aaamusic | On 22, Sep 2011

AAAmusic:  Hello, you’ve recently released the track ‘Civilisation’ from your upcoming album. It’s a strongly dystopian view on things – would you say it describes your own views on society?

Yes. Be aware of the encroaching darkness as everything seems to be spiralling down the plughole.

 

AAAmusic:    Following on, would you say changes in politics (if there have been any you’ve really noticed) have affected your music? Do you write as a direct reaction to events, or deal more in ideas about politics?

A bit of both really. Lyrically, the album is an instinctive, if not somewhat dark perspective on the human race and its behaviour, peppered with a dash of surrealism in places.

 

AAAmusic:    This will be your first original album in twenty years. Would you say that the break has significantly changed your songwriting process?

Basically it’s the same as it always was back in the day, Mark comes in with these amazing lyrics and we build the music around it, often from the rhythm upwards, with James and Murray working somewhere between the rhythm and the vocal melody and playing off each other with the keyboard and guitar parts.

 

AAAmusic:  Also, how would you say the music industry has changed over the years? For example, would you say the internet helps or hinder artists?

Massively but in a lot of ways it’s much easier to promote a band like us. In the old days, we had John Peel and the three music weeklies. We were fortunate to have the support of John Peel. The power of the internet is immense though and definitely something have used to our advantage! There are obvious pitfalls and ways for people to obtain music for free but on balance its easier to get your stuff heard and expand your fan base than it was 30 years ago, where you’d get a live review in the music press two weeks after your tour had finished.

We also embarked on a project to get as many people as possible to remix tracks off the new album and the ‘net is the obvious place to release them. Add to that the immediacy of being able to send the masters to the artists, several bands and DJs from around the UK and Europe have been able to contribute, something that would have been impossible to achieve first time around. The fantastic artwork for the album by French photographer Christophe Dessaigne also came via the internet, this piece people are reading now would probably have been in a hand-written photocopied fanzine, read by fifty people, now its available to the planet at the click of a button – so much more of a help than a hinderance for sure.

 

AAAmusic:   People readily compare you to Gang Of Four/The Fall/Killing Joke as part of the post-punk pre-industrial bands. What are your views on this, as both comparisons between bands, and the genres people seem to put you in?

All excellent bands, it’s a compliment to be spoken of in the same sentence as any of them. We were literally by timing, from the post-punk era, so again no problem with that. The inexplicable one for me – and the band we usually get ‘compared’ to is Joy Division. I suppose people just need a reference point.

 

AAAmusic: What would you put as your biggest influences, musically and otherwise?

We have such a diverse range of musical influences within the band it would be impossible to pinpoint any one thing. Lyrically, no specific influence from any particular source, other than ones’ inner self and a view of the forever changing world in which we live.

 

AAAmusic: Finally, what is on the horizon for Artery?

 

Album is released on CD and digitally on Monday October 10^th, with the first of a few select launch dates in Sheffield on Saturday 15^th October at The Corporation, with more to follow and a tour later in the year.

 

Author:Katie H-Halinski