Wild Palms Interview

With a forthcoming release of a AA side single and a string of UK tour dates ahead of them, we caught up with Lou Hill from Wild Palms to give us an insight into the band.

More Than The Music: What a year it’s been for Wild Palms! You only formed in the past couple of years, yet you’ve had a string of festival dates, are in the midst of your UK tour, and have your third single coming out next month. What do you think your success can be put down to?

Wild Palms: We’ve been together about 2 years actually, but our relative success is down to being resourceful and hard-working, making sacrifices, and also not compromising ourselves or our music. We keep close-knit and push each other to keep progressing.

MTTM: How did you find the Festival circuit this year? I saw you at Offset in September and you were great!

Wild Palms: Offset was good, although James’ kit was basically swimming on that stage he had to keep like chasing it because it was moving around. The festival season kind of just went by quite quickly actually, there were a few really good ones like Standon Calling, Camden Crawl, Great Escape and a couple of European dates; but we had our minds on making the record so we were a bit preoccupied this summer I think.

MTTM: I understand you have signed a three-album deal with One Little Indian Records. It must be great to have such a significant amount of security and creative independence, especially with the music industry being the way it is at the moment?

Wild Palms: Yeah that’s basically what it has given us. The best thing about One Little Indian is that they give us complete creative control: there’s a lot to be said for that, especially in relation to us we wouldn’t do well with people sticking their oar in and messing with our music I don’t think. But in fairness security will only stretch so far, its not a charity we still have to create good music.

MTTM: You’ve sited a variety of musical influences previously; Captain Beefheart, Sonic Youth and Talking Heads to name a few.  Are these artists a great influence on you creative output generally, or are you more influenced by everyday life, relationships, personal anecdotes etc.?

Wild Palms: I’d say everyday life, but listening to music is part of that life y’know. Our minds are basically filters: some stuff sticks some stuff evaporates, its whatever strikes chord with you day-to-day: music, images, writing, conversations, events, glances etc etc…

MTTM: Who would you say your contemporaries are? Where do you fit in the modern music market?

Wild Palms: I don’t know. I tend not to think about it. In fact I make a concerted effort to keep that out of my consciousness and general life as much as possible and especially out of the studio: we all do. We never bring that into the studio, I think it could potentially have detrimental effect on the music, more specifically on what you create and the reasons why.

MTTM: Aestheticism seems to be an integral part of your work; with your singles sporting beautiful art work and photography. Will you be continuing this with the new releases?

Wild Palms: Yes, most definitely. This is all down to Aneel Kalsi (art direction and graphic design) and Ben Westoby (photography), they are a pair of very talented friends who we sat down with about a year ago and worked out an overarching concept and aesthetic that we thought represented WP and which would run throughout all releases and any affiliated artwork. We are heavily indebted and thankful to them.

MTTM: I loved the thick, heavy sound of your previous single Deep Dive. Will this vibe continue within your work, or do you aim to diversify?

Wild Palms: We always aim to diversify. Deep Dive was essentially a transitional song I think, I hope its heavy and deeper now than it ever was but the I also think that the sounds lighter and more mellow in many songs on the album, I think the whole album is fairly diverse actually,  which coincidentally Deep Dive is not on.

MTTM: You have a new Double AA side single out on the 8^th November (To the Lighthouse/Draw in Light). Can we expect your debut album anytime soon?

Wild Palms: I think Until Spring will be released in February.