Sturdy As He Goes Mark Sturdy – musician, label owner (Sturdy Records), author and stalwart of the Leeds music scene. After growing up near Wetherby and going to university at Warwick, he moved to Leeds, wrote a book about Pulp and got involved in things musical. In the last three years he has got married, started Don’t Falter, released records by The Sequins, The Wind-up Birds, Post War Glamour Girls, The Seven Inches, joined The World Service, become a dad and was surprised to find it was somehow possible to combine the latter with still doing band, club night and label. Phew! Cactus turns up the heat and grills the man in question... Your latest band was Freemasonry in the Philippines, who played their first and last gig at the Fenton on 19 July. Tell us more… I just fancied doing something completely for the hell of it. I know Kroyd [The Wind-Up Birds] and James [Post War Glamour Girls] through the label etc, so asked them “do you want to form a band, write a bunch of stuff really quickly, play one gig and split up?” and they did. Kroyd just writes reams of lyrics constantly so I knew we’d have no problem with material, and James quite rightly has a lot of time for Kroyd so I knew he’d be up for it. Richard from This Many Boyfriends came on board with his Casio VL Tone and lovely voice, and somehow we had a set. Two days before the gig we roped in Liam from Moody Gowns on bass – one rehearsal was all he needed because he’s an actual musician. I’m not a great musician by any stretch but I fancied doing a band where I’m the guitarist/main ‘composer’ because I thought it’d push me a bit – especially as I hadn’t so much as taken my guitar out of its case for a good five years. The timeframe meant that nothing got overthought – if someone had an idea, it went in. As a result it was rough and a bit shambolic, but there was a freshness and spontaneity to it, and as we were only doing one gig it meant nobody got too self-conscious or precious about things. I really enjoyed it, and think the others did too. What other bands have you been in? 1. Arthur’s Departure (2000-2003) Vocals, guitar, occasional violin. Archetypal ridiculous inept student band. Thoroughly unique though. One of those bands that was crap and great at the same time. Still hugely proud of the little we achieved.
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2. Unexploded Shells (2004-2008) Vocals, guitar. Arthur’s Departure fizzled shortly after I left the Midlands, then editing Sandman for a year gave me a taste for band type activities around Leeds. When I was leaving Sandman, I sent a message out to the contributors saying “Oh by the way, some of the writers are forming a band, anyone who fancies it let me know.” What I didn’t mention was that I was the only person aware of this plan, which was how I ended up fronting a band that also included Tom Goodhand (then a youthful Sandman writer, later editor of both that and Leeds Guide, NME contributor and all sorts besides) and
some character called Steve Walsh [Vibrations’ CD reviews editor]. Tom and I wrote and sang the songs, and a brilliant guitarist called Tim Corbridge (subsequently seen with Ali Whitton, The Lodger and The Birthday Kiss) significantly raised their capabilities. It was a bit more ‘proper’ than Arthur’s Departure – quite a lot of gigs and recordings. We got slagged off quite a lot for allegedly abusing our position as well-connected local journos, which is odd looking back because we spent an awful lot of our time playing to our girlfriends at the Primrose or the Mixing Tin on a Wednesday night like everyone else (and enjoying it very much, I might add). 3. Adel Primary School Orchestra (2007-2011) Guitar, chime bars, triangle etc. Good version of ‘Summertime’. 4. This Many Boyfriends (2010) One day (2 gigs) filling in on bass. 5. The World Service (2011-present) Bass. Proud sideman to the substantial songwriting/singing/guitaring talents of Owen Lloyd (also known as the French Defence) and Jonny Hart (also known as Jonny from Delorian Drivers). How do you write songs? In my last band it was a case of “Quick! Play something!” and then everyone else played something too and then it was a song. In previous bands it was a case of pissing around on a guitar at home till I had something half-presentable, then playing it to the rest of the band and we’d gradually hew away at it till it was at least three-quarters presentable. So basically the same process, but slower. In both cases my favourite bit was where everyone else put their own ideas in – even a guitar part or a drum beat that you weren’t expecting is enough to drag a song off in a completely different direction. Same thing when someone else would come in with a song and I got to put my stamp on it. What’s your favourite venue? Unfashionably, I used to really like playing at the Primrose – still think the fact that place no longer does live music is a sad loss to Leeds. And the Packhorse, much like its namesake, is a reliable, seldom-acknowledged stalwart. Why start a record label? I’d always wanted to do a label, but the catalyst was several years spent working with Loqui, just trying to do what I could for them because I thought they were such a great band – this turned out to mainly be doing their website and spending a lot of time piecing together an archive compilation (‘I Can’t Believe It’s Not Better’) which, although it didn’t have the label name attached to it, could possibly sort-of stake a claim to being the first Sturdy Records release. Eventually they’d recorded a track called ‘Hermes Pan’ which they were describing as their next “single”, and because I’d already built up this relationship with them they were happy for me to step in and try to make it a bit more of a proper release. The other thing that fed into it was the experience of trying to