The Beat Surrender

Brainlove Records are probably one of the most interesting record labels around at the moment with a series of releases that don’t fit easily under one umbrella, it’s a diverse roster for a label that cares about the music and the artists.

The latest release from the label is the album Fight My Battles For Me by Pagan Wanderer Lu. To try and give you a little more insight into the twisted genius of this keyboard folk hero in waiting we caught up with him for a quick chat recently.

What do you think are the pitfalls of writing political lyrics? Is it difficult to avoid trite sloganeering?

Well you’ve pretty much answered your own question there… I think the main risk is that you end up with a song which has no merit outside of its lyrics. A song where you absorb the meaning but have no desire to listen to it again after a while. I always take issue with people focusing too much on the political songs because I don’t think the majority of my songs are political.

But I am conscious when writing something like ‘Our New Hospital Sucks’ that it needs some lightness and humour to lift it. That or it needs to have some human edge to it.

I don’t think sloganeering is inherently bad. There’s a skill in capturing an idea succinctly. Bad sloganeering can be hilarious though. I also hate it when bands write about politics because they think that’s what’s required to make their music ‘important’.

You’ve got to have some perspective on how much you can get through to people in a song. Ultimately I’m just writing about whatever I’m interested in at the time. I don’t get on stage thinking ‘now I will change the minds of the audience’.

Talk us through your electronics.. It appears you’ve got some pretty neat toys on the go…

On the album I used a Yamaha keyboard from a car boot sale, Roland D2 and MC505 grooveboxes, a korg kaoss pad and kaossilator, a Suzuki omnichord and QChord, a monome, an alesis micron, ableton live, a kazoo, a music box and some pots and pans.

As a solo artist, do you get lonely?

Yeah actually. Mostly in the bit before and after sound check at gigs. I usually have a book with me but a bit of human contact doesn’t hurt. I think I have a naturally grumpy looking face so perhaps people who would ordinarily come up and say hello are scared to do so?

I saw the live videos you recorded at Dreamtrak, they were amazing! Do you think you’d ever try and play live like that?

I’d love to really. Getting a band together kind of hasn’t worked out for reasons mostly musical. I had a band for a while which was more like a straight guitar band and that didn’t feel right. The one-off Dreamtrak band was much more like I’d want it to be – collaborative, spontaneous, people not using conventional instruments – but sadly all the people in that band live in London and I live in Cardiff.

How far do you want to take your life in music? Would you like to do it as a career?

I’ve managed to stop thinking too much in terms of music as a career. These days record labels are becoming more conservative because of the economy, and the bottom dropping out of record sales. For someone like me you’re competing with much more obviously commercial bands who are willing to do whatever nonsense it takes to get into the lottery of big money releases.

It’s well known that something like 9 out of 10 albums don’t recoup and the band gets dropped. Often perfectly good albums don’t sell for completely unknowable reasons, or you can’t tell why one band succeeds and another fails because they both basically sound the same. That’s not something I want to get involved with. The more I know about the ‘music industry’ the less I want to do with it.

Of course I’d like to be able to just make music and not have to work, but I’d rather work and not have the extra pressure of wondering whether what I write has enough commercial potential to put food on my table for another year…

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