High Voltage

This year marks the 21st anniversary of the first recording sessions of one of the UK’s most dependable indie bands. Cue retrospective boxset, BBC4 special, fan-mugging tour, so on and so forth? Not so, it would seem.

On the contrary, there has been little in the way of fanfare for Teenage Fanclub’s evergreen career. Perhaps, though, they prefer it this way. Raymond McGinley, Norman Blake and Gerard Love have steered Teenage Fanclub through largely untroubled waters...

After the underground success of their debut, Alpinisms, School of Seven Bells went from strength to strength, touring with Bat for Lashes and playing with My Bloody Valentine at the All Tomorrow's Parties festival. Now they are back, and with a new album - Disconnect from Desire. HV caught up with their guitarist (and sometime drummer) Ben Curtis, to talk about... well, pretty much everything.

HV: Ben, thanks for talking to us. So what's going on at the moment, now the record is...

I’m told that Sarah Neufeld – only recently touring with The Luyas; imminently due to begin the global wave of promotional rounds for Arcade Fire ahead of the new album – doesn’t do Skype.

And, at the time of interrogation speculation of The Suburbs release was all over the place filled with excited hopefulness.

SP - First of all, it looks like you’ve been having fun on tour with The Luyas. How do you feel The Luyas differ to your other...

Few bands can stand the test of time in the music biz without either selling their soul to the label or selling out. Then there is the issue of songs, as a brilliant debut album will only get you so far, before the second album syndrome kicks in and its all over in a flash. Liverpudlians The Coral have seen contemporaries fall at the wayside due to these pit falls, but luckily for them their psychedelic take on modern day rock, together with consistent hit singles - enough to fill a...

Noah and the Whale play the Manchester Cathedral on Saturday 3rd July and it’s been a while since they were on Manchester streets (the last time they were here all their equipment was stolen) so I caught up with Charlie[Fink, front man] ahead of their show for a chat about machine guns, Prince and Roman amphitheatres.

First off, have you beefed up security since the last time you played Manchester?
"Yeah! We have a bank of sandbags now, machine guns, dogs ......

With her debut single ‘Spiders’ released this week HV is introduced to Manchester’s own Kirsty Almeida. A lady with an extraordinary ability to merge folk, soul and pop sounds coupled with her stadium filling voice.

So Kirsty, what have you done in the last 48 hours?

“I’ve been buying a lot of gardening stuff actually, also mostly painting; I’ve been preparing the album artwork which I basically took a picture, self-portrait, and...

Dutch uncle (noun)
A stern, candid critic or advisor.

The world cup is here again. Sullen English faces are out in force; irritable and dejected. Burley middle-aged men yell at tele boxes, neglect their families and convince one another that they “could do a better job than that prick, Cappello. Wanker!”. England becomes infested with Dutch uncles. How then, does the Manchester musical outfit, Dutch Uncles, cope with all these impostors? Well, their world...

Four years ago Ed Banger artist Uffie released her first single ‘Pop the Glock’ which earned her a cult underground following.  HV caught up with the now 22 year old to find out why the release of her debut album ‘Sex Dreams and Denim Jeans’ took so long, what she thinks of Ke$ha, and what her ideal pet would be…

HV: Why was there such a gap in between releasing ‘Pop the Glock’ in 2006 and the release of the album? Do you think there...

“Qui?” says the French receptionist. It’s been a while since GCSE French, and I seem to have forgotten the translation for “please put me through to the producer and synth-player from Ratatat. He’s somewhere in your hotel”. Eventually the message gets through and a sleepy sounding Evan Mast comes on the line, sounding as far removed from the hype storm surrounding the impending release of his band’s new album as it is possible to be, without...

Stalwart prog enthusiasts, 65daysofstatic have plied their trade for the best part of a decade and having just released their fourth studio album, We Were Exploding Anyway, Yorkshire’s finest are still evidently still keen as mustard. Midway round their European tour, High Voltage caught up with 65days’ Paul Wolinski…

You've been together in one form or another for nearly 10 years now.  How do you stay enthusiastic about the band?

Loads of coffee...