Django Django - Neo-psychedelic collages

Tommy Grace, officially the synth operator for Django Django, tells us in this phone conversation just how collective the band's writing and production process really is, even if it's guided by David McLean's ideas. His answers give a precise idea of the philosophy underpinning the work of this quartet, now on their third album. 

You've said that, as far as the working method for the new album goes, you went back to what you did on the first record. When did you realize you wanted to make that choice? Did it happen because of how the songs were coming out, or was it something you wanted from the start?

We didn't go completely back to how we made the first record, but there were things that, looking back, had really helped. We gave ourselves loads of time and kept control over everything, but there were also things we'd liked about how we made the second record, namely going into a proper studio and getting really good recordings of the drums and other things. Ultimately, there were certain things about how we made both records that we wanted to keep, so we definitely wanted to go back to our own studio, which is more or less Dave's old bedroom, where we'd recorded the first record, and that's where we really did the recording this time too. We felt like we'd lost a bit of control on the second record, because we needed an engineer to operate that huge desk in order to do things and change them. I think we didn't want anyone in the middle this time around, that was really important to us.

We think this new record is much more electronic-leaning than the previous ones. Do you agree? If so, how did you get there?

It wasn't really a conscious decision, we recorded a lot, we could have released two albums' worth of songs, and when we had to decide which songs to put on the record, we realized the more electronic ones worked better together. We've got loads of acoustic songs that didn't make the album, and I think we'll put them out on another one, maybe even by the end of the year, and maybe it won't be a full album, just an EP. In our studio now we've got loads of vintage and modern synths and drum machines, and obviously we wanted to use all of that stuff. We also did some sampling and played with other drummers. I can assure you the more acoustic songs turned out well too.

Want to say something about the songwriting process?

On this record, me, Dave and Jim worked together much more than in the past. We made demos, then went into the studio and Dave, who's the main producer, worked on them, he does a lot of cutting and pasting, so it could happen that me or Jim wrote a song, but then Dave changed the order of verse, bridge and chorus, or put the bridge as the intro, or changed some chords, he's really very skilled at making a song flow well, his work is essential.

I think there are a lot of layers in the sound, and I like that, and I also think the rhythm isn't just a beat, it's really part of the sonic fabric, and that's another thing I like about it.

Yeah, we've got tons of layers, we use an old program called Cubase, and one of its great things is that you can use it without limits, you can really handle as much stuff as you like, whereas with most programs you can't manage as many layers as you want, even if you go into a professional studio. We simply worked a huge amount on all the songs, using the same “collage” approach I described earlier for the writing. The writing process involves recording what we've written, putting it into a computer, pulling it back out and cutting and pasting, and even when we work on production, we do it the same way; in my opinion, there's no better way to create a song.

We think that, on this record, there's a different interaction between rhythm and melody compared to the past, because your melodic style has always been fairly unconventional, and the same could be said of the songs' tempos, whereas here the tempos are more straightforward, but the melodic style is similar to before.

I'm not sure I'm able to talk analytically about how the rhythmic and melodic elements fit together, it's not something I've particularly thought about.

Regarding Rebecca from Slow Club’s contribution, was the song written with an outside female voice in mind, or did you write it as if it were meant to be sung by you, like all the others?

I wrote the melody for that song myself, but I’m really, really bad at singing, so when I write melodies I play them on a piano or a synth. I wrote this one while Dave was away… there was just this melody worked out on a synth, then Dave came back, sang over it and it was okay, but we didn’t find the result particularly interesting, so we set it aside for a while. A couple of months later, Dave brought Rebecca into the studio – they were recording for a solo project of hers called Self Esteem – and Dave asked her if she wanted to sing on that chorus. She did, and it sounded really good, so she ended up singing the whole song, and we love it, it’s a lovely thing.

We feel there’s a strong sense of irony in your music. Do you agree?

No, actually that’s something we try to avoid. I think there can be a sense of humour, but we don’t like irony, mainly because it can come across as a shield, as if you were using it to hide your emotions, and that’s not something we’re interested in doing.

We hope you’ll be touring for a long time and that you’ll come back to Italy – what can we expect from your current live show?

New lights and new songs, and, because of the strange way we put songs together in the studio, we then have to learn them all over again to play them live, so we change them a lot. We like to make our live show its own thing, separate from recording – we always try to write songs in a way that lets us play them live afterwards, and we try to keep as much energy as possible. We started out playing small gigs in London, where you always have to be able to hold people’s attention, so we got used to playing in a more “in your face” style, and we’ve kept that quality. So I hope people get a party feeling, where they can dance. If people are dancing, then it’s a good Django Django show.

(Photo: Fiona Garden)

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