Interview with Polly & the Billets Doux

That sounds more preferable than being a musical refugee in the back of a van.Well it is good fun, it is good fun but its kind of quite tiring travelling between gigs.

So you tour and obviously play with your husband, is that right?Yeah, that’s right he’s the drummer.

Is that a comfort to you? He must be like a slice of home always.Well it’s nice; it is nice I guess. He does all the driving so we don’t actually see huge amounts of each other, you would think we would. Because he’s always driving and I’m always in the back, when we arrive, we’re both pretty busy doing everything. But it does mean we get nice beds when we travel because he’s the driver so he always gets first dibs on the beds. It is lovely to be on tour with him. I think for the others it’s difficult missing their wives and girlfriends, its tough for them. Ben and I are very lucky in that respect that we can combine everything.

Absolutely, so if we were to talk about music. It’s timeless music really which defies genres but there does seem to be a revival a really good kind of blues, rockabilly, jive jazz revival at the moment. Which artists have been paving the way for you to feel confident enough to do your thing?Well for me it’s all the older, and dead, musicians that I love. That would be Billy Holiday, Nina Simone and Mahalia Jackson and a lot of old gospel singers I really like. But more modern singers I like Jolie Holland, a lot of Norfolk people really. Our musical tastes are so varied; we’re influenced by so many different things. I mean I love Grinderman, I love Sleepy Sun - just so many different bands, they are all influential really. It’s really hard to pick out one or pick out a certain genre. There’s not one genre that’s influenced enough on its own.

Do you reckon it’s less musicians and more radio figures that have allowed this revival, that have championed it? I think the public listen to the radio a lot there’s a lot to be very interested in what’s new and what’s kind of hot. I think certain radio stations have a very specific playlist that they have to stick to but there are some others, I think Radio 6 is very good at this, I get the impression that the DJs on there can pick whatever they want. There’s a lot more freedom for them actually to pick what they like. I think a lot more people are tuning into Radio 6 to see what they actually want to play, instead of what they are getting paid to play.

You’ve had a good champion in the mighty Wogan! He’s a national treasure, what’s it like to be championed by someone as big as him?It was very funny because when he played the record, obviously because we’ve got a name that always throws up questions and people often are wondering and asking what it means and things like that and how to pronounce it. But it works in our favour because people have to say it again and again on the radio and it becomes a point of discussion. They have phone-ins to discuss what our name means. Actually when he plays the song, it’s funny to hear someone with such an iconic voice saying the name over and over again. He said our name about six times I think and it was just very strange to hear Terry Wogan say your name. It was a bit weird.  In the greatest of ways.  And the same with Cerys Matthews - she plays us on Radio 6 and she’s such a wonderful lady, she’s so cool. It’s strange, its almost like you haven’t quite woken up.

I can imagine it being like an out of body experience because you’re kind of looking at yourself from a different angle.I still find it kind of strange if I find any films of us on YouTube or something like that. I try to avoid it sometimes because I don’t really like to look at myself. It is very strange.

I read in an interview that you prefer your live sound, how do you go about capturing that same energy on a recording? It’s very difficult, I’m actually reading a book about it now actually, it’s a really good book. It talks about it a bit in there because its really hard to capture the live sound unless you just record it when you are playing live which we have got some recordings of us playing live which I do prefer. It’s hard to make a recorded studio sound live because it’s not a live event. You can do all you can to make it sound that but its just not. This book indicates ‘what are you actually recording? What is the event you are recording? Because it isn’t a live gig. From my point of view I find a lot of the performance comes from the banter with the audience. If you have a really good audience there who give you a lot, I often give a lot more back. If the audience are quite quiet and reserved and don’t really respond as much I become a lot shyer and my performance is a little more conscious and shyer. Because I’m only human. What you get from a live performance is often what you get from the audience and I think that comes out in the music, which is why I prefer the live performance because I like the banter with the audience and in a recording situation you stand there with your earphones on and waiting and there’s a lot more anticipation with it rather than the raw energy.

Yeah so you need a few bods in the studio with you don’t you, just sitting down.Yeah just cram the studio full of people, I think a lot of bands have them you hear a lot of bands and they have loads of people in the studio. Maybe we just need to do a bit of that.

Yeah invite people in; that would be good. So the videos I’ve seen of you, you play completely unplugged, is that still how you play now? I’m looking forward to seeing it live.Well it depends really what is required. Sometimes we’ll turn up somewhere and there’s no PA system so we just have to do it unplugged. It used to be just Ben and I, drums and bass and then Dan joined with the guitar and then Steen with guitar because we all lived together. But originally I had no pick up for bass so I had to just stand there and belt it out because we had no way of amplify it. Now that we have got with the modern world, and got some equipment and have the option to amplify it, sometimes having said that we have had times when we are plugged into the PA but have unplugged ourselves and stepped off the stage, which we do occasionally. Especially if we are not quite happy with the sound on stage or we can’t quite hear something. In the past we’ve kind of come off the stage into the middle and carried on playing. I think the audience really love that, they really love it when people come off the stage and I think they really enjoy it.

Yeah that kind of makes me a bit giddy.They often go quiet as well so even though you’re not amplified they can still hear because they have gone quite. I do like that, though I don’t think you can do it every time otherwise it’s not quite as special. We just like to have fun and do whatever fits the moment.

So what would you like from us, Polly, as an audience when you come to Norwich?Ooh, well I like it when people clap! A bit of dancing, a bit of foot tapping, generally smiling. We’ve played in some really, really good music venues, and because they’re such good venues, the audience have been really intently watching and listening and judging what we’re doing and that can really put me on edge, because it seems like you’re in the spotlight and they’re watching everything you do. I prefer it when it’s a little more hot and sweaty and raucous. Also we like to sometimes pull things out the bag that we wouldn’t normally do, you know, like a bit of rapping, and if the audience responds to that then we can do more of that, whereas if they’re more of a tame audience, we tend not to pull all the other things out the bag. Not in a ‘screw you’ sort of way, but more in a sort of – you really do just feed off the audience; if they give a lot, you give a lot. For me, it’s a confidence thing; if people aren’t reacting very much, I think they can’t be enjoying it and then to suddenly think, ‘oh, should I maybe rap’, I think they probably wouldn’t like a rap! I don’t know, I just like a lot of banter.

Emma Roberts

Polly and the Billets Doux come to the Norwich Arts Centre on April 9th as a triple headline act with Rachael Dadd and Cakes & Ale. Get more info from www.norwichartscentre.co.uk.