INTERVIEW WITH FIGHTING FICTION
Where are you from and how has that shaped you?
We grew up in different towns and met at Uni, I’m from Brighton, Andy from the Isle of Wight Matt from Cheltenham and Nate is from Lincoln. I’d say these places all have or while we were younger had excellent local music scenes the feeling of community within those scenes is something that has shaped our attitude to the way we go about things in the band and to a large extent our attitudes to work and friendship as well. Things like making sure when a band or a friend is visiting your town they have somewhere to stay and good company the favour is always returned and that kind of attitudes spills over into everyday life.
Do you think punk is dead?
No it’s very much alive especially across the uk at the moment. It’s fragmented though little sub genres and cliques divide allot of people which is frustrating because from hardcore to ska there are similar reasons those people got into that sort of music and lifestyle in the first place, just a little bit of time taken to talk to someone usually leads to some common ground that can be shared. Appreciating the ways you are similar as well as enjoying some variety (who wants to listen to four bands that sound the same at a show?) would lead to a more unified scene across the UK. That’d be nice.
How political are you?
Wow that’s a vague question. I think we are political in varying degrees, some of us are vegetarian some fairly liberal one straight edge. The band isn’t intended to be a political vehicle for a message the songs are an expression f
Of what we are feeling, our intention is never to preach at anyone,about our separate views if someone walks away from a show or our record feeling informed or having a different viewpoint on a given subject that’s great, but I wouldn’t wan to label is with a group message because we all believe in different things l; not entirely different, I guess what I’m trying to say that tolerance and acceptance its a more progressive solution to minor differences than affront and aggravation. We believe in community and making differences from a small and local level. That can eventually impact on a bigger scale, so its worth putting in the effort where you are from to make a difference nationally and internationally in the long run.
You’ve already had some decent support slots – what’s your fave tour to date been?
We supported Dead to Me in Southampton it was great. We’ve got allot of friends down there and dead to me are one of our favourite bands. the whole show felt like a big party to me. We also were lucky enough to support Frank in Bath (our university town) a while ago. That has to be one of my favourites, having played all over the venues in Bath to support one of our favourite artists at the biggest venue in town (Komedia) a full house as well. That felt like one hell of a homecoming.
Tell us about the recent all dayer in Plymouth, sounds like it was pretty cool…
It was awesome allot of bands we are friends with were playing so it was a lovely meet up with some real quality bands on the line up. It said allot to me about the diversity and ingenuity of bands in the uk at the moment having 12 or so quality acts converge on one venue for a night. My favourite discovery from the night were Muncie Girls. They were incredible. Great songs with beautiful female vocals up front, they’re from Exeter and totally worth checking out.
You’re playing Cardiff and Cheltenham in May, what else are you up to?
We are touring across Europe for the best part of three weeks (April 3rd to 24th) with our good friends Egos at the Door. We’ve not been before so We are very excited. we’ll have another single out in may too I expect we’re are planning tour over the summer keep checking our websites to find out when we are coming near to you!
Finally, if you had to fight a book, what book would it be and why?
Not a hardback, we’d go for one with soft edges.
Fighting Fiction play Cardiff Moon on May 18 and Cheltenham Frog and Fiddle on may 19. More information at www.fightingfiction.com
