Hello, good morning and welcome to the Wednesday edition of The New Cue,
OK, so that David Frost impersonation doesn’t really come across written down, but trust us, IRL it’s uncanny. In today’s letter, we speak to Bastille’s Dan Smith and Chris ‘Woody’ Wood. Alongside having just released a new triple album version of their latest album, Give Me The Future, the band are performing at the final of cricket tournament The Hundred at Lord’s this Saturday. Didn’t think cricket and new music were natural bedfellows? Well, scroll down to find out why you’re mistaken. As regular readers will know, our Wednesday editions are usually for paying subscribers only but because there was a Bank Holiday on Monday, we thought we’d give you an extra freebie. We know, we know, our pleasure. We’ll be back on Friday for our weekly glut of new music recommendations - for paying subscribers only, you understand. Click Subscribe Now to get the first class TNC experience.
Enjoy the edition,
Ted, Niall and Chris
Line One… Bastille
Starting out as the solo project of singer and keyboardist, Dan Smith, Bastille have become one of the UK’s most successful pop acts, with three number one albums and over eleven million record sales to date under their belts. Yesterday, they released a three-part extended edition of February’s chart-topping Give Me The Future, which now includes a sister album, Dreams Of The Past, and a raft of collaborations and new versions. This Saturday, the band are also headlining the final of hundred-ball cricket tournament The Hundred at Lords. In edition to back-to-back games by men’s and women’s teams, each match this year has featured a lineup of live music from artists including The Big Moon, Phoebe Green, Katy J Pearson and a brace of emerging talent curated by BBC Introducing. Despite knowing very little about cricket, Chris spoke to Dan and Woody from the group to talk about playing the final, a Geoffrey Boycott-obsessed death metal band and the other musical plans the band are laying for the future…
Bastille are headlining the final of The Hundred next week. I wasn’t aware you were cricket fans, how did that come about?
Chris ‘Woody’ Wood: I’m a massive cricket fan. Occasionally, these things roll up where two worlds collide and the second that this got mentioned as an idea I was like [excitedly], ‘Yes, yes, yes. Yes, please. Yes, we’ll do that. We’ll do that. Yes please…’ Thankfully no-one else shot me down.
Dan Smith: Basically, for anything sport-related, Woody will lose his mind. If anything Formula One-related comes up, Will [Farquarson, guitarist] wets his pants. If anything film or TV soundtrack-related comes up, I’m pushing the other guys out the way to do it, and for Kyle [Simmons, keyboardist], anything that’s like Dungeons And Dragons or nerd-related he’d be up for it. Which hasn’t really come through yet, but maybe one day.
CW: Maybe we could headline Comic-Con?
DS: Maybe. It’s Woody’s absolute dream to do this. It’s also a perfect fusion of cricket in a form that an idiot like me, who doesn’t know much about the sport, can potentially really get into and enjoy - obviously, it’s not intended for idiots. It’s just that I’m an idiot - but it’s a great combination of that and music. It’s a platform for loads of BBC Introducing artists as well. There are so few opportunities as a new and as an emerging artist to get out in front of people at the moment. It’s so hard to build an audience unless it’s put in front of people algorithmically. I think it’s brilliant to have something like this that that brings together sport for a casual fan with new music.
Watching cricket might not be the place where you would expect to discover new bands…
DS: No, it’s not an association you’d necessarily expect, but I think that’s part of why it’s fucking great. Unless you’re a music fan who’s going to a festival because you love music and therefore expect to see a lot of new bands, there’s not that many places on TV or wherever that you’re going to find that. It’s tough out there for new bands.
Woody, what other bands are into cricket? Who do you find yourself with backstage at festivals listening in to Test Match Special?
CW: Well, I once went to Berghain, the famous techno club in Berlin, and I ran into Jack from Friendly Fires who I’m on a WhatsApp group with about cricket. I’m convinced that’s the only time in history test cricket has ever been discussed within the walls of Berghain. It’s the middle of an eight-day rave, everyone’s half naked and we were in there discussing Alastair Cook’s forward defensive. Obviously, there’s Felix White from The Maccabees who has now become a cricket journalist because he loves it so much…
DS: It’s Woody’s actual dream to become a sports pundit. He thought he could get into it via a music and a love of Plymouth Argyle. Hopefully one day…
CW: Never say never. I do have as part of our touring set up a little plastic cricket set, so occasionally at festivals I can get a game going. You’d be amazed how many passing roadies or band members suddenly end up fielding at short leg or out in the distance. Everyone gets involved.
Which musicians are good at cricket?
CW: Felix isn’t bad. The bass player in The Futureheads plays decent level men’s cricket up in Newcastle, like in the premier division, so The Futureheads can beat anyone.
You should set up a little league. What are your top five songs about cricket?
CW: Soul Limbo because that’s the soundtrack to Test Match Special. Dreadlock Holiday by 10cc… after that, I don’t know.
I had a look earlier and Half Man Half Biscuit did a song about [long-serving Middlesex and England cricketer] Fred Titmus. There’s also an I-Roy song from the ‘70s about Michael Holding…
CW: Excellent. Michael Holding is the only reason I’m allowed to watch cricket at home because my missus really likes the sound of his voice. When I was at uni, the band who won battle of the bands went out in full cricket whites, pads, helmets, the lot and played death metal songs about Geoffrey Boycott. They were called LBW.
Very good. In musical terms, if you were describe test cricket as, say, a Genesis record - four, lengthy sides of prog rock - then what would The Hundred be?
CW: Good question. Well, it’s short, and it’s exciting and the idea is that everyone can grasp it…
DS: It’s for everyone. Maybe it’d be like a bit like Fleetwood Mac, because it’s half male and half female too. It’s punchy and to the point and they’ve got loads of amazing tunes, what some people would call bangers.
And there’s conflict in there...
DS: Yeah. Conflict, inner turmoil, a lot of drama.
Outside of cricket, what else is happening in Bastille’s word?
DS: We’ve not really looked back. We released an album earlier this year, we toured it around the UK and Europe, we were in America for six weeks and we’ve just been doing festivals all summer. The second half of the album comes out in a couple of weeks. So, it’s Give Me The Future, plus Dreams Of The Past. It’s basically this double album of music that we’ve been working on for the last couple of years. It’s a pretty mad busy year for us. We’re in Malta at the moment. This weekend, we’re playing four festivals in four different countries.
Blimey. You look remarkably fresh-faced considering.
DS: Thanks. I’m working on loads of new music as well. Nothing I can really talk about, but it’s been fun doing film and TV stuff as well and lots of other weird and wonderful side projects. Me and Woody do quite a lot of writing for other artists as well, so we’ve been really enjoying that.
It’ll be ten years since the debut album soon. Are there any plans to do something around that?
CW: It’s been discussed.
DS: We haven’t decided anything.
Have the label asked you to go back over your old hard drives to dig out some bonus material?
DS: Because I’m so bad at technology every time my phone dies or a laptop breaks, I lose everything. I have all these ideas and bits of music on like voice notes so when I see my phone about to die I’m like, ‘Nooooo…’
Have you heard of this thing called iCloud?
DS: Yeah, I know that now! But back then I just lost everything.
Thanks for talking to us, guys. What else are you up to today?
DS: We’re going to explore Malta a bit as we’re not on until later this evening
Enjoy. Have fun at the cricket.
Bastille will play The Hundred final at Lords cricket ground on the 3rd September. Catch it live on BBC and Sky Sports, and visit www.thehundred.com for more information and tickets.
Give Me The Future + Dreams Of The Past is out now, via Virgin EMI.
CC