Nick: The Dave Matthews Band – Busted Stuff
Every now and then music takes on a special role, they become the soundtrack to a once in a life time experience. In my late teens I was on holiday in a country called Lesotho. We broke down in the middle of nowhere with 1 CD. Busted Stuff starts calm, its title track Busted Stuff sets you up for one of the greatest tracks I know, Grey street. This song delivers on instrumentation, lyrics and orchestration.
Rob: Frank Zappa – Roxy and Elsewhere
This album had a massive influence on what I thought music could be, and what could be done within a live set. I love concept albums, especially when the songs join together into one piece of music. Pink Floyd do this, but with a certain cold English sincerity. On Roxy and Elsewhere Zappa takes a pretty much continuous piece of music and takes the piss with it for 45. A lot of the stuff we do live now is hugely influenced by Zappa, especially by songs like Echidna’s Arf. We do pop songs like Her Name (buttered with a cheeky sly grin) and more sombre songs like Field (served with a nip of ginny sadness). Zappa is almost purposely devoid of this ginny sentimentality. Village of the Sun is as about as misty as he gets. I think the marriage of two things is what I learned from Zappa; anything can be mixed. Whether it’s tango and bebop, or piss take and sentimentality. Keeping a sense of humour about what you do is hugely important, we always try to be funny with our music. A song like Her Name wouldn’t be on a Floyd album. Probably not a Zappa one either but I hope it’s at least in the same universe.
Hugh: Tom Waits – Nighthawks at the Diner
This album was recorded live in the studio, with a tables and an audience rented specifically for the occasion. The hollering of the crowd and Tom Wait’s rambling stories and worn jokes draw you in completely. The takeover of the audience’s members mind is what we try to learn from Tom. A transformative mood changer, this album is exactly what we would like to create with our set, although we are usually more disruptive. The players are rebounding off and reminiscing with each other as they cruise through jazz blues turnaround after turnaround. Mike Melvoin especially has a tasty ear, together with tenor sax Pete Christlieb they follow Waits down every rabbit hole.
Fab: Mr. Bungle – California
Whilst working out exactly what kind of musician I wanted to be in my days as a student (as far back as high school) I was looking at as many different genres as I could poke at stick at. Bungle made their entrance, their debut ‘Mr Bungle’ hopped across them all in a satisfying king of the 90’s fashion. The appeal was instant, a Whitmans sampler. But as I developed, the extreme nature of the early recordings left me feeling… wanting I guess. It seemed like a million different ideas could make a “song”; though none fully formed. The final instalment California satisfied me. They took that unbridled creativity and musical vocabulary and reigned it in to produce fully formed songs that had a story of their own. They encapsulated my ideals of musical drive, theme, variation, development (thanks Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven…) and most importantly consolidation.
Humans As Animals’ EP launch of Eurakia goes down at The Evelyn on Thursday August 14.
