Music > Interviews
Interview with The Joy Formidable 2013
07/01/13
Wolf’s Law is the name of the sophomore album from The Joy Formidable, a name steeped in imagery and exactly in-keeping with the stories of how the band were ensconced by Native American literature at the time of writing the album. The title is not superficial though, and has deeper layers; to look up the phrase, it’s a medical term that denotes the adaptation that bones can have to their surroundings; that they can heal around their obstruction. That is true of the band, who had a line-up change early on, but adopted and remolded to their new member, and who constantly have to cushion the varying nature of travelling on the road. It’s a brilliant title for a band, who we hope continue to evolve…
So how are you today Rhydian?I’m not too bad thankyou; just arrived in Savannah, Georgia, so we’re just stopping off now. The day’s just beginning.
You sound a bit confused – it must be confusing when you’re travelling through so many states and stuff… Yeah, you do often lose track of times; you go through so many different time zones and distances, and stuff like that, your body clock gets messed up or whatever, but we manage!
Yeah, you’re pros at it now though, aren’t you? We do a lot of touring, yeah, so we’re pretty used to it.
You’re playing loads of dates in America before Christmas – you must have a strong relationship with the country now, having recorded your album there. Do you feel less like tourists now? Erm, well you know it’s obviously such a vast country that there are always areas to explore, even though we have done a lot of shows over here. But yeah, we’re slowly getting used to all the little nuances, the customs and all that kind of stuff but there’s always plenty to see. Gigs are funny things as well; you can go back to the same area and a gig can make it feel very different. It’s great – that’s what we like about touring; there’s so much variation and that keeps us alive, as well as the music.
When I spoke to Ritzy in 2009, she was saying you love what you do, and you don’t really have a home, so it doesn’t affect you, being on the road. Then I read recently that you’re homeless again! What’s that about?! Yeah, yeah! Well we had a place in London for a couple of years but we were on the road so much that it ended up being a wiser decision, really, not to have anywhere. So now, any time we’re gonna be off tour, we’ll just hang our hats wherever, really; we’ll just be nomads for a while. We were only in London a couple of weeks, for instance, in this last year, so it’s just a bit of a sensible, logistical decision.
I guess that you may have other things, other than a house, that have some connection to home for you? Do you have anything you take with you? Well you know, we’re always Skyping and talking to our friends and family and stuff, and wherever we go, we take a lot of pictures and do quite a lot of Dictaphone recordings, so there’s always a lot of things like that – memories. We listen to a lot of music too, but in terms of what we carry around – I mean, I don’t know about the guys, but with me personally I don’t know if it’s so much about that, or just memories. We do enjoy going back to North Wales, but we always have to travel quite lightly as well, you know. Even though Ritzy’s a fucking hoarder! She’d have hundreds and hundreds of cases ‘cause she just collects everything if she can. But that’s the thing, we very often can’t take much with us, but we try to go home as much as we can, ‘cause we do miss North Wales, but the rest of the time, it’s just about keeping in touch with people.
I’m really happy to be talking to you about your second album – it’s already been whispered about lots, even though it’s not out yet. Again, when I spoke to Ritzy last time, you were just finishing putting the first album together. Does that feel like a long time ago now? I suppose it kinda does, only in the sense that we’ve been so busy. We’re always writing, always doing something, always playing shows but even a short space of time can feel like a way away, because you’re constantly stimulated; you’re always doing something and there’s very little repetitive routine, but I think that’s exactly the kind of lifestyle we like to have, and we’re very privileged to have it. But yeah, ‘The Big Roar’ does feel like quite a way away and even though we’ve finished this album, we’re always writing as well. We’ve always got tracks, and you kind of view things in terms of how many ideas for songs you’ve had since then and we’ve had a lot, not just from this next album coming up.
That’s good news for us, that you’ve always got a bit more material tucked up your sleeves. Yeah, I think you have to live and breathe it – it’s within you. We don’t just see it as a job, so it’s not like you’ve got your album, then you go away and not write any more. I think you should always take down your ideas and inspirations whenever you feel them. So in 2009, Matt was still a relatively new part of the band – he was the new boy, but I imagine there’s been a lot of cementing of his part in the band after so much touring and experiences in the band together… Yeah, absolutely; as soon as he joined, actually, about a week later we were sort of gigging heavily, so he kinda got thrown in at the deep end anyway, which was great ‘cause it just shows how well we work together, and how good our dynamic was. Just after that week, even, we had our first gig in Paris and it’s been non-stop gigging since. And I guess it’s the best way to really get to know each other! At the beginning, the music was what drove us together, that’s the most important thing, so with that understanding there, we just get each other. It’s an added bonus that we all get on as personalities; it’s so important, because there are some great artists out there, but if you can’t get along with each other, then you’re in for a really tough slog!
Ashley sent me the new album, but the Norwich post let us down – it hasn’t arrived yet, but my interest has piqued already after hearing some of the titles, and learning of some of the stories you’re telling. It sounds like there’s more narrating themes than personal lyrics – is that fair to say? Er, no I’d say there are some really personal moments in it, but there is a lot of symbolism running through it. I think the same as ‘The Big Roar’, really; first and foremost, each lyric means something and it has to come from you, so it feels like there a lot of personal stories entwined within it all, but yeah, there’s songs that touch on issues, and so forth, that are outside of us as well. Things like ‘The Leopard and the Lung’, for instance, are inspired by Wangari Maathai, who we were reading about when we were in Maine. There was a Kenyan environmentalist who was basically this really brave lady who stood up to the Kenyan government, basically by herself and took care of a lot of women. She got a lot of women to empower themselves by looking at the environment, planting trees and so forth. Her story was just absolutely inspirational to us, so that song touches on that. There’s ‘The Turn Around’, which touches on Ritzy losing her grandfather, who was one of our biggest fans, and that changed her quite a bit. You know, we lost a few people on making this album, and that’s definitely crept in quite a bit. Overall, the running theme almost of them is that you should seize the moment; obviously when you do lose someone, that makes you feel all those things, you know.
‘Wolf’s Law’ is the name of the album, and it’s also the title of one of the tracks, which you’ve put up online for us to hear. It’s a medical term, isn’t it, Rhydian? I can’t seem to get my head around it – something about the form and function of bones. Is that right, or have I gone a bit too dictionary crazy? Yeah, that’s right. The title of the album is kinda multi-layered to us, but one of those is definitely the medical term. It talks about how if you put stress on bones, the bones, or the body will adapt to deal with that stress. It was this sense of – like I was saying before – seizing the moment, reconnecting with yourself spiritually and the healing process. That was one dimension to it, and the fact that it’s called Wolf’s Law as well is that we were reading lots of Native American literature as well. Also, being Celts, we’re fascinated with nature and how it’s used in various folk laws, you know. Things like the wolf were a big part of the stories we were reading, so that’s just a little bit of it as well. There’s a few meanings going on, but I’d say the main one was this whole process of healing.
I absolutely love the video to ‘Wolf’s Law’ – there’s some stunning cinematography in it. Was any of that set in Wales?! No, no, that’s all footage that we found. We’re very proud of it because that was essentially not meant to be a single back or anything like that, it was just a visual piece that had to go along with the song. We saw the two completely linked together, you know. Just to give people a sense of what this new album was about, thematically and in terms of the feel of the album. I think it’s quite funny ‘cause it threw a few people, thinking it was the first single back and people think it’s quite different and stuff, which is great by us ‘cause we like to keep people on their toes, but it wasn’t a single. It was more of an art piece in a way.
I read a little bit about you guys writing in some classical orchestration into the album. We’re used to seeing you live, stretching out wild solos and really being free with your music. I’m not a musician, but with classical sections, do you have to be much more structured than the way you’re used to working? Well we enjoy the challengers that just being a writer bring, really. We’re very much interested in composition as a whole, so we never feel restricted by the instrumentation that we’ve got, or that we should be this ‘guitar band’. I think you should always question what that is, for instance, we enjoy artists that you never quite know what’s gonna happen with the next album, and as long as it’s not contrived, then a great writer can put his or her hand to anything. You know, we’ve always produced our music ourselves and that’s exactly what we did with this album, but we’ve just expanded the palate, you know. We scored orchestral pieces, we have harp on the album, we have keyboard and piano lines; there’s quite a lot going on, there’s a real breadth to the album, to the timbre and the tones, or whatever. It doesn’t feel unnatural though, it’s completely natural; to other people it might be surprising, but to us, it’s not surprising at all. We’re interested in all kinds of music, just good music, so we’d like to extend on that even further. We’d like to write for a film, when we get some time, you know, and have a variety of interesting projects going on.
You’re coming to Norwich in the New Year, which we’re really pleased about, but you’ve got your eye on bigger things, haven’t you – you’re headlining The Roundhouse as well – that’s gonna be a huge gig. Yeah, that’ll be our biggest London show to date, I suppose. It puts a smile on our face that we kind of grow and grow for the right reasons; there’s not this two minutes of hype kind of bullshit. It’s people that want to be there at the gigs, they’ve told their friends and then they come along, or whatever, so it feels like a very natural process. And when you do something that you wholeheartedly stand behind, that connects with people, it’s a very special thing. So yeah, we’re absolutely gonna revel in that tour.
And I’m sure you’re aware of the big following you have in Norwich, partly because of the tireless support of promoter wombatwombat, who completely energised the city into loving The Joy Formidable. Can you feel the love in Norwich? We do, honestly, we do; we always enjoy coming to Norwich. I think this show is at The Waterfront, but we have very, very fond memories of playing the Arts Centre and you’re right, Annie [wombatwombat] has been such a big part of that; people like her are such an important piece of the puzzle, you know. It’s not just music, it’s supporters of music as well, as people are championing bands because they believe in the quality, not just because they’re supposedly the next big thing. Real fans of music – that’s what it should all be about.
Emma Garwood
The Waterfront and wombatwombat bring The Joy Formidable to the Norwich venue on January 23rd. For tickets, go to www.ueaticketbookings.co.uk. Read the uncut version of this interview at Outlineonline.co.uk