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This is the exclusive interview take from The New Thing blog. Its the first interview in which the new NC album 'X. Enc' is discussed. Enjoy.
2009 marks ten years since they formed in Harlow, but perennially
progressive post-punks Neils Children are only now gearing up to
properly release their debut album X.Enc. Last year they scrapped their Pop:Aural
LP due to controversies between the band and their studio, and released
two killer singles - 'Reflective/Surface' and 'I'm Ill' - and now
they’re finally ready to unleash a full-length blast of their
distinctive melancholy indie-punk onto an unsuspecting world. We spoke
(exclusively, as luck would have it) to John Linger, guitarist and
vocalist, to ask him about where Neils Children are and where they’re
going next.‘We have always
been a band who have thrived on progression,’ states Linger. Those who
have been following the Neils Children saga over the past decade, who
have seen the progression from Mod-inspired freakbeat to snotty
psychedelic punk to a more melodic post-punk sound in recent years,
won’t argue with that – but there are always those who crave for the
past. ‘Some of our fans have been a bit behind us in terms of how we
develop our sound and criticised us for changing our sound, but they
don’t understand that if we continued writing 'I Hate Models' type
songs four to five years later, we would be criticised for that too.
The album is tougher in places, with a much more direct sound.’‘I
Hate Models’, the band’s 2004 commercial peak, has been something of an
albatross around Neils Children’s necks, and there’s still the
occasional request at their live shows – ignored or mocked, of course,
since they’ve gained a reputation as a band dead set against
self-nostalgia. Surprising, then, to hear the reappearance in their set
last year of a few songs which had long been missing, presumed dead –
2006’s cover of ‘Lucifer Sam’ by Pink Floyd and, most astonishingly,
‘Come Down’, the single that introduced the band to a wider public in
2003, aired at Offset Festival, 2008’s most public outing for the band.
Linger explains: ‘I think the way some of the newer songs sound made us
re-evaluate some of the older material. We know that the older material
is very powerful, but to us as artists, lacks certain elements which we
have developed since… I think the fact that we played those songs for
years goes some length at helping people realise why we wanted to
distance ourselves from them. They are great songs, but the newer songs
are even better, and next to some of the tracks from the new album, the
older tracks make a lot more sense to us.’So, with that in mind, the band present X.Enc.,
due out in March. The title is taken from an experimental sound collage
single from the late 1970s – ‘it’s supposed to be interpretive, so
people can call it what they want to. We feel it had a mysterious
nature to it, but there is also a correct meaning and pronunciation to
it... answers on a postcard’. Linger describes it as ‘both a step
forward and a look backwards’, and says that the convoluted abandonment
of Pop:Aural (originally
scheduled for May 2007 and finally officially terminated in March last
year) had an important impact on the new project. ‘We realised how we
wanted to present our music to people. The fact that we decided against
releasing the album helped us look upon the way we had recorded the
songs, and have a different approach to the way we recorded X.Enc. We wanted to make the album harder, but not lose the melodic quality to songs which we had developed.’The track listing is different to that proposed for Pop:Aural,
and includes some songs which have been in the live set for a year or
more, and some which are yet to be heard. ‘The songs written after Pop:Aural
had a much different sound, and we wanted to make a complete sounding
album. We knew where we were heading by knowing what we didn’t like
about the scrapped album, so it was a case of saving some tracks from
that sinking ship, whilst using the album to mainly showcase the new
material. It was a balancing act.’The band seems to have got
away with the act so far, managing to write new material, salvage old
songs, and record the album in isolation over the course of the year.
‘We can proudly say that X.Enc.
was recorded by us and us alone, except for 'Reflective/Surface’, which
was recorded in Paris with a producer called Arnaud Bascunana. We
recorded the remaining tracks in an industrial unit in Cheshunt, our
home town. I mixed the album myself over the course of a week or so. We
really benefited by recording in isolation. It added to the tougher
sound of the record. It pissed down with rain most days we were
recording, and you can hear the rain on the metal doors in some of the
quieter bits.’Just to emphasise this DIY stance, the band
decided to release the album themselves as well. They’ve created the
Structurally Sound label to put out not only X.Enc and
last year’s 'I’m Ill' 7”, but also releases from other bands, possibly
including something from Chichester’s Disconcerts, managed by John
Linger. But why found your own label when there are hundreds out there
already? ‘I guess it was due to the experiences we had with labels in
the past,’ explains Linger. ‘We have worked with some great people, and
some… not so great. We just wanted to take control of what we released
and when we released it. Brandon starting Modern Pop Records [the label
owned by Brandon Jacobs, Neils Children drummer, has released music by
Strange Idols and Electricity In Our Homes] influenced us as well, and
the whole DIY thing is very much a part of our ethos.’So, with
the whole project under the watchful eye of the Children themselves,
this time nothing (hopefully) will go wrong, and the world will finally
see a full-length Neils Children album. What next? ‘We will be playing
shows around the country and also in Japan and Europe. We want to keep
releasing new material as it comes, so we don’t become stale and so we
keep people up to date with how we are developing our sound. There will
be an X.Enc. album launch in
London in March... it will be special.’ Details are under wraps, but
pencil something in your diary for the 16th. For now Neils Children are
keeping themselves busy with have concerts booked in Italy, France,
Germany, Wales, and Sheffield. Those who cling to the band’s past might
have to revise their views, because Neils Children are doing their best
to forge themselves a future. Whether they’ll get the exposure that
they’ve skirted so narrowly for so long remains to be seen.
1:24 PM
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