Shiny Toy Guns - London, UK - Spring 2007
By: Tom Hocknell
Shiny Toy Guns are on their 3rd tour of the UK. Quietly, and without 'product' in the shops, they've been slowly building the goodwill that's essential for success. It's typical of their approach; their fully produced album, assisted by producer Mark Saunders (The Cure, Tricky), led from being sold out of the trunks of cars in Oklahoma, to a bidding battle between major record labels, (which Mercury won). This commitment is why Robbie, Oasis and many others never made it in the US; they weren't willing to put in the hard work. So, here the 'Shinies' are, it's about taking that chance, having confidence in your material and making things work.
"When we first came over we had nothing, but we asked our booking agent to book a tour, they said we were crazy, why? (they asked) Because we need to, to come over and start a beginning and whether we get a record deal or not, we're not going to get anywhere without playing to the British people. And that's when NME turned up like 4 shows into the tour, and gave us a gig review."
As ever, it's about exposure, people may not like you, but they at least need the opportunity to form an opinion. And they do have an identifiable sound, two lead vocals, one female and one male, in the tradition of Human League and, well, Jimmy Nail. Singer Chad, despite nominating Goth-fringed keyboardist Jeremy as band spokesman explained...
"Jeremy and I do the writing, we like to make it like a duet, talking to each other. Most songs are primarily about different emotions, hate, anger, fear, joy, love. They're mostly the result of bad love, or the expectation of good love. If you have the ying and the yang, the opposite opinions of the story in the lyric, you're able to see the two sides. You cover the whole spectrum of what the songs about, not just the male or the female, which gives us more options as writers."
Although the album has been around for some time, its UK release has been unclear. About which, to Chad's relief, Jeremy took over -
"It's had a US release, October 06, and the albums out in the UK today". ("Is it?" Pipes up Chad), "Yes," Jeremy informs his partner, "the UK version is different though, it has some new panels on the cover and, what? 12 or 13 tracks?"
"I have no idea." Answers Chad. "There's a bonus song, that hasn't been released before, but one we've played live for a long time. It's popular here. It's more of a clubby song. Nu-rave meets banging synth, with lots of guitars on it, it's a real fun thing. It kind of slips over the heads of Americans, but plants firmly into England very easily."
Jeremy seems more aware of the band as a product, of where they sit, and most importantly, of the fact the album is actually released today. He also reveals the stark difference between the US and UK music scenes;
"The US is primarily rock, although there's tonnes of people who like electronic music and rock bands that implement electronics. But over there Muse will sell 200,000 records and open for My Chemical Romance, and English kids are like - what?"
Despite the sense they operate in their own universe, which is often a good thing, they do brush shoulders with other bands.
"The next tour in US is with the Rapture, which'll be primarily us headlining, apart from a couple of shows, like New York City, where they're massive, but out in the middle part, where we've been touring for 2 years. It's technically a co-headlining."
This touring gives them a good idea of what songs will make good singles, "'Rainy Monday' goes down well over here. It'll be a possible single, whereas it wouldn't be in America. The label have ideas about singles, but we're the ones out in the dirt, watching the reactions."
The subjects flit about, we talk about Alaska being one of their favourite places, a new band The Teddy Bears, from Sweden, other favourite bands, such as The Doves, Flaming Lips, Pink Floyd, and the 90's English sound, Lush, Lightening Seeds, Charlatans UK, James, Pulp, Blur, Jesus Jones, Neneh Cherry and EMF, leading to our discussing the unlikely possibility that the EMF keyboardist died from putting a lemon under his foreskin. We also discuss the absence of B-sides -
"We've a few songs left over, but B-sides are really only over here, in America it doesn't happen, its just all remixes."
They've never heard much Take That, who never made it in US, though apparently they get played on College radio's 'Bad Music Half Hour' with David Essex and others. "Don't mention any names," Chad warns, evidently not wanting to alienate David Essex fans. We consider whether David Hasselhof is being serious with his 'Get Out Of My Car' song, (to which presumably any mentally stable passenger would answer yes and reach for the ejector seat). They've also heard of Robbie Williams, who they (wryly) consider to be a good actor. The polarised US market also comes up again;
"In the 90's, without the Internet, if you liked punk you were a punk, if you liked club you were a clubber, if you were hanging out, and you were like 'I like this band', you're not supposed to do that, you supposed to be a raver, or a rocker. Of course the lines are destroyed now by the web."
Chad adds to this - "there are great songs by anyone, whether it be a dance song, or a rock song." And so, we then discuss their song writing;
"There's no formula to our writing that we use, it varies, it can start with a feeling or words."
"I'm more of a melody freak," volunteers Chad, "I'll probably write a melody before I stick a lyric in, he (Jeremy) is probably the other way round, he'll write the whole song before the melody, but it really varies."
Jeremy continues, "Songs are constructed in different cities; some will be 4 months old, some 8 years old. We've been writing for 16 years now,"
"Really?" Gasps Chad. "He'll give me half a song and I'll go 'wow', and that'll inspire me, and we juggle back and forth. We don't write in the same room at the same time, but we will have a lyric session and just bang it out. Influences are an accumulation of everything we grew up listening to in the 90's, although we're more song influenced than band influenced, its not like we like this punk rock song, so we like every punk rock band, or not we love this band, so every album they put out we love, it's more there's 2 songs of this band I love so much."
They feel that it's not just Oklahoma in the songs, but also LA and California.
"The simplicity of living and growing up there adds to the melancholy, we're not so overly dramatic, there's an optimism, the working hard ethic, the small town thinking, not tainted by L.A. And the lyrics are directed, they dwell on dark subjects but by the end of the song, (they) reveal there's a place you can go, everything makes its way back, in a circle, back to the beginning. There's control over our destiny, despite everything."
With the interview finished they offer a beer, while we flick through the NME and admire the waitress. They both emanate an Americanism and confidence without arrogance, as though their place is already booked. We'll see, but they're good company and it's a strong pop album that goes down well to a sell out crowd, rather appropriately, on a 'Rainy Monday'.
Artists in this article: Shiny Toy Guns