Errors Photoshoot for The Skinny Magazine

MUSIC

STOP MAKING SENSE Before Errors storm the land with Have Some Faith In Magic, we sit down with the Glasgow trio to talk gut instincts, aborted album titles and the attraction of bald Mogwai fans INTERVIEW: Chris Buckle photos: Tom Manley

Since their formation in 2004, Errors have forged twin reputations: first, as pigeonhole-shirking ‘post-electro’ soundsmiths; second, as reliable punproviders. From How Clean Is Your Acid House? to remix LP Celebrity Come Down with Me, they’ve long exercised a penchant for baptising serious music with firmly non-serious labels.

By comparison, their third album’s title seems disarmingly direct, surprisingly free from irreverence. Should the lack of reference to Channel 4’s daytime listings be taken as a sign that the comedy of Errors is on the wane? “I think there was just less terrible chat when we were making this record,” suggests Simon Ward, discussing Have Some Faith in Magic just days ahead of its release. Not for the first time during our conversation, Stephen ‘Steev’ Livingstone respectfully disagrees. “I don’t know about that,” he laughs,

10 THE SKINNY February 2012

“we just didn’t write as much of it down. One alternative I do remember we considered was ‘You Know Where the Bin Is’. We imagined someone giving a demo to a band, and the band just saying that in response. Not us, like, another band…” he hastens to add, preserving their upstanding reputations in the nick of time.

It seems their collective sense of humour remains intact, an observation borne out by the memorably eccentric promo for latest single Pleasure Palaces, which translates the track’s shiny, shimmering charms into garish, gif-inspired graphics and some silky dance moves (from a bubble-headed Steev in particular). Never mind placing faith in magic – they presumably had to invest a fair chunk of confidence in director Rachel MacLean [who also kindly designed the cover of this very magazine] not to make them look like

eejits. “I was thinking about it this morning and I wouldn’t even know where to begin with doing something like that, just the amount of layers,” marvels a de-bubbled Steev. “It made me think that what we do is really primitive in comparison.”

Maintaining such modesty can’t be easy of late, what with Have Some Faith in Magic already rubber-stamped within these pages (and beyond) as the band’s finest work to this point in its seven year lifespan. “The reviews have all been pretty encouraging so far, and I think that helps you a wee bit ahead of going on tour, the fact that at least a few people think it’s good,” says Steev, before considering the potential brainwashing effects of such positive press. “Hopefully that will pollute other people’s minds, make them think it’s good before they’ve actually heard it.”

Are reviews, positive or otherwise, something

they pay much attention to? “I try not to,” says Simon, “I think they can change your opinion, change what you thought of your own music in some ways – which I find quite worrying, that I’m so easily swayed.” For Steev, this has its advantages. “You’re not always really aware of what it is you’ve done and it can take other people to tell you,” he suggests. “I’ve noticed that a lot with response to the titles and the artwork, stuff that we didn’t really think about.” Simon agrees: “It’s amazing some of the interpretations that people come up with,” he smiles. “It makes us seem really smart, like we’ve thought about these things, but most of it is just by accident pretty much…”

Errors insist that such “happy accidents” are rife, yet ultimately they place great faith in their own instincts. “With past records, I’ve always kind of looked back, to go, ‘well, on the last record there was this tune, so we need to have a version of that for this one,’” says Steev. “But this time it was just about looking forward and not thinking about what came before.” The results are, in the band’s own words, their “biggest change of direction” thus far, though they’re keen to stress that any developments were wholly organic. “It was a natural thing,” suggests Steev. “We didn’t sit down and plan out how the album would differ from the others.”

The only exception was the decision to use vocals more extensively than ever before. “That was one of the few conversations that we had before we started writing the record,” starts Steev, but Simon looks puzzled. “Do you think it was as deliberate as that?” he asks. “Because I just said the opposite to someone else yesterday… I mean, I know we talked about it, but I think it came more through experimentation.”

Such dalliances have certainly produced unorthodox results, influenced by Panda Bear, Atlas Sound and, most tellingly, Liz Fraser of the Cocteau Twins. “I quite like the process she goes through,” says Steev. “Like, she goes through dictionaries, takes words from different languages, and puts them together. So it’s more like a collage, but it’s still emotional and powerful even though what she’s saying doesn’t make any sense. I think that’s quite a unique talent to have – to be able to say something, but not mean anything.”

If that was their intention, it’s a lesson successfully absorbed; the lyrics are so masked in digital effects that it’s impossible to tell whether they’re profound or gibberish. “It is gibberish,” deadpans Steev. “It’s mostly just a stream-of-consciousness, just whatever is in my head at that time. It’s more about the sounds that the words make rather than what the words are.”

With their prior comments regarding peculiar misinterpretations of song titles in mind, I wonder how they feel about the prospect of lyric websites trying to elucidate said gibberish? “I don’t really want people to know what the actual lyrics are,” says Steev, “because it’s not important, but people will try and figure out what they are regardless.”

Elsewhere in this issue’s takeover, Errors have interviewed a range of artists about the different spaces in which they work, investigating how environment influences expression. It’s perhaps an inevitable talking point for the band, what with Have Some Faith in Magic having been written and recorded predominantly in Simon’s flat after their studio’s roof collapsed. “It probably changed the actual sound of the record a bit,” reckons Steev of their forced relocation, “because it was obviously a more relaxed space, and we could take our time. We could take plenty of breaks if we needed to; before, you kind of felt that if you weren’t getting anything done, then you were just best to go home, where at least at Simon’s, you were at home already.”

TRACK BY TRACK Steev Livingstone exclusively presents the synth wizards’ third LP

ERRORS R TAKEOVE

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It’s more about the sounds that the words make rather than what the words are Steev Livingstone

The close quarters helped foster a fairly regimented routine. “We just got on with it,” Simon recalls. “I think it was a good set of circumstances in the end. It didn’t really affect the way we worked too much, in terms of just getting stuff done.” By Steev’s reckoning, “we did more or less seven days a week for three or four months – it was pretty intense, but in a good way.”

Does that make going out on tour less of an adjustment then – if you’ve already spent all that time living in each other’s laps, what strain could a few weeks on the road add? “I think we’ve kind of gotten used to that in a lot of ways, particularly with the American tour [by Mogwai’s side last spring], which was five weeks in a car together.

Not a van,” Simon stresses, “a car.” Coping mechanisms were swiftly improvised. “I think we did pretty well considering the lack of space,” says Steev. “We all just put our headphones on and ignored each other for a month.”

2011 culminated with a show at the Barrowlands, again supporting their label bosses. “We tried a couple of the new tracks there, and they seemed to go down pretty well,” says Steev. “But the thing that made me feel quite comfortable about the whole show was getting up, and looking out, and realising I knew loads of people in the first few

rows. I was shitting myself up until that point.”

Simon takes somewhat less comfort from performing to friends and family, stating a preference for “a faceless mass,” to Steev’s amusement. “Really, you’d prefer just loads of bald Mogwai fans looking back at you, aye?” he mocks, but Simon’s steadfast. “Oh definitely – just loads of bald guys, like the cover of Being John Malkovich.”

This month they’ll set out on a headline tour of their own, placing Have Some Faith in Magic squarely in the spotlight for the first time – a daunting prospect, all things considered. “With this record, we kind of didn’t think about how we were going to recreate it live,” says Steev. “Since it was more of a bedroom record, we didn’t jam in the studio – there wasn’t even a drum kit set up.”

Complicating rehearsals further is the band’s recent line-up change, with four becoming three following the amicable departure of guitarist Greg Paterson to pursue a career in dentistry. “We just carried on, not really thinking about how we would deal with it, in terms of our live set-up,” says Simon.

“It was just a case of ‘finish the record, and worry about that sort of stuff afterwards’.” The bands’ downsizing affects new material and old alike, but they’re confident they’ve got all bases covered.

“We’re keen not to just have Greg’s parts running off a laptop,” says Steev. “We want to cover as much of that as possible with what we do, but obviously that’s difficult when there’s just three of us, and only two of us playing keyboards and guitars.

But I think we’ve worked out a way of doing it.”

Ignoring their previous warnings against reading too much into their album’s title, I ask whether they feel lucky to be doing what they’re doing. “There is a big chunk of luck, definitely,” reckons Steev, pondering the break that led to their signing with Rock Action. “I mean if certain people hadn’t been at early shows, then who knows what would have happened…” He pauses before joking, “maybe there would have been a guy from a better label, who knows. I guess it’s best not to think about these things…” Faithful? Perhaps not entirely.

Magic? Oh aye.

Have Some Faith In Magic is released via Rock Action Records on 30 Jan Playing Dundee Doghouse on 24 Feb, Aberdeen Lemon Tree on 25 Feb and Glasgow Arches on 11 May www.havesomefaithinmagic.com

Tusk I’d just bought a new harmony guitar pedal the same day I started writing this, which gives everything this sparkly quality. I’ve been getting into the twin-harmonic-guitar à la Steely Dan’s Reelin’ In the Years. It definitely has an ‘albumopener’ feel to it, we wanted something that would have an impact. It’s the only song on the album not to feature vocals. I definitely think there’s a prog influence here too – Scottish prog!

Magna Encarta This is our first tune to make use of prominent vocals; a starting point for the direction that the new material was headed in, it was already in the bag and we released it as a single last March. The only difference with this version is the addition of live drums.

It uses more or less just one synthesiser – the Poly 800, from the same month and year that I was born (September 1984). I can imagine a scif-fi film where we’re accidentally swapped at birth but then meet up years later to duet on this record. It was finished within three days, which is why I think it sounds quite consistent even though it travels down many paths.

Blank Media As I was travelling down to the old studio one day, I decided to get off the bus early and walk through the Barras; I was listening to The Cocteau Twins on my headphones and walked past a stall selling ‘Blank Media’. I got into the studio and wrote the first section for what became this track – I had just bought a new reverb pedal and was looking to get that Cocteau Twins flangey-reverb sound which you can hear in the intro. This is probably my favourite of our new material because it seems unlike anything we’ve ever done before. We used Take My Breath Away by Berlin as a reference point for this song, hence shit-loads of reverb on the snare drum.

Pleasure Palaces This is actually the second version of Pleasure Palaces, the first of which I accidentally deleted just as I had finished it. I actually cried when that happened because I’d spent so long working on it and was really happy with it. I was taking pretty strong (prescribed) codeine at the time of recording this, which made me feel pretty spaced-out most of the time and probably influenced the ethereal quality that the tune has (but also led me to making idiotic mistakes like deleting the whole thing). Once I had wiped away the tears, sworn-at and booted a few inanimate objects, I began rebuilding the tune from scratch. Originally it was called Ben Vane after the hill of the same name – as I started the tune the day I climbed it. But I didn’t really think that suited how the tune eventually sounded, so we named it Pleasure Palaces after a programme about historical British buildings of pleasure and leisure, by the engineering enthusiast and historian Fred Dibnah.

The Knock Similarly, this tune was named after a hill I climbed, but this time it stuck. A lot of it was written when we were on tour in the US last year; it’s pretty difficult and frustrating to write on the road, everything becomes disjointed and I think that can be heard a little here as it sounds like two tunes in one. It’s got some auto-tuned vocals at the start and a Terrahawks sample which I slowed down and warped on my 4-track. It captures a moment when Zelda is berating her son for being an idiot, you can make out the words ‘Sorry, mother,’ which sounds pretty sinister.

John Carpenter’s soundtracks were an influence on this one, the chimey melody and the constant bassline are tricks of his that we’ve borrowed.

Canon This was written and recorded in one day in December 2010. The bass line is really confusing; just when you think you understand the pattern of it, it suddenly doesn’t make sense any more. I recorded this in my bedroom, using an old knackered snaredrum as a ‘bongo.’ All the synths on it are a Korg DW-8000, which is from around the same time as the Poly 800, but it’s got a more digital late-80s quality to it. There are wee synth noises on there that remind me of Roedelius, which I was probably listening to a lot of at the time.

Earthscore The title of this comes from the 1976 film At The Earth’s Core – a film about Victorian scientists journeying to the centre of the Earth where they discover a strange underground labyrinth ruled by telepathic birds and inhabited by cavemen and monsters. I had that on in the background as I started writing this tune. I think the title ended up influencing the overall sound, because it’s pretty epic and tribal.

The early demos are unrecognisable to what the tune eventually evolved into, having started it in November 2009, right after we finished recording Come Down With Me and taking until August 2011 to make it satisfactory. This is definitely the longest we’ve ever spent on a track; there were points when we almost abandoned the whole thing, right up to the end of the recording process we were still arguing about it, mainly about how the drums should sound. Again, this is more prog influenced, it travels down unexpected avenues before you realise you are back at the start again, similar to the labyrinthine world of the film that inspired it.

Cloud Chamber This one was being completed right up to the final moments of the deadline for the record. I couldn’t help thinking of Enya when recording the vocals and I think that’s pretty evident in listening to it. We made most comprehensive use of the synths that we had recently purchased (Yamaha DX7 and Roland JX 3P) on this one; the working title was Nervous. It took on many forms, being deleted and undeleted several times.

Barton Spring I was experimenting with one-take recording when writing this. At the end of the recording one of the synths makes a discordant ‘wvwamp’ sound – that’s me accidentally leaning on the synth in an attempt to press STOP on the computer, I think little nuances like that can be good and make the music a little more interesting. The drums are from an old Casio keyboard, which I saw in the window of a charity shop and used the day I started recording it. I felt that something was missing so got in touch with a guy called Kip Uhlhorn who plays in a band from Memphis called Cloudland Canyon, asking if he could help me out with some vocals.

I met him at South by Southwest earlier that year and we’d talked about collaborating at some point, so it was great to get him involved.

Holus Bolus I had more or less finished this a year prior to writing the rest of the record, but I didn’t have an ending. The vocals were probably influenced by the religious choir music I’d been listening to around the time. The working title was Shallow Tears, but we decided that sounded like a terrible emo band’s name so we changed it to Holus Bolus, which means ‘all at once’ and suits its nature as there are so many instruments playing the same parts in unison. The noise-out at the end was fun to do.

February 2012

THE SKINNY 11