While honouring the perhaps stereotypical indie rock look (including trademark black skinny jeans, dishevelled hair and a rather funky pair of thick-rimmed glasses), it is the guitarist and backing vocalist Felix White’s easy and down to earth nature that makes him instantly likeable, not least when he kindly obliges me with a sound check as I (overcautious by nature) nervously prod my voice recorder.
Laid back and confident in speaking his mind, White immediately objects to the critical consensus that The Maccabees adopted a darker sound in Wall of Arms to its predecessor (though with the exception of ‘No Kind Words’, which he considers to be “obviously the darkest thing that we’d done”). Instead, he prefers to see the album as “a light spirited pop record” and “more three dimensional and maybe less lightweight” than their debut Colour It In. Ultimately, he is keen to add, “It’s a lot better.” It is refreshing for an acclaimed artist not to take himself too seriously, yet he is understandably concerned about how their upcoming third offering will be received following such success. “I think we feel pressure in terms of quality of output because we don’t want to be a band that just churns out crap. . . I’m just looking forward to it, man. I think we’ll make our best record next up.” As for when to expect the new material, he hesitantly suggests that “It’ll hopefully be out this time next year.”
When questioned about the still topical debate of music piracy, White refuses to jump on the bandwagon of slagging off Lily Allen, insisting that she “has a right to an opinion. . . and all the more to her for voicing it”. He compares the public’s illegal downloading to “biting the hands that feed it”, seeing it as “a reaction to record labels ripping off bands for decades”. Therefore, he thinks it’s “totally acceptable that people would say ‘fuck that, we’ll take it for free now’”, but warns that “the people that end up getting hurt the most are the bands, and people aren’t realising that”.
However, whereas Allen infamously blasted Radiohead as “arrogant” for letting fans choose how much (if anything) to pay for their last album In Rainbows, White states “That’s fine for Radiohead to do. . . It’s great.” In fact, he is clearly a huge fan of the behemothic band, which headlined the Reading and Leeds festival last summer where the Maccabees also played; he goes as far as to describe them as “definitely one of the best bands of all time. They’re unbelievable”. He also praises Jamie T, and Richard Hawley and Micachu and the Shapes of the current crop of talent for making “great records” in 2009. When asked if there were any plans to do the festival circuit again this year, White hints at “a couple of festivals, but it won’t be the same thing. We can’t do them every year because then they won’t feel special.” And right now it’d be a tragic state of affairs for the British music scene if the Maccabees lost what makes them so special.
As for the gig, New York-based The Drums opened the show with a set that was nothing if not memorable, as flamboyant front man Jonathan Pierce leapt from stage left to stage right while the band belted out highlight track ‘Let’s Go Surfing’. Next up were The Big Pink, accompanied by a darker, rockier sound before ending with the anthemic crowd-pleaser ‘Dominos’. Bombay Bicycle Club almost rivalled the headliners with a diverse set list that brilliantly showcased their debut album, leaving me (and much of the audience, I suspect) eager to see a full gig by the up-and-coming group. The crowd reserved the majority of their excitement, however, for the Maccabees’ arrival on stage, as they enthusiastically combined favourites such as ‘Toothpaste Kisses’ with standout tracks from Wall of Arms (including ‘Can You Give It’, ‘One Hand Holding’ and ‘Love You Better’), along with a surprise cover of the 1980s hit ‘Rip It Up’ by the post-punk band Orange Juice. The Maccabees were evidently having just as much fun as their fans were as they continued to set the benchmark for the current generation of British indie rock music.
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