Interviews

The Incredible Flight of Birdman

Alisha Ahmed 03/03/2010

"...with their own kind of interests on hobbies... assuming birds have hobbies"


I am perfectly aware of how this quote might sound, filling the blanks out of nowhere, and I promise in due time I'll bring you around to its context.

For now, as birds apparently do, let me tell you about my own hobby of getting out of the M25 for the best reason I can possibly think about... because "There's some hope to be followed, there's some light to believe in", basically, there's a gig on.

On the 6th of February I ventured all the way to Cambridge, as my new favourite band was playing at The Globe, first gig after their London experience a month earlier, for the very successful launch of their first single "Where I Can't See You".

After being tutored by "The Incredible Flight of Birdman" themselves for my trip to the city of Universities, I was then welcomed and introduced to one of the best "with-the-band" nights I have had the pleasure of experiencing in a very long time. And, if the fun and music themselves weren't enough, Nick, Richard, Doug and Rob granted yours truly the privilege of a thirty minutes properly formal interview time (as the chats of the night were lost with no recorder active to keep them for future keeping, for the world to enjoy, shame).

After pondered the question of where this interview would take place, the outside tables of The Globe won over its toilets and the supposed "Brothel chambers" that still occupy the upper floors. All in all, freezing mist aside, it wasn't a bad choice.

The thing about "The Incredible Flight of Birdman" is not just one, but the one you definitely have to pay attention to is their tongue-in-cheek-ness, which will have you tread softly on any territory you might end up explore during their "flights" around words, to the most unsuspicious corners of the human mind, and your own credibility... sometimes dignity will be fair game, and it will definitely crack a bit if you aren;t able to catch up constantly with their witty-borderline-challenging savoir faire. And that doesn't begin to include the intellectually-challenging discussions that will always, definitely come up when singer Nick Osbourne takes the floor (not necessarily in a literal way, but also).

I came prepared for this, and apparently presenting them with chocolate definitely helps their collaborative attitude, but I'm not sure it was nearly enough, they managed to fool me a couple of times anyway, but in the name of art and for the pleasure of their company and with their attention solely devoted to myself for half an hour, my ego tends to believe it was a good bargain in the end...


Alisha: Well thank you, for being so nice to me, it happens very few times with bands but when it happens it's always nice, because it reminds me why I do this kind of stuff.


Richard: The chocolate helps as well...

A: Well that's good, cause what I read made me wonder if you're always that challenging and... well... witty/challenging, with people that interviews you, like...you are "intellectually challenging" ?

Nick: No I am... I think I am friendly, loving, caring, giving, warm...

A: Is that another way of saying "yes you are"? [general laughs] Ok, that's a good start... I also read that when you were interviewed in the Wilmington Arms in London where you said that The Globe actually, where we are now, was your favourite place to play. Is that still the case or did London change anything?

Rob: London's the best gig we played in terms of audience and so it felt really good, and that was a really nice aspect of it, I guess it's because it's also the first good gig we did this year...

R: Yeah but we played here quite a few times so... we kind of trust the sound guys here to give us a good sound, so we just kind of like playing here, so this is something, some kind of stable place that we play

N: it's a very strange atmosphere sort of... like there's not frequently a lot of people here, it's really bright, it shouldn't really work, but we seem to enjoy it anyway, I think it's just because it's like, going into your living room home and play in front of a few people so...

A: So... where exactly and how many times have you played so far?


R: Three... about three or four... [laughs] no.. we played a few places here in Cabridge.

N: maybe 10... 15... 14 and we had 3 aborted gigs so we've had 3 gigs, one main one was aborted when we got on stage we were just about to play and... It was our very first gig, which was... When we first got together we were looking for places to play, and we were looking to play pubs like this, just small venues to kinda get going, but it was at the point when the recession, that terrible apocalyptic recession hit...And the first two we booked places, and the pubs closed down, and we found out only a couple of days before so we were all ready to go for our first gig and then then place closes down. Then we finally got a gig at the university, Cambridge university, and we were on stage, we though "there's no way that Cambridge's University is gonna close down" it's a 800 years old university, so this gig is gonna happen, we go on stage and then this bearded man, he looked something like half the fleet foxes half of an old magic roundabout english cartoon, with this weird... He had big beard and massive hat, crawled over like this [old character voice] "the gig is off!" [laughs] and I looked at him and I went... "Ok... why?" and I though he was joking, he was just...But then an older man came over and said the gig is off there's a riot on in the bar because the way it was there was a bar and another room, like in the Wilmington arms, with the bar in one room and then the venue in the other, and apparently in the bar there was a big riot, and so we went through and there was nothing! nothing happened, there was no one there, the only thing was, there was a picture frame on the wall, that had been moved, had just been smashed, but because it was Cambridge University it was considered... you know... a riot... cause a frame got moved... so... to get a long story short... 15 gigs and one half a gig.

A: Fourth time lucky eh...Ok... so any chance that you are starting to go around the UK on a proper tour, eventually?

N: Well, we've got a gig on the scilly isle, we're gonna try for the surrounding islands first...

R: We're gonna kind of encircle the British isle, and then work our way towards the center.... and then eventually hit the mainland... like a virus. [laughs]

N: We plan to, at the minute we just released our first single, we're going to the studio in a couple of weeks time to record our second single, so at the minute we're just concentrating on that, we're just doing a few little things, just to promote the single we did a few gigs and now it's kinda getting to that point where we're just doing a few things here and there concentrating on getting prepare to record the single and then after that probably tour during the summer, I think we'll do something more wide spread and get out to the rest of England... Scotland... but not Wales.

A: Why not Wales?

N: Actually wales it's alright, I quite like Wales,

A: We're back to the challenging part, ok... so is that because, you know, usual question, are you more of a studio band rather than a live band?

Rob: We're kind of in between, we like gigs and stuff we don't want to sort of, knock ourselves out playing every night around the country so, we also love being in the studio... I think our ideal thing is doing kind of strategic good gigs and spending time in the studio

N: But I particularly prefer the live element of it.

A: And I can see why...

N: Yeah but you know, I think we all do like...

R: I don't... I kind of like the songwriting more than the playing live, but the playing live is kinda growing on me, I kind of like it more the more we do it, I think initially we were kinda trying to be a songwriting band, but Nick's so good at the live thing... it's only fair that we give him... we kind of release him, unleash him on an audience every now and again, so...

N: Yeah, when we get to studio I am put into this...not actually a boot but I am put into a cage, and they chain me up, occasionally they'll throw me a few things...

A: And then they call you Tweety...? it all goes in circles...

N: But you see, now I am here, you know, I am on an elephant tranquillizer at the minute...

R: This is as sedated as he gets...

A: interesting... well... onto another subject, you're first single [Where I Can't See You] came out on Wet Records, and I read their mission statement and they just want to release like, a couple of singles for a band, and them put them under the public eye so that a bigger label or a more established one can come along, so, how is that working, what's the outlook for you?

[silence all around, which with them, is kind of weird]

A: If... you can tell me?

R: We can certainly give you some answers but I don't know whether they will be... uhm... true.

A: well what about the second single? Is that coming out on Wet Records or have you been approached by any other label?

N: We were approached by EMI, but they just reported a massive loss and we just though... we're not gonna go... uhm... no.

[laughs, so chances are the EMI part might or might not have happened]

N: At the minute it won't be release through Wet Records but we haven't... At the minute we just gonna record it first, it's the process we followed when we released the first one, which is where we just recorded it ourselves so that we can take as much time as we wanted over it, with no one interfering so that we can just record it and then present it in a shiny golden box to a record label...

A: Which is what record labels tend to like a lot nowadays [Mumford & Sons' album was made this way too]

N: It's easier for them and it's easy for us really, so that what we'll do with the second one, once we record it, I'll dress up in a clown outfit and I'll go around doing little magic tricks in front of all the record labels...

A: I though it would've been feathers, not clowns...

R: They expect that though... by now...

N: But I'll be wearing a clown outfit on top but underneath I'll be completely covered in feathers like a kind of...

A: Like the character of your short story? [The name of the band comes from one of the short stories Richard and Nick used to write -and sometimes still do write- together]

N: Yes... written by... Richard Yates.

A: I'll get there..

Rob: I like the ethos of what Wet Records is about, in terms of just giving bands a platform to try and get more interest and maybe be picked up by another label, I think it's a very positive, helpful thing.


N: And we're not a major label band anyway I think... We weren't apporached by EMI [a-ha! I knew it!] and if they did approach us i would probably jump on a horse and joust them... like.. full armor...

D: is that the same label as Robbie Williams?

A: Yeah

D: [to Nick] would you have a jousting competition with Robbie Williams?

N: I don't think I'd need to...

R: Don't... don't do it...

N: I think Robbie Williams is quite good on a horse... in fact.. doesn't he, in one of his videos he's actually on a horse [yes, Feel]... if we were to joust it could be quite complicated... maybe pool... [which we'll all get to, by the end of the night].

A: Ok, let me try to get back on track... I know you should be back in the studio on the 15th, so tell me about it [...] I've read you had some 30 songs ready...

R: We have a lots of songs, I think we actually have more than 30. I think when we said we had 30 that was when we just started playing as a band and before that me and Nick would kind write songs together, cause we met at university. So we've got lots of songs in kind of a nebulous state, and now we have all the songs we've written as a band which is another 15, 20 songs, but the one we're gonna record is the A side for the next single it's called Vlad it's a song we wrote a couple of years ago, so it's quite old and we've been kind of slowly... not perfecting it but we've been improving it over time. It's one that we don't particularly like but everyone else seem to like. so we kind of thought really with the next single we need something that is gonna generate some word of mouth and so we thought we'd go for this one that people seem to like, I don't know why they like it...

D: It's brilliant though, we just have very high standards, so everyone else loves it and we're a little bit more...

R: We're suspicious of it... the b-side it's a song we just wrote in the last few weeks so it's a fresher song, it's called "Talk to it" which Nick can tell you about... if he wants...

N: I could do it... [silence]

A: are you going to? I remember you said for the first single that the b-side [We Are Made] was actually better for you than the A-side... which I agree with...

N: Yeah we wanted to do it as a double A side originally, because we thought they were the standout songs.

A: what do you think about this one?

N: I think the same may apply, the b-side is gonna be better...

D: we're gonna be a b-side band, that's our mission statement.

N: eventually we'll collect all our b-sides and it will be our best album...

D: and then the A-side will be the rarity

R: I think it's kind of difficult because cause no matter how much you plan a song, when you go and record it it will just sound different, you never quite realise what you had imagined. The plan at the moment is to have one as the a-side and one as the b-side, but once we've recorded them I think it could easily go the other way around, especially as the other song is quite new, so once we put the first layer of guitars and that, an d we put the other guitars and vocals on it, it might become a stronger song than the other one, so it's kind of uncertain, but so far that is the plan

N: yeah, going into a recording studio is like going to a different world, time doesn't operate the same way, all of a sudden the day has gone by and you think "oh, we've only done the drums", it seems to be a totally different world, it is a wormhole, and sometimes your whole perspective changes in that environment..

R: yeah and it sounds brilliant in the studio and then you take it home and it sounds like shit... or the other way around

A: And where are you gonna record it? And who with? [please do pay attention at the end of this monologue by Nick, I believe it's brilliancy in its rawest state]

N: It's gonna be the same producer and the same studio... we recorded the last one... basically we did a search to see who... some of the bands we like, where they recorded, and Radiohead and Supergrass recorded at this studio in Oxford, , and the engineer, Ian Davenport, had been involved in those recording processes, and we though that sounded like a good place to record... It's very difficult to get time there cause it's so in demand and there are so many bands, with big labels paying for those bands, so those big labels pay the big money so, when we try and get time with him , it's very difficult because we only, we pay a mate-rate, he does not charge us very much but that means that if he's got someone else who's paying more we're sort of shifted, so we were supposed to record on the 15th but now it looks like we'll be recording the next week, because he's got another band coming in, so we sort have to shift around , but it's gonna be the same studio and the same engineer, just cause it's a very comfortable studio to play at and I like... the bed I sleep in, Tom Jones has slept in, so I like the idea... of sleeping in the same bed as Tom Jones, not at the same time... I think he'd be sweaty, I think he'd snore, he'd give a lot of hairs everywhere, I think he'd be aggresive...

A: We're really entering the off-the-record part of the interview here... ok... literature part... [on the short story "The Incredible Flight of Birdman" where the name of the band comes from, which you can find here, and Richard will hate me forever for this...]

R: Oh dear...

A: oh come on I made the effort to read the story... which actually wasn't much of an effort at all... it was just interesting..

R: It was interesting? [sceptical]

[welcome to the deep-introspective part of the interview, if I were you I'd start taking notes]

A: Yeah... and I was interested by the fact that the short story itself reads like a modern take on the Icarus Myth, and the main character, Ostrich, seems to have both inferiority and superiority complexes at the same time, so it made me wonder how much this short story is related to the band? is it just the name or it can be about the songs too? Meaning that... if some songs aren't autobiographical, then are they sung from the perspective of this character?

R:Uhm... you ask a very good question.... which Nick will be delighted to answer to... [laughs] actually, what you said it's the only thing that I still would say I kind of identify within the story is having that kind of ambivalent inferiority and superiority complex, i certainly have elements of both all the time, but I don't know about the story cause it's kind of like... I didn't want it to be an inspirational story, a story about escaping from one kind of existence to another, I wanted it just to kind of be surreal

N: I think there were certain, in therms of going to the second part of the question, for the point of view of the songs whether they were autobiographical or characters I think there is a mix of both, I think certainly cause Dickie and I write the songs together in terms of lyrically... sometimes he'll write the lyrics, sometimes I will.... the lyrics I write tend to be more narrative, they seem to be more like short stories but condensed into lyrics, and I would try and take on it a character and... there is inevitably some kind of autobiographical resonance to it, can't help to infuse it to the songs, and sometimes it's the starting point, even if it's just ... say for example if I have a minor argument with my girlfriend I will turn that minor argument into something which is a domestic nightmare... the most... a terrible relationship, based on those kind of arguments happening over and over again, so some mind of things that happen in life turn into a germ for a wider story [...] cause as well as writing lots of songs Dickie and I write a lot of short stories together so that one is just one example of many... sometimes there are a few little things that we've plucked from the stories, at least I certainly plucked a few things from them... and they are quite narrative but I often get confused sometimes about the song I am singing whether it's a character or whether it's me sometimes because... you get so involved with the story you're telling you know some of it it's relevant to you not all of it.. so they overlap sometimes... and sometimes it's very difficult to know when it's the character you're singing about or when it's you...

A: Isn't that the drama and the basics of being an artist? that you mix up so much with your art sometimes that it brings you to a different stage where the lines are blurred...

N: I don't know...

R: [To Nick] Are you an artist?

N: I like to think that what I experience no one else goes through but me... and I don't like to think that there are other artists out there going through the same thing because that makes me feel inferior, it makes me feel I am one of them, one of just the many, generic kind...

A: Ok... so... what's with the whole fascination with birds... is it for the feathers or is it for the wings?


[everyone in the band tries to suffocate laughs, which makes me suspect there's probably a very funny and unorthodox real answer to that question which I am just never gonna get...]


R: There is like... bands... just tend to like birds... I don't know.. I know that British Sea Power in particular are Twitchers.. and we just love birds..

Rob: I believe they like to be called "birders" now, do they?

R: but... yeah if the band has any shared interests it's cheese and birds... and we just like both a lot so our reharsals are kind of just based around... one of us takes turns bringing in cheese... and we are all just looking forward to the break when we're gonna have the cheese... and the reharsal itself it's just something to share the cheese experience... but birds... I don't know... I just love birds... and you just don't know what birds are thinking do you? you don't know what birds have seen and what they've done... they have a different view of the world... and... i just think they're interesting...

N: also... a bird is my spirit animal... and occasionally... I very rarely have sexual dreams... but when I do have sexual dreams I am a bird... with another bird...

R: How does it work?

Rob: It's bit of a paradox...

N: it's very pinchy... but you know... it's mid-air... it's free, it's feathery, it's soft... and...

R: I'll tell you what birds are paradoxes because they're a bit like us, they don't have any kind of natural predators so all they have to worry about is vanity...to attract the opposite sex and kind of...their own kind of interests on hobbies... assuming birds have hobbies... and so they kinda are the closest thing to us... in that sense...

N: bowerbirds are kind of interesting as well to link back to the idea of superiority and inferiority... bowerbirds are interesting cause the ugliest you know, they make these sculptures to attract the opposite sex so to attract the female, so the males will make these bowers, these little towers and use various things, almost like magpies, they'll steal all sort of things to make this structure,

R: and it's the structure that attracts the opposite sex and not the bird...

N: yeah so it's almost like having a job or a car...

R: clothes.. face..

N: but the most attractive of the bowerbirds, the ones that are very content with themselves they won't care about it, they'll just get.. "fuck I'll just use that.. and use that" and their bowers are very ugly and just hanging off ey just won't be bothered to collect anything.. just a few leaves.. a straw.. and they'll go... "how about that? will that do?" whereas the ugly ones, the ones that are very... they feel the inferiority complex they go and collect everything, they spend ages making these very intricate bowers, full of colour, very expressive, they're just desperate for people to see these... for the female birds to see them... basically that's what I do on stage... I am one of the inferior bowerbirds... everyone else is completely secure of themselve, I am just trying to kake all of these things... so that will attract the others... so I'm like... people compared me to various singers... Placido Domingo.. every time..

A: seriously, where does that come from? I've read about it but come on... there's a limit to the challenge...

N: I think I actually spread myself...

D: He's his own myth maker...

N: It's a natural thing for people to do when they're trying to describe a band to use a comparative scale and "they're like that"... but I just told to somebody that I knew to compare me to Placido Domingo and a few people have picked up on that and it's so ridiculous... makes the mockery of the whole comparative..

A: so it makes it worth so you can mock them when you're answering their questions... fair enough...

R: Did you say "comparative scale"?

N: yeah...

R: beautiful...


[So yes, wings might be structural as music is to them, but they are also fascinated by the feathers as they are fascinated by the brilliant sound of articulate thoughts.]

Band Photo credited to Madeleine Fishburne