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Initially conceived in 2007 as a vehicle for frontman Michael Angelakos to record a few songs for his girlfriend as a belated Valentine’s Day present, Massachusetts-based five-piece Passion Pit have swiftly become one of the hottest indie-electro acts on the planet. An intelligent slice of quirky synth-pop, debut album Manners is bound to find its way into a pile of end of year “best of” lists thanks to its quirky take on 21st Century synth-pop.

According to the BBC:

“Passion Pit make colourful and cerebral electronica, combining layers of sunny vocals, warped samples, glitchy beats and euphoric effects with a sturdy rhythmic backbone.”

A songwriter since the age of five, Angelakos is a manic musician with a refreshingly off-kilter approach to composition. Catch him and his band live at Northumbria University on Thursday (October 22).

Around the time of their debut album Instant Coffee Baby I interviewed David Tattersall from The Wave Pictures for a Flux Magazine feature. With the band playing The Star and Shadow Cinema on Friday, here’s some of the best bits from our chat.

Firstly, can you tell me about The Wave Pictures?

The Wave Pictures are a three piece band currently living and playing music in London. The band consists of David Tattersall, that’s me, on vocals and guitar, Jonny Helm on drums and Franic Rozycki on bass. We write many songs and we like to play them. We like guitar solos. We like rock and roll music, from Chuck Berry and Jimmy Reed, Dick Dale and Link Wray, through The Velvet Underground and Creedence Clearwater Revival, on to the Faces, on to Jonathan Richman and The Modern Lovers, The Violent Femmes etc etc…. We also like songwriters like Townes Van Zandt and Bob Dylan. Somewhere from out of the the middle of all this, we make our own sound, which is lyric driven and intelligent (in theory), without compromising our love of a good drum beat and some chugging guitars with surfy reverb. These days you seem to get either Belle and Sebastian OR The White Stripes. It didn’t used to be this way. Why not play rock and roll with good lyrics like The Kinks did? Or Bruce Springsteen: he really had the balance right for a while back there. Mostly this is all in the interests of entertaining ourselves, becase it is utterly impossible in my experience to try to take on the many different opinions that come flying at new bands. You can forget what you think so easily. So, we try to stay true to the things we liked about ourselves and what we did in the years before anybody paid us any attention. So, that’s The Wave Pictures I guess.

How would you describe the band to someone who hasn’t had the chance to hear you yet?

I’m not sure that I would bother really. I make something different up every time when a taxi driver asks me what kind of music I play when he sees I have a guitar. Sometimes I say ”oh, you know, it’s like The Smiths”, other times ”oh, you know, it’s a kind of Jimi Hendrix thing”, or I say ”oh, you know, we’re a folk band”. It doesn’t really matter. If someone was genuinely interested I direct them to our website, where there is music they can download and stuff they can read about us.

There’s a remarkable sense of real life commentary running through the record. Where do you find the inspiration for your songs?

I use some real life events and I make up others. I often sing quite surreal or nonsensical streams of words, then other times I’ll sing something straight. I’m not interested in straight autobiography all the time or making a relentless straight sense. As for the inspiration part, I’d say that songwriting was its own inspiration and its own reward. I love doing it, it’s fun. It just happens because I want to do it! I don’t wait for something interesting to happen somewhere or for inspiration to strike. The thing that inspires me is the song. And the things that make me wanna write songs are the songs of other people. I get so excited listening to songs. It’s a very simple thing. Like anything else, it’s work and it’s about process. Later on there’s the emotional life of a song… that’s the magic part, the part you can’t choose or control. I don’t know how that works any better than anybody else.
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Since they started spinning records under the Simian Mobile Disco moniker, duo James Ford and Jas Shaw have played everywhere from Club NME to British dance edifice Fabric. They’ve helped introduce the skinny-jeans brigade to acid house and even dropped the theme from lysergic kids classic ‘Willy Wonka’ at Bugged Out.

Signed to Wichita Recordings, the two former members of Manchester-based outfit Simian have risen from the ashes of the much-derided new rave scene to become one of the UK’s most in-demand DJ/production teams. Released in August, second album Temporary Pleasure is an explosive barrage of bleep-fuelled electro-rock that keeps the pair firmly in the eye of the indie-dance hurricane.

Catch them live at Digital this Wednesday (October 7).

Watch the video for latest single ‘Audacity Of The Huge’ here:

Northampton-based singer-songwriter Katie Malco visits Newcastle for the first time tomorrow night for an eagerly awaited appearance at The Tyne. We caught up with the talented southpaw to find out what to expect.

Firstly, how are things going?

Great thank you, I’m currently in Edinburgh enjoying the Fringe Festival and about to go and see my friend James Acaster do some stand-up before I play later. This has to be the most laid-back tour ever!

You’re playing at The Tyne in Newcastle this week. Looking forward to it?

Yes I am, I’ve never played in Newcastle before so I’m slightly anxious and not sure what to expect but also excited. Its been nice to get out of London and play north for a change. I actually used to live in Newcastle when I was a nipper, for a short time. Our house was haunted.

What can we expect from your live show?

Well…you can expect a girl with brown hair playing an acoustic guitar upside down, singing songs she wrote about life in her early twenties and babbling on about nothing in between them. Sound appealing?! You should come just to see the upside down guitar playing, its a treat. Read the rest of this entry »