The Golden Hours play a cracking set, full of involved enthusiasm, relishing the great response from the crowd. Later I caught up with Luke, Sam, Will and Alex in the quietest possible spot of the club to discuss single releases, directional changes and questionable music tastes.
Q1. So guys why exactly did you feel it was necessary to change your band name and general direction from The Wookies to the Golden Hours?
The Golden Hours: We never felt it was necessary as in essential, more that it would be beneficial. We had written some new stuff that didn't really sound like something The Wookies would have written, so we wanted to release our new tracks under a different name. Also, perhaps most obviously, we wanted something that wasn't so directly associated with something else, [e.g. Star Wars]. We wanted to move away from those previous stigmas that had been associated with us, and we quite fancied a fresh start as we'd been with the old set-up for 4 years, so it was time to move on. That new ideology follows through to our single release…
Q2. So what exactly is the new release and when is it happening?
TGH: It's a double a side called "Wash the Night Eyes" and "Pioneering" which can both be previewed on our website thegoldenhours.co.uk. It's released at the end of June, June 28th. It's a spilt release on Broken Tail Records.
So is there going to be a follow up single, EP, album…? What's the next focus?
TGH: The next single! We're going to focus on singles for the foreseeable future, until we're established enough for someone else to pay for it!
And are you releasing a hard copy of the single or is it just going to be online?
TGH: Digital will be the main market. We might have some limited edition CDs and promos, to sell at gigs and stuff, but officially it will be digital.
Q3. Aestheticism was an integral part of your previous release Sparks, and you seem to be continuing this theme beautifully with your newly designed the Golden Hours website. Will you be able to continue this with the new release?
Will, TGH: Its not going to be that arty…
TGH: Will's our arty chap, artistic director and resident genius, and lets put it this way, when he says its not going to be that arty, its still going to be far more arty than the average band.
The new website is beautifully constructed with gorgeous photography…
TGH: Exactly, it is really good. With our old release Sparks we had a fair bit of freedom and literally speaking a lot to play around with, especially that cool cardboard case. With the new release we don't have quite that much freedom because it's mostly a digital release, so we're going to have to think of something more innovative. We are planning a video for the new release, possibly even two videos, one for each track, but we are still working on that. Essentially we are talking with our label about the idea. Also, we're possibly going to use Amazon to get out our physical copies of the track. They do a service where you can either buy the mp3 or they will burn a hard copy of the track and send it out to customers, like an on demand service. So we might design something for that.
Q4. Are you still continuing with the self proclaimed progressive vibe in your new music? The curious time signatures, the decidedly English accents?
TGH: Definitely! But we will be slanting it to be more accessible.
Alex, TGH: On a person level I'm not necessarily a fan of prog music, more the progressive attitude, aesthetic values etc.. But I honestly think if you want to create pioneering music, you have to think of yourself as a long-term project. First impressions do count, but after that you can change and develop. We might be currently introducing ourselves as a simpler incarnation, but we can still develop and become more complex, and hopefully we'll be able to take our audience along with us. The Golden Hours are not necessarily progressive rock, but certainly progressive something. Maybe progressive indie…
Sam, TGH: I don't understand why we don't we just go full on progressive. [Silence]
Alex, TGH: Actually I think ultimately we should determine ourselves as Epic Art Rock.
TGH: I guess we are that. Officially anyway.
So there's no prog in that title at all then?!
TGH: No. Not overtly. Although I guess in a way art rock is prog rock and visa versa.
Q5. So musically speaking have any of your influences changed with your new incarnation?
TGH: Essentially it's still the same. We all like complicated music, and have a bit of a delight in the absurd. One group we have all started listening to is The Stills. I think Album Club has helped us mix it up a bit influence wise.
Q6. So what exactly is Album Club, for those who don't know? What were the ideas behind it? More importantly, who has the most questionable taste?
TGH: Sam! Definitely Sam. In the early days of Album Club he actually put forward a local prog band from Newbury that he used to be a part of called Tantalus.
Sam, TGH: It was a great album, it's still a great album!
TGH: But the whole reason we've started publishing it for was exactly that, to get other people involved. Choosing an album no one has heard of or can get hold of is a bit counter productive…
Sam, TGH: Hold on, I though the whole purpose of album club was to give people a small insight into my world! What better way than with an album from a band I was in?!
Alex, TGH: Actually I thought album club was genuinely started to piss me off! They keep making me listen to music I think is crap!
Luke, TGH: There have been a couple of positives from Album Club, like I've realised Maximo Park are actually quite a good band, making complicated music that is actually good to listen to.
Alex, TGH: My choices were not popular though. I chose The Horrors' new album.
Luke, TGH: I think Arcade Fire has been one of the few choices that has been immune to criticism… [Sam shakes his head] no? Ok, nothing has been immune to criticism.
Is the idea of Album Club to get other people involved, fans and such?
TGH: Yes. Originally we didn't announce it Album Club weekly, we just did it ourselves. But we then thought it might be an interesting thing to put on the website and now its developed and we do have a few people following it. The main idea for us though was for it to be like a musical book club - something we could do together and keep connected musically fairly regularly. And also we had the other idea that it might help us as a band artistically, supplying ideas and seeing what works.
Alex, TGH: Also, where we used argue to each others faces about how crap our music taste was, or our playing was, we can now direct it through album club; completely annihilating certain suggestions. Ultimately though that's ok, because we're not doing it directly to each other as much any more.
Q7. So who would you say your contemporaries are?
TGH: Worship, who we're playing with tonight. Their sound comes from the same place, but is realised in a different way sonically. They're our brothers from another mother! In reality though we don't really have many direct contemporaries. It does make things difficult in the short term because people can't pigeonhole us genre wise. Ultimately we prefer it that way, but people always want to classify things, and we kind of defy genre.
Q8. And how are you guys doing on with the Storm the Charts campaign and how are you involved in it?
TGH: It's going well. The basic idea behind it is to try to get independent "real music" into the top 40 charts. At the moment the project is getting together 40 songs from unsigned bands and independent labels to try and get as many as possible into the UK top 40 in the same week. The target week is the week beginning 27th June 2010. Our submission will be our forthcoming single release, which people can vote for right now.
Q9. Wrapping up then, ultimately would you say that the your band's new incarnation, and the Golden Hours generally is a positive progression?
TGH: Yes, definitely. In the past three months we've had much better gigs, and to an extent we feel liberated as we haven't got any connotations attached to us from the old band. And although we have made some of the prog elements of our music a bit more accessible, we have tried not to water things down too much. There is still an experimental ethic to the group, and ultimately we are still trying to make music we would also enjoy listening to.
The Golden Hours are truly lovely chaps creating good, interesting music, and can be found at their website http://www.thegoldenhours.co.uk/. This features their Album Club and lots of other lovely stuff including their new Double A side "Wash the Night Eyes"/"Pioneering" and their previous EP Sparks. You really should also check out their exploits in Storm the Charts, see http://stormthecharts.wordpress.com for a detailed summary of the campaign and how you can get involved!
