“It’s funny because people would always say “you’re an indie band” and we were like we’re not an indie band or people would say “oh, you’re a punk band” but we’re not a punk band either! What are we … it’s impossible to say.”
All the way back in 2008, fresh-faced four-piece Pulled Apart by Horses sent out a text inviting people to an intimate ‘secret gig’ in Leeds city centre. This was the first of many reputation-cementing shows for the alt-rock group, who are now revered on the gig circuit for rampant live performances which capture the unhinged, chaotic spirit of the band. Their signature sound – raw, punk-edged rock – has evolved over the years, as have their musical influences. Early albums were inspired by screech-heavy imaginings of Radiohead and Nirvana while their most recent tracks are tinged with nostalgia, echoing the classic rock ‘n’ roll of the sixties and seventies. Two years after the release of their fourth album, the boys are going back to basics with a series of ‘up close and personal’ shows across the UK, reminiscent of the ‘secret gig’ that kick-started their career. We caught up with lead guitarist James Brown to talk about touring, new music and why Sheffield has a special place in the band’s heart.
Why did you want the gigs on your upcoming tour to be in intimate, smaller venues?
There were a few reasons for wanting to do this tour. It was mainly because we haven’t done a tour in a couple of years and we’ve got lots of new material – I guess you could say we’ve got a new album’s worth of music! It’s a thing we used to do: go out and play new songs at small shows, then after we’d done the little tours we’d go back to the studio and record the music that we played live. We haven’t done that since the second album so we decided that we needed to play these songs live and get up close and personal with the fans to see how they like the new material. It’s a process of working out which songs work and which don’t – almost like a bit of a feedback forum.
You’ve been busy playing some festivals this summer, Y Not Festival in Derbyshire and 2000 Trees as well as a few abroad. What have been your highlights so far this year?
2000 Trees is such a good festival, that’s one we always hope we get an offer to play at. It’s so well respected, the people that go to it are proper music fans, they’re not just going to get drunk and take drugs in a field. And we finally got to play the main stage! It’s been seven or eight years of us playing there on smaller stages so it was brilliant. We were all really excited for that and it was just everything we thought it would be – a bit of a riot! Something really cool about the festival is that nobody gets any phone reception so people aren’t on their phones all the time. It makes a massive difference at a festival. When we got there, even our manager couldn’t find us and that sort of translates to the audience so they’re all hanging out together, going round in packs having fun instead of being sat there doing Instagram stories.
Does that really grate on you as a performer?
It does and it doesn’t… I remember when it started, I think it was when we did our third record Blood, you massively noticed it in the crowd. Looking down from the stage, you would just see a sea of phones in the air. On the tour for the second album, we’d see people taking pictures and stuff but it was madness with Blood, people live streaming and everything. I’d just think to myself, put your phone away, you’re missing the gig! It’s the same as anything though, if you go for a walk through the Yorkshire Dales and you’re looking at the view on a screen, you’re missing out; it’s not immersive at all. I saw recently that Jack White has banned all phones at his shows. When you turn up, you have to put your phone in a little box – it’s quite militant! That’s taking it a bit too far but I can see why it’s annoying for performers.
A homecoming gig in Leeds isn’t planned for this tour. Is there any reason for that?
This is the thing, we’re always seen as a Leeds band or a Yorkshire band and we love playing there but you’ve got to share it out sometimes – the idea for the tour was to maybe not do main cities like Manchester, London and Leeds but to go to smaller places that we wouldn’t normally go to.
It’s been a while since you played Sheffield – almost four years ago at the O2 Academy. It’ll be good to have you back.
Yeah, we realised that we hadn’t been to Sheffield in a couple of years and we recorded our last album there so we were all really keen to add Sheffield into the tour. Rob, our bassist, is from Sheffield and we love playing there. While we were recording the album, we stayed at The Harley, which was cool because we used to play lots of gigs there back in the day. We’re really looking forward to playing at Picture House Social too, we went there pretty much every night for pizza – it’s an amazing venue.
You said with The Haze that you were trying to recapture that youthful energy of your early stuff, having gone with a darker, more atmospheric feel for Blood. That being said, what direction will the new record be going in?
I don’t really want to give too much away… we’re changing things up a little bit. All I’ll say is that we’re going down the rock ‘n’ roll route with this record. We’ve been listening to The Rolling Stones and Iggy Pop and The Stooges, and we’ve all got on the same wavelength where we’re enjoying traditional rock ‘n’ roll, it’s a shared influence. This is why we came to the conclusion that we should go and play live, see if it works and if it doesn’t work then re-evaluate the stuff. Bands don’t really do that anymore and we didn’t do it for the last couple of albums but I think it’s important to go and give the fans a preview of what you want to do. We want to see how people will react to it before we record it.
It’s always important to keep people on their toes a bit.
Yeah, I think it’s really important to keep things fresh. With the second record that we did with Gil Norton who’s worked with Foo Fighters and The Pixies, we could’ve really easily become a normal rock band that keeps pumping out the same sort of albums but we would just get bored.
Yeah, I think you can really feel that in your albums, each one goes in a slightly different direction and it feels like you’re always evolving as a band. You don’t really fit into any one genre, but how would you have a go at describing yourselves?
It’s funny because people would always say “you’re an indie band” and we were like we’re not an indie band or people would say “oh, you’re a punk band” but we’re not a punk band either! What are we … it’s impossible to say. Back in the day, we’d be booked in for Download Festival one week then Latitude the next – nobody really knows what sort of band we are! I guess I’d say we’re an alternative rock band but if we just wrote the same sort of songs every time, it wouldn’t be exciting.
What was the writing process like for your new songs? Previously, you’ve said you cooped yourselves up in a cottage in Wales to make music. Was it a similar approach in terms of shutting yourselves away this time?
It’s been a similar process to before, really. It’s the four of us; it’s always a shared thing. There’s never been any one person directing everything. Tom’s done a few demos and brought them into the studio and we’ve all turned them into songs. Rob or I will have an idea for a song or Tommy will write basslines and little riffs and we all just get in the room and work together, that’s the essence of the band. It’s why we’re called Pulled Apart by Horses really, it’s four people with shared and different influences trying to create one thing – it’s everyone inputting and bringing ideas.
It seems like the solidarity and friendship between everyone is a key part of the band’s success.
It’s the only reason, it really is. We’ve seen bands over the years where they don’t have that collaboration and not everyone’s involved and it just leads to people being bored and wanting to be creative somewhere else. You can see it now in 2019 with certain bands (I’m not naming names) where one person is leading the band and the rest are just following… and that’s fine! But it’s not how we do things. We were basically just four geeky art students who liked being creative and wanted to be in a band.
You’ve been in the music industry for over a decade now, what lessons have you learned over the years?
The main thing we’ve learned is that you have to keep your feet on the ground. You think you’re living some kind of dream but you’re not… we’ve had some crashing lows. It’s boring to talk about but money is a big thing that we’ve learned you have to be really careful about. Someone comes along and goes: “Go and record with this guy, it’s gonna cost you £40,000 and it’s gonna be brilliant.” You need to hang on a minute and think if it’s the right thing to do? Don’t just jump right in. But yeah, if you’re passionate and you love making music, you’ll find a way to do it regardless of who’s giving you money. We’re just really happy that people still want to hear our music after all these years. I think that’s a really important part of the band, we want to keep doing it because we love it, we’re not looking for fame and stardom, we just enjoy it.
I think that really comes across in your music – even just scrolling down your social media, you have so many loyal fans commenting on the posts, eager for new music and shows.
If there ever came a point where we were stood on stage playing to five people, we’d probably think this isn’t really worth it anymore. But for now, it just feels right. We all enjoy it and we’re all friends and our fans still enjoy it so we will keep doing it!
Pulled Apart By Horses play Picture House Social on 8 October, tickets are £12 and available from leadmill.co.uk
