Lee Vincent – Drums

James Brown – Guitar

Rob Lee – Bass

Tom Hudson – Guitar & Vocals

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Title image: Bart Pettman

James McDonald And you find yourself sat on a picnic bench outside a student union in Wycombe, hugging cigarettes with three northern tykes and a fellow Dorset bumpkin. I initially became aware of the lads around me maybe a year or two prior to tonight, this being our second shared meeting since I first heard a demo carrying the title ‘High Five, Swan Dive, Nose Dive’.

One thing that was evident then (still now) was that their music was big fun – it’s riff worship, balls to the wall duurty rock, and unashamedly so. What more could an adolescent male want?

Guitarist James Brown is an icon in the making, throwing himself around the stage with a blatant disregard for health and safety. Rebel. He uses 5 strings, once assuring me ‘no one needs 2 E’s’. Tom Hudson possesses a vocal girth nothing short of brutal, regularly throwing up after sets from the strain he puts on his cords. He can often be seen spitting on audiences from great heights during an exercise in what he refers to as ‘target practice’. Lee Vincent is a relentless driving force behind the kit, an essential ingredient in a solid live act, beating the skins much as he wouldn’t a lover. Pulled Apart By Horses also have a bass player. His name is Robert Lee, and I definitely would.

But you know all this, right? In fact, it’s quite levelling to think that a band yet to release a full album has been warmed to in such a fashion, both across our isles and Europe. It becomes more absurd when you remember the band have released two sold out 7″ singles, a sold out EP, have performed on sizable stages at the Reading and Leeds festivals, and have just come back from supporting Biffy Clyro across the UK and Ireland.

Who do they think they are?

Well, it’s just after this stretch with Biffy, playing to thousands each night, that we find ourselves together in Wycombe, so I figured I’d find out…

Lee Vincent ‘You’re a freak if you’ve never had fucking nits mate, I just don’t trust ya!’

Tom Hudson ‘Alright… I’ve had chicken pox…’

Lee Vincent ‘With nits in?’

James Brown ‘NITS IN!’

****
Lee and James’ DJ set in London tomorrow has been canceled late in the day, so the drinking has begun early tonight…
****
James McDonald So what do you usually drop when you DJ? Isn’t it great when people take notice of your skills behind the decks just because you’re in a band, you can fulfill your true calling eh?

James Brown ‘Exactly, it’s a fucking relief!’

Lee Vincent ‘We usually play Biggie Smalls. Basically it’s an equal mix of New Orleans sludge-metal and Hip Hop.’

James Brown ‘…and a bit of Gypsey Kings to round off the night…’

Lee Vincent ‘Yeah, but that’s only if the party is really banging.’

James McDonald Do you do Bar Mitzvahs?

James Brown ‘When we can…’

James McDonald So, gentlemen, the last time I saw you was in a van in Steventon this summer… actually ‘van’ is putting it down a little bit, it was pretty spacious…

Lee Vincent The splitter of power.

James Brown I didn’t think it was that plush to be honest…

James McDonald It had a table…

Tom Hudson It was fucking horrible by the end…

James Brown We’d covered it in ash and cans…

Lee Vincent It became a halfway house for bands that day I think.

James Brown Once it started raining…

Lee Vincent I think Sky Larking hauled themselves up in there with us.

Tom Hudson Plus the odd Telegraph coming in…

James McDonald You told me then you had plans to take over the universe – is that still the goal?

Lee Vincent Yeah, always. I think we’ve pretty much taken over Leeds…

Rob Lee Leeds is the mothership.

James McDonald I guess the first step would be putting out your album, any idea when that will be?

James Brown I think the album’s coming out in May now?

Lee Vincent I dunno man, I don’t wanna put at date on it anymore…

James Brown Yeah, yeah…

Lee Vincent …it really changes all the time. Early next year.

James McDonald Aye, fair enough… I went onto the live webcam [the band set up a studio web feed during the recording process] briefly, but all it seemed to be was Rob dancing around in his underwear. I’m not complaining…

Rob Lee Haha, yeah, we put a post out saying ‘tune in at 11 o’clock’ or whatever – then we woke up at 11 and I think Dom [ex Grammatics, now tour manager] was there as well, so it was just us walking around in duvets and in our underwear, then just looking at the camera like ‘ah fuck!

James Brown Absolutely nothing to do with recording, that became the theme.

Lee Vincent It was just cabin fever really, and we saw it as a way of elevating the boredom.

James McDonald How long were you in the studio in the end?>

Tom Hudson Eight days on the trot? Seven or eight…

Rob Lee It wasn’t really all that bad, but when you’re living on microwave food the whole time…

Lee Vincent Yeah, you basically just have a master room and then your bedroom’s right next to it and the recording room’s just above it all – it gets a bit weird.

Tom Hudson We did have Goldeneye though…

Lee Vincent …and that South Park game which was shit!

Tom Hudson All I could hear when I was doing my vocals was Lee in the other room going ‘Die Die!’

Lee Vincent …killing Nazis…

James Brown Bridlington is one of the most depressing places I’ve been to.

Lee Vincent The only good thing about Bridlington is the studio…

Rob Lee Yeah, it’s the loveliest place in Bridlington.

James McDonald But you’ve got it done now… I guess you’ve heard the masters already?

Lee Vincent Yeah, it’s kind of going backwards and forwards a little bit at the moment but we just got the final one back, we were listening to it in the car on the way over tonight…

Rob Lee But even that needs some tweaking…

Tom Hudson Do you reckon?

Rob Lee Yeah, the vocals needs to go up a bit in ‘…Talons’

Lee Vincent The thing is it’s been mastered already…

James Brown At Abbey Road…

Lee Vincent …but now we’ve had a change of heart…

James Brown Yeah, so it was already finished but then we kind of realised… It wasn’t that it was rushed…

Lee Vincent The drums weren’t loud enough!

Rob Lee The guy who was mixing it, he likes the band so he said anything that needed redoing he would do it…

James McDonald [To Rob] Are you happy with the bass sound? Were you after a high end bass or a deeper tone?

Lee Vincent It sounds like Dubstep!

Rob Lee I recorded it with loads of high end on it because I knew it would get pulled back in the mix like, but it’s fucking thunderous, I’m so happy with it!

James Brown On the song ‘I’ve Got Guestlist…’, when it came on in the car I could feel my feet trembling!

Rob Lee I would say ‘Bring it on Lightening Bolt‘ but that would be ridiculous…

James Brown Yeah, yeah, he ‘would’ say that…

Tom Hudson They are playing tonight in Leeds…

James Brown Yeah, we all had tickets to go there but we wanted to come to High Wycombe SO much!

Tom Hudson SOOOO BAD!

James McDonald So apart from one or two tweaks you’re happy with how the album’s sounding…

All: ‘Yeah, yeah’

Lee Vincent It’s captured what we wanted to get really.

James McDonald Last time I spoke to you you said you were aiming for about a 35/40 minute duration…

Lee Vincent Yeah, it’s pretty much exactly 35 minutes

James McDonald That’s keeping it quite brief then…

Rob Lee Yeah, the majority of the album is like, two to three minute songs and then the end one is about eight minutes which is like…

Tom Hudson It’s like one and a half minute song and then the rest of it is just riff

Rob Lee Just a massive riff…

James Brown ‘The album’s kind of like an imprint of the sets we’ve been doing, you know, short and sharp…

Lee Vincent But we thought we ought to finish it on something special so it’s just a massive kind of stoner riff at the end really…

James McDonald You see, the only criticism I hear about Pulled Apart By Horses is that you’re a one trick pony…

Rob Lee We are a one trick pony, but it’s a fucking good trick!

James McDonald Exactly. It’s like, you build up a riff and then you drop it, then you build it up again and drop it twice as hard, but I guess it’s easier to criticise something once it’s been done…

Lee Vincent I think once people have actually heard the album, because live it’s more of a punch in the face, not with the intricacies… you can’t really hear the subtleties, but once you hear the whole album…

Tom Hudson I think it’s fucking boppin’.

Lee Vincent Even though perhaps it’s well within a specific genre I still think it’s quite eclectic and I’d disagree with people saying, you know, the songs sound the same…

Rob Lee That’s for other people to decide.

James Brown I think, especially when we were writing the new songs, there was a point where we were going, hang on a minute, this doesn’t really fit in with what we’ve previously done. Obviously there are songs people haven’t heard from the album, like there’s a track called ‘Yeah Buddy’…

Lee Vincent It’s completely different to anything we’ve done…

James Brown …and ‘…Talons’, I think we became aware. I remember you [to Lee] saying ‘we’re just building it up to a big riff…’

James McDonald Was that realisation because you’ve had time now to find your feet?

Lee Vincent I think it’s just a matter of being happy with what you’re doing, and we are very happy when we write a song and it descends into a massive riff and you just chug that out and have fun with it. But I think, to keep us all happy, before anyone else, is to just write stuff that keeps it interesting. We’re never gonna drastically change, but y’know…

Tom Hudson Like ‘Ghost Train’ is a lot slower and we wanted to have something we could put in the middle of the set, to stop us from dying really!

James Brown I think once people have heard the album there’ll definitely be some tracks that people wouldn’t immediately trademark as us.

Lee Vincent It’s just progression really…

James McDonald Having a change of pace mid set is probably a good idea; I remember Lins [Tom’s wife, aka ‘Stunt Boobs’] saying at Truck that was one of the first sets where you hadn’t thrown up…

Tom Hudson Yeah…

Lee Vincent I think you’re getting used to it now eh?

Tom Hudson Yeah, because we’ve just done the Biffy tour and we were on at like, half seven every night, so I was getting catering but after the set in a little box! Cold!

James Brown [to Tom] It’s always the same story though, if you eat just before the set you’re gonna throw up, it’s just gonna happen…

Rob Lee I think, going back to what we were saying about being a one trick pony, with respect when we were first getting together we just wanted to get a set down without faffing around… Not to the detriment of not actually getting anything together, and once we had those songs we were immediately out on the road and people were booking us everywhere. We’ve been gigging pretty much constantly since then so we’ve not really had much of a chance.

Tom Hudson We spent about three quarters of a year playing five songs I think…

James Brown Looking back on the time we’ve had between gigging in the last year and a half…

Lee Vincent I’m surprised we’ve got a fucking album together really!

James Brown Yeah!

James McDonald Yeah, you’re a new band so it’s kind of unfair to be making too many criticisms at this point.

Lee Vincent But people having these criticisms, it’s still cool y’know? At least people are interested…

Tom Hudson I was thinking, like, when I was speaking to Sam from Blakfish he was saying like, NME reviewed their album and gave them like, one star or something…

James Brown oh yeah…

Tom Hudson But I was talking to him and saying, well I wouldn’t be that bothered y’know – I’d rather get the lowest mark possible than a five or something mediocre. If someone really hates you…

Lee Vincent You’re kind of doing something right in a way!

Tom Hudson Yeah, at least someone’s giving you some sort of emotion, something real towards your music. Unless people are bored by it then maybe you are doing something wrong. Saying that we’ll probably get a five in NME now!

Lee Vincent Comme ci comme ça!

Rob Lee Also since recording the album and touring with Biffy, that’s been huge for us so we’ve been coming up with new ideas and writing bits since then…

James Brown Have we?

Rob Lee Well, I have!

James McDonald I guess once the album’s out and you’ve done the press run and the touring for that, you’ll have time to take stock and go from there. It’s a classic case…

Rob Lee That’s it, when you’re touring you kind of immerse yourself in that and concentrate on that and you give those songs as much as you can.

Lee Vincent I think it’s cool that we haven’t started playing all the songs from the album live yet, so we can still have kind of a pretty fresh set plus we’ll be gradually getting other new songs together as well.

James McDonald I remember talking to Biffy just before ‘Puzzle’ came out, and it’s interesting because they were saying pretty much what you are now; that they had to hold back some of the tracks until the album was actually released, but once it had been they could explore the album a bit more in the set and it would give it a new lease of life. You’ll be fine though, you’ve got nothing to worry about!

James Brown Yeah!

Lee Vincent I think, as long as we’re still enjoying ourselves and what we’re playing then there’s no real problem.

Tom Hudson We got off the Biffy tour, what, two weeks ago, and we’re already buzzing about having a gig tonight.

James McDonald Two weeks must seem like a lifetime after a tour like that, how many dates was it in the end?

Tom Hudson errrrrrrr…

Lee Vincent It’s hard to work out!

James Brown With all the other gigs we were playing…

Lee VincentYeah, basically all the days we had ‘off’ from that tour, we had a separate gig of our own so…

James Brown I think we only had one day actually ‘off’ on the whole tour…

Lee Vincent And that was a travel day so we were working anyway!

Rob Lee We had two gigs in one day as well in Ireland.

Lee Vincent But once you gear yourself up to go on tour you’re kind of ready for anything really. You’re in that place in your mind where you’re just, you want to play every night and, it’s just weird.

Rob Lee That’s the thing with having an artillery of one set of songs and playing them every night and really honing down who you are as a band, you kind of write better from that, you kind of learn who you are as a band…

Tom Hudson We play so many gigs we don’t practice!

James McDonald I was going to ask actually, did you find at the end of the tour the songs were noticeably tighter?

Rob Lee Oh yeah

Tom Hudson There were only few gigs where we had real stinkers…

Lee Vincent There was only one bad one really, the rest were maybe two to three people shrugging and thought it wasn’t that great, but the one bad one wasn’t really down to us…

Tom Hudson Yeah!

Lee Vincent …so there was only one that we thought was shit and that’s not too bad out of a whole tour.

James Brown Out of like, 20 gigs… the thing is for a few of our sets there were like, circle pits and shit, so when that happens you don’t really think about mistakes and that, the first thing you remember is the good stuff.’

Lee Vincent If people are getting that into it at half seven in the evening you kind of go, well, fair enough, we did what we were supposed to do.

James McDonald You had Manchester Orchestra on after you, very different type of music…

Rob Lee They were such cunts as well(!)

[All laugh]

James Brown Nah, they were really nice guys…

Lee Vincent I don’t think the album does their live set justice if you see what I mean?

Tom Hudson Yeah, like when you’re on tour with a band it’s like listening to their album repeatedly, but through that it really grew on me because at first when I checked them out I couldn’t really get into it that much. When I listened back to the album after the tour it sounded completely different, it didn’t have the weight behind it or the heaviness.’

Lee Vincent I guess it must have been kind of weird for them between us and Biffy because even with Biffy’s more poppier moments they’re still quite heavy and epic…

Rob Lee Like us!

James Brown It was one of the first things Andy, their singer, pointed out to me. He was like, ‘Man, I can’t believe they put us in between you two!

Rob Lee We’d come off stage and they’d be like, ‘we fucking hate you guys(!)

Tom Hudson I remember the first gig we did with them in Belfast, and we’d just come off stage and saw Chris, their keyboard player, just throwing the horns at us going ‘Fuck yeah!

James McDonald That’s cool! I guess looking back, in ten years’ time when you’re all bloated having released you 27th studio album or whatever, you’ll look back on that tour as a real turning point?

Tom Hudson Yeah definitely…

Lee Vincent It definitely felt like the next step y’know?

James McDonald But it was in a way a make or break thing – playing gigs that size as the first band on in whichever city…

Lee Vincent Oh yeah definitely. I think, I don’t know if it’s ‘coz we’re stupid, but we just didn’t think about it really, we just went out…

Rob Lee Do exactly what we do…

Tom Hudson I think that naivety really helped!

James Brown I kind of saw it as a challenge, opening for a band of that size in front of loads of people who probably haven’t heard of you, it was great! We just had to try and win them over somehow.

Tom Hudson I think a lot of the time we just scared them into liking us!

Rob Lee Like we mentioned earlier about a few similarities between us and Biffy, I could definitely understand that with regard to their earlier career…

Lee Vincent Also there were a lot of new Biffy fans there who weren’t digging the screaming at all!

James McDonald For me, it almost got to the point where I wouldn’t wear a Biffy tee out anymore because you’d get 15/16 year old girls coming up to you and you’d say ‘have you heard ‘The Vertigo of Bliss?’, have you heard this song or that song, and you’d just get blank looks or whatever. That said, if you like a band who gives a fuck what other people think…

James Brown Right on!

Rob Lee I think with the similarities between us now and Biffy’s earlier career, without trying to sound arrogant, but it seemed like they really picked up on that on tour and maybe it brought back a bit of nostalgia…

Lee Vincent Yeah, like now they’ve got their feet firmly on the ground but you could tell they were like, ah, we were you once!

James McDonald I mean, say what you like about Biffy, but they’ve fucking worked to get there…

Tom Hudson Yeah, definitely!

Rob Lee Aside from the music you can see it in them as people because there’s just no ego there at all…

Lee Vincent The way they’ve gone about everything, they’re still in it for the right reasons even though they’re one of the biggest bands in the UK now.

James Brown But yeah, to kind of sum up the tour, to play to a load of Biffy Clyro fans and to see them get into what we’re doing is fucking amazing and to see a band go so far and not let it go to their heads is also fucking amazing for us.

Rob Lee From doing that tour as well you really understand how important they are as a live band – I bought ‘Vertigo of Bliss’ when it came out and used to listen to that album constantly, I still do, but the way it kind of started getting pumped through the media, I kind of lost interest really. It’s not that I disliked them or anything, I just lost interest a bit. But then going on tour with them and seeing them live I was just completely transfixed again, it was great!

Tom Hudson I watched the whole of their set for at least half the tour…

James Brown Yeah, it just didn’t get boring.

Lee Vincent Plus it was quite funny just watching the crowd at the front worshiping them!

James McDonald Ha! I’ve been that guy way too often

Rob Lee Well yeah, so were we, but also from watching and being around a band on tour you learn a lot from them about how they operate on tour. Just watching Simon sometimes, he’s totally lost in what he’s doing. It’s like some kind of meditative state, like that’s where they belong; on stage, and it’s just really inspiring to see that.

James McDonald So then, out of 10, the Biffy tour…

James Brown Definite 10!

Rob Lee Yeah!

Lee Vincent I’d say nine – it wasn’t a perfect tour…

Rob Lee Not necessarily on our playing or anything, but as an experience…

Tom Hudson I’d give it a five(!)

[All laugh]

Lee Vincent No, it was really good. I don’t want to say it was the best thing that’s ever happened to us but for a tour of that size, we couldn’t have asked to have been treated any better really.

Tom Hudson Yeah, it’s just one of those ones, like you said, that we’ll look back on and say it was totally rad.

James Brown I just think, it was a really big impact coming back off it, back to my room, was just such a huge downer.

James McDonald Did you feel more comfortable playing to like, thousands, than some of the smaller shows you’ve done?

James Brown Yeah I’d say so. It’s easier than playing small gigs.

Rob Lee We played at the Brudenell on Halloween and I felt more nervous doing that than at any time on the Biffy tour.

James Brown And that was like, 250 people…

Lee Vincent I think it kind of shows playing relatively smaller shows is also good for us. Like Nottingham Rock City was probably the best show we did even though it was one of the smallest dates on the tour.

James McDonald Great venue…

Tom Hudson Bloody great!

Rob Lee I think what was great about it all was it gave us a taster of what we can do if we work really hard at it…

Lee Vincent Just knowing we can come across on a stage that size is good enough, do you know what I mean? Like, we could’ve just stacked it and failed fucking badly.

James Brown Like at Glasgow Barrowlands, backstage there’s all kind of plaster painted stars around the roof and ceiling and you see where people have pulled them off the wall, and they’re kind of like tacky 70s decorations so you’ve got a bit of history behind them, and Lee was…

Lee Vincent They wouldn’t let me have one!

Rob Lee Yeah! Lee was like, ‘Can I have a star?’

Lee Vincent …and Adam [Johnston, third brother and Biffy’s drum technician] was like, ‘no, you can only have one when you headline the Barrowlands… don’t worry, it’ll happen!’ and it was like, ‘gnaaaaaawwww, thanks!’

Rob Lee Ha, he came up to me afterwards and said ‘not really, the cleaners just have them(!)

James McDonald 2009 was a good year then, but 2010 might be the one…

Tom Hudson I just want to go to the US so badly, do a tour out there…

James Brown Yeah!

Lee Vincent That’d be great. Also Europe a lot more, maybe Australia…

James Brown Hopefully Europe after the album tour, but then it’s festival season again…

Tom Hudson What happens with festivals? If you’ve already played do they definitely get you back for the next year or whatever?

James Brown I guess you can if you’re higher up, like a lot higher up than we were…

Lee Vincent I guess it’s just down to how well the album’s perceived or how well your band’s doing at that time?

James McDonald I’d be pretty surprised if you weren’t doing Reading and Leeds again next year…

Tom Hudson I’m not paying for it!

James McDonald How did you feel the set went? I was at Reading, not Leeds…

Lee Vincent Reading was definitely better than Leeds.

James Brown Yeah…

Rob Lee We played Leeds twice as well, on the Friday then on the Sunday…

James Brown Actually, Sunday was fucking good.

Rob Lee But we played at the same time as Kings of Leon, and Faith No More were playing as well, but we still had a reasonably full tent so that was cool.

James Brown It was a nice surprise!

James McDonald Just to close – do you have an idea of who’ll you’ll put the album out through? BSM?

James Brown Noooooo, not BSM.

Tom Hudson People think we’re tied to them because we had the single out with them y’know?

Lee Vincent Yeah, they’re a really great label though, really good group of guys and they’ve been a huge help. I think Kev quite enjoys finding the newer, ‘breaking’ bands and nurturing them a bit so we’re really grateful for that.’

Tom Hudson Yeah definitely. I think we’ve had a few offers but it’s all with management at the moment, we don’t know who just now.’

Lee Vincent Either way, it’ll be a good label!

James McDonald I don’t doubt that, you’ll need decent distribution across the UK, possibly Europe?

Lee Vincent Yeah. We just want to find a label with the same ideals as us, looking to go in the same direction like.

Tom Hudson You’ve got to have your wits about you. Sometimes you’ll think people are real nice then you’ll realise in a day or two that they’re just complete fucking dicks!

James Brown It’s just good to have a decent relationship, not just with your label, but with the management and your agent, your chauffeur and your fluffier!

Rob Lee But I think we’re lucky as a band because where we’ve got so far has all been down to other people’s enthusiasm in the band and they’ve all been doing it for free just because they believe in us or whatever, so we want that with the label who run the album, just that kind of honest enthusiasm really.’

****

By this point in the evening we’ve all been jibbering on for a good while now, and it’s suddenly brought to everyone’s attention that the band are due on stage in a matter of minutes, so we temporarily part ways and I scout out a good spot to catch the set.

It’s blistering, easily one of the best I’ve witnessed of theirs (despite Lee splitting the snare skin halfway through). The songs are pitch perfect, even at breakneck speed and after a two week lull. The aforementioned eight minute closer (‘Den Horn’) is even snuck in toward the end, albeit condensed into a more manageable five minutes. However the ‘stoner riff’, on first impression, is something special indeed. Hearing it live tonight has only whetted my appetite for the album; I’m looking forward to collapsing into a comfortable spot with a decent smoke and some decent headphones.

It was exciting talking to a young band who are genuinely enjoying what they’re doing, and who are experiencing things through new eyes, all the while humbly taking it on board. The way they dealt with the suggested ‘criticism’ was cool, I had a lot of respect respect for the way they composed themselves and the honesty of the answers they gave. As I said atop this article, the core of Pulled Apart By Horses’ music is big fun, and as long as they keep having fun, they won’t go far wrong.