frank Zappa you wouldn't have Steve Vai.

Dan: Definitely Frank Zappa.

And finally a spinal tap-esque: What would you be doing if you weren't doing this?

James: Aaahh....probably...could be on the tour bus, in the other bands' dressing rooms, watching a video...

Dan: That's a suitably pisstake answer...

James: No its not! That's what I'd be doing!

Dan: No (laughs) he means instead of being in SikTh.

James: (laughs) Oh right if I wasn't here now, probably working at waitrose or something.

Dan: A professional golfer, that was what I wanted to be when I was younger, that was what I was on the road to being but gave it up for playing the guitar, there's always waitrose though (laughs) Who knows? But to give a serious angle I think that life is completely fateful so I don't think there was anything else for us, this is what we are meant to be doing. Because if you didn't think like that you'd just have regrets, everything that goes wrong your life you'd think 'Damn, I should have done this.' But if you believe in fate you just have to go with it.

SikTh's second album 'Death of a Dead Day' and spin-off E.P with aternative mixes 'Flogging the Horses' are out now.

Taken At:

Norwich Waterfront

Taken On:

October 13th, 2006

Interviewees:

Dan Weller and James Leach

Related Links:

• www.sikth.com

Interviews

Oct 13, 2006 Norwich Waterfront