INTERVIEW WITH THE TEMPER TRAP
It’s been a while since you played the South West – what have you been up to?
Once we stopped touring Conditions in 2011, we planned to take a break but got bored after a few weeks so we got straight into writing for the second record. That took about 8 months and then we headed over to LA for a few months to record it.
The South West is often compared to Melbourne; do you reckon that’s a fair comparison? And what do you love most about your hometown?
I haven’t spent too much time in the South West so I couldn’t say. Jonny went on a surfing trip down there last year and it looked amazing in his photos. I’m looking forward to getting down to Falmouth and checking it out for myself. The things I miss most about Melbourne are probably the coffee, dim sims and the football.
Why do you think it was important to move to London and are you still there?
Yes we are still here, 3 years and counting; Melbourne is just too far away from the UK, Europe and the US. We would have spent half our lives in planes. The UK really embraces new music more so than America so London was the obvious choice. I’ve had a great time living here. It really feels like home now.
We loved the video for Love Lost – how did that come about?
We’d been fans of Dougal Wilson’s work for a while so we were really excited when he submitted that treatment. We went off on tour and when we came back he sent us the first cut and it was done. It’s definitely our favourite video from Conditions though we are excited about the new video for Need Your Love.
Some people dismiss Australia as a vacuum for good music; what would you say to that?
I think Australia has a great music scene! Gotye is number one all round the world right now and there are lots of other hidden gems to be found. Bands like The Presets and Midnight Juggernauts have been flying the flag for a while and there’s a bunch of new artists like Chet Faker and Twerps that are making great tunes.
Tell us about the new album …Overall it’s a lot more synth heavy then Conditions. There are still some guitar based tunes but we wanted to try out new things and push our musical boundaries a little. Need Your Love has got a real 80’s vibe to it which is something new for us but I think fans of Conditions will really like Trembling Hands and The Sea is Calling.
More info on The Temper Trap at www.thetempertrap.com or see them live at Falmouth Princess Pavilion on May 9 or at Cardiff Coal Exchange on May 12.
