Formed in Balham, in 1999 by childhood friends Olly Knights and Gale Paridjanian, Turin Brakes burst on to the UK music scene with their Mercury Music Prize nominated debut album ‘The Optimist’ in 2001. 12 years on, the now Brixton based folk rock band are celebrating the release of their 6th studio album ‘We Were Here’. As they prepare to head off on their headline tour of the UK, Brixton Blog and Bugle contributor Jen Ewbank talks to Gale about the bands career to date and how their music has been influenced by their local upbringing.
Friends since they were in short trousers, Olly and Gale met at Macaulay Primary School in Clapham Common and spent their teenage years getting stoned and listening to old blues and folk records in the their bedrooms. After the success of their debut album, the band played 2 sold out dates at Brixton Academy to cap off their Ether Song album tour in July 2003. “Brixton Academy was always the venue we went to watch bands at” (Olly had his first live music experience there with Transvision Vamp at the tender age of 10) “so when we played there, for us it was a sign that we were having a similar effect on other people. I couldn’t really enjoy those gigs as it was such a big deal to be playing there, I just couldn’t relax!”
Turin Brakes 3rd and 5th studio albums ‘JackInABox’ and ‘Outbursts’ were recorded in Brixton as well as their 4th album ‘Dark On Fire’ being demoed here. Until recently the band had a studio at Loughborough Junction where lots of their music was written including much of the latest album ‘We Were Here’. “I always felt like the local environment was influencing some of our tracks musically. Songs “Sea Change” (from Outbursts) and “Ghost” (from Dark On Fire) both had a pace to them that felt like walking down a busy Brixton High Street”.
A fan of and contributor to the Brixton music scene and “great venues supporting live music like the Hootananny and the Windmill”, Gale is also involved with a local Afro-rock Maggot Brain band called ZAZA. Based around a master drummer – Henri Gaobi – and a load of singers; Zaza fuses African drumming with Western instruments and melodies, demonstrating perfectly the multiculturalism and diversity that the Brixton music scene has to offer.
As the band prepare to head out on a 22 date tour of the UK with long time collaborators and now official band members Rob Allum on Drums and Eddie Myer on Bass Guitar, Gale explains how the band feel a London audience compare to the rest of the country. “London’s a big big mix of people and that’s a unique thing, people from everywhere all doing the same thing. It’s always nice to be home – there’s a strange kind of understanding in your home town, that you can read people better and they understand what you’re saying. You could all get a bus home together after the show”.
Turin Brakes will play Shepherd’s Bush Empire on November 20th, Zaza will play the Hootenanny in Brixton on Sunday 24th November 2013. Keep an eye out for some familiar faces on the bus journey home!
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always nice to read nice things about one of my favourite bands!