Moon & Back Music

Interview: Tim & Sam (10/06/2009)

Over a bag of Harribo, a nervous-looing Tim McIver gave us twenty minutes to tell us about Tim & Sam:
M&BM: Okay, if you could just introduce yourself and your band

TM: Sure, I’m Tim from Tim and Sam’s Tim and Sam Band with Tim and Sam, or just Tim and Sam for short

M&BM: Who else is in the band?

TM: There’s me, Becca on clarinet, Adam on guitar and Jamie on drums.

M&BM: You’ve got to enlighten us on the band name…

TM: Well, basically I started off making music with a friend called Sam, um, and it started taking off, but we only really made a few songs together; we’d made a Myspace and it just stuck.

M&BM: Cool, how long ago was that?

TM: Uh, probably about, just over two years ago now.

M&BM: How is you’ve come to be supporting Hafdis Huld?

TM: We’ve got the same booking agent, so….

M&BM: How long have you been with them [Hooked]?

TM: Since…October I think?

M&BM: Early days then, how is that going so far?

TM: Yeah it’s good, I used to do all the booking myself and, everything; I started doing music full time in June but since we got a manager and booking agent, it’s alot easier. It’s just more frequent and better gigs.

M&BM: Is it a permanent support slot on this tour?

TM: No no, it’s just a one off.

M&BM: Ah cool okay; so where do you hail from originally?

TM: We’re from North Wales, and Manchester. I went to uni in Manchester and we started doing gigs there, our gigging home is there, and Jamie is from Manchester. But we all live in North Wales.

M&BM: Just listening to yourselves just, we were really impressed; you’ve obviously into quite Icelandic music like Sigur Ros, Mum, Seabear. What sort of influences do have for your music because it’s quite different sounding.

TM: I do, I do like like Mum and Seabear and Penguin Cafe Orchestra, but I didn’t get into them till way after forming the band. But, just people like Radiohead, Sufjan Stevens, The National, um, yeah just alot of stuff where an acoustic guitar is the main instrument really.

M&BM: You’re a very accomplished guitarist, how old were you when you started?

TM: started when I was 8, so quite a while.

M&BM: How about the other members of the group?

TM: Becca’s started clarinet when she was 11 I think, I’ve been in bands with Adam since I was about 14 I think.

M&BM: How did you all meet?

TM: I’ve known Adam since I was like 4, we went to school together. Met Becca through friends of friends, and met Jamie at uni.

M&BM: What sort of things do you want to do in the future with the band?

TM: Well, we’ve got an album out on October 5th, the single is coming out 25th June on Static Caravan; I wanna do like mixing, producing, and we want to go into film soundtracks. We’ve had a few little things.

M&BM: How would you describe your sound, like as a band?

TM: Um, I generally just refer to my favourite press quote, which is um, “music for the entrance foyer to heaven”.

M&BM: that’s brilliant! There wasn’t much of a vocal aspect to your music, is it purely instrumental or can you see yourself exploring vocals later on?

TM: It started as an experiment really, I never thought “oh i wanna be an instrumental band” it just kind of happened. We have some ahhhs on record, but no proper vocals. For the album we should be having some guest vocalists in.

M&BM:  So what have you got planned for this summer, are you playing any festivals?

TM: yeah we have a few small ones, but I think we’re just generally having a quiet one really, so we can earn a bit of money; then in September we’re going to Europe for a tour; just at the planning stage at the moment.

M&BM: What’s your general recording process, because it’s a very layered sound isn’t it?

TM: Yeah, it starts with just recordings of my own in my like little home studio with guitars and i’ve got a big collection of instruments in my little studio so I just grab what’s to hand, mainly guitar, piano, banjos, mandolin, xylophones, glockenspiels, harmonnium, flutes, just anything i can get my hand on really. Then the others kinda bring their parts to it. Then we just struggle to put it together.

M&BM: On your last track live just I think there were three of you playing drums, what do you think that brings?

TM: Well that’s the first time anybody has said that actually, i don’t know if it’s the new drummer, it’s only his second gig. But, i suppose it brings a relatively unique sound. But Jamie is a very accomplished drummer I’m very pleased to be working with him.