Alpha

MAA : How did you meet? Why did you choose to make this kind of music instead of another style?
Corin : We meet in a studio called PIJ in Bristol . I (corin) was working at the studio as the engineer and Andy came in with his project “Static sound system’ I had recorded many tracks for them for the label ‘Cup of tea’. I then got to here some of andy’s other demo’s that I felt could bring something to them. So after a few sessions round at Andy’s flat we began to create the Alpha sound.

MAA : I’d rather say ‘this music’ coz I don’t want to ‘classify’ you, how would you classified your music, does it belong to a special style?
Corin : The style is difficult to point to, I guess that it is more about what we do not want to put in the music than trying to put it in a style. We try to avoid Break beats, something we were both using a lot with the other projects we were in. We also wanted to create a feel of classic sounding production with real strings and a timeless sound, something we new we could only do with lots of money.

MAA : What is the musical past of the members of the band? what are your influences?
Corin : I grew up around quite a musical family, my brothers both played instruments, better than I could and were in bands, my mum also was in a choir. I always have had an interest in the recording side of things and started recording my brother’s band when I was 13. My influences are wide, being the youngest I had to listen everyone else’s records, Beatles, Beach boys, Haircut 100, Elvis, Barbara Streisand, Dave Brubeck, XTC. Then later in life when I got a chance to play my music it was more electronic like, Orbital, Shamen, The orb etc...
Andy : I played very bad 3 chord guitar in punk bands when at school, eventually went to art school where an interest in experimental music was nurtured, and happily discovered the sampler which has shaped everything since. I grew up as everyone listening to music my parents listened to, Neil Diamond, the carpenters, country and western etc. punk was a revelation, then my epiphany was hearing 23 skidoo in a club. Then more and more started listening to Sinatra, bacharach, scott walker, soundtracks etc, and as time passed, money restrictions meant it was necessary to buy cheap records in charity shops and so discovered a world of obscure brilliance.

MAA : How do you deal with the critics about your music, especially those from the media?
Corin : They always say great things about our music, not much to deal with. I think someone one said I sounded like Kylie Minogue?
Andy : there was one great review that said they would rather cut off their own eyelids and read all of jane austins novels than listen to our record again, that made us laugh.

MAA : Do you easily know when a track is finished and satisfying, or when you listen to it a while after do you think you could have done better?
Corin : Nearly always feel that we could have done better. Sometimes it is difficult to know when to stop with a track, you can over do it, lose the original vibe of the track, kill it. We felt that some of the songs on ‘The Impossible Thrill’ lost the plot at times so we made an effort to keep things more simple and not to go to far with tracks on ‘Stargazing’.

MAA : How do you write and compose a song?
Corin : We start songs in different ways, sometimes with loops, sometimes with some chords, some songs may start off and then take one idea from that track to start a new idea. We like starting with loops but it can be hard to find good loops.

MAA : Your first records where released on Melankolic, why did the collaboration stopped? What happens with Melankolic?
Corin : Virgin pulled the plug on Melankolic so that was the end of that. We still see Massive though, there are no bad feelings.

MAA : How did you meet with Massive Attack?
Corin : We put a 7” single out on a Bristol Label that we then gave to Massive , they loved it and asked for more, we gave them more, they liked that too so we had a meeting in the Mud Dock café in Bristol .

MAA : Are you still in touch with them?
Corin : Yes

MAA : ’Lost in a garden of clouds’ is an instrumental album, did Helen, Wendy, Martin and Kelvin worked on it?
Corin : No.

MAA : What about their solo carrier?
Corin : Yes Helen has been working her material for an album which we hope to be out this year. Wendy also has an Album which will be out this year. Kelvin has a project called ‘The Heavy’ They have been playing live which has been going down really well. The Album is coming along great, almost finished just needs to be just a little heavier. We are posting a free download track on our site at www.alphaheaven.com

MAA : Tell us more about the making of ‘Lost in a garden of clouds’, what the differences, similitude with ‘Come from heaven, ‘The impossible thrill’ and ‘Stargazing’?
Corin : Lost in a garden of clouds grew from the cine mixes that we have been performing across Europe . Andy and myself were asked to put a score to a few old films that we then perform in cinemas with decks, laptops, keyboards, effects....Some of the music written for the films we used on ‘Lost in a garden of clouds’. We did change and re-work a lot of the tunes and wrote new ones which were then mixed together as a continues album, a soundtrack to an imaginary film.

MAA : The lack of voices create some kind of uniformity, this album would easily fit a movie: did you ever make a movie soundtrack? if not, would you like to do one?
Corin : We would love to do a soundtrack, we have had our music used on films but no one has asked us to write for a new film yet, still waiting.......

MAA : From which movies are extracted the samples of the new album?
Andy : can’t really answer that. Most of the samples come from sources that people may find surprising. Unfortunately the law on sampling still stifles creativity.

MAA : Are you going on tour? Do you already have tour dates to promote the release of ‘Lost in a garden of clouds’ (any breaking news???)
Corin : Sorry no touring as yet, Wendy is expecting twins so she is a little occupied at the moment, so gigs we have to hold off for now. We have been in the studio working on lots of project, I think there are about 5/6 albums on the alpha computer at the moment so lots to get through. I have just completed an album for ‘Jamie Roberts’ formally ‘Delta’, release of this we do not know yet but we will put all news on our website and forum.

MAA : Your new site seems really important to you, are you totally in control of your site?
Corin : It has been great being in control of the site, Having a mailing list is great, we can’t believe how many people sign up! Only we just feel that we are not giving them enough, more downloads coming.... promise. Our forum too has been great fun. The internet is great, it’s growing and becoming quite exciting, we what to start a radio station next. Playing lots of music that has influenced us as well as new unreleased material, remixes and so on., Listeners will be able to form poles on favourite tunes (like a play list). We could even open up the possablities of the listeners running poles on new tunes (demos) that then we work on. There are so many possibilities with the Internet. We are currently waiting for ‘Lost in a garden of Clouds ’ to be available as a digital download.

MAA : We know few about ‘Vacant’ your other band, would you tell us more about it?
Corin : Vacant is our dance project, we are about to release 12” vinyl ‘Dodger’. We both love dance music and this is our chance to get those ideas out that we are not allowed to put into Alpha. It’s great fun.

MAA : You have created your own label ‘Don’t touch’ what other bands are part of it?
Corin : Don’t touch is still early days, we licence Alpha from don’t touch. We have other projects in the studio which could be released through Don’t touch or licensed through a major label.

MAA : What’s on your decks at the moment?
Corin : Nothing they are broken, though my CD player has had every thing from Queen to Tim Buckley.
Andy : still listening to a lot of old stuff, a lot of hip hop, the new lps by Rodney p, roots manuva are great, tracks by dangermouse, starving artist collective, gift of gab, maroon, m.f.doom, also just got a copy of something for everyone by sammy davis jnr...