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Interview with Andrew Jackson Jihad at Exchange Bristol

Posted on: 07 Oct 2014

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Andrew Jackson Jihad played at The Exchange in Bristol on Monday 6 October 2014 and 365Bristol reporter Miri Teixeira caught up with the band for a chat. Here's how it went!

 

Miri: You’re here with the full band, who you’ve been touring with for a good while now, but how does that compare to the classic two-piece set up you used to have?

 

Ben: You can get a lot louder! It’s always fun to get quiet and then get loud. And have more moving parts. I imagine more interesting to watch too, having more people around doing stuff. I really enjoy it, it was something that we wanted to do for a long time.

 

Sean: Yeah, I mean you’re able to get dynamics that you wouldn’t otherwise be able to. You get the chance to just kind of... throw your hair around a little bit, so to speak. It’s fun to rock and its fun to bring it really low.

 

Ben: We often tour as an acoustic group and our albums often have many instruments. People who are familiar with that and don’t know about the band, maybe they’ve just heard the albums, and I think for them – going to see the band and realising it’s so stripped down could be a bit of a letdown. But it’s a lot of fun, mainly that’s why we’re doing it.

 

Miri: Your sound has obviously come a long way since Candy Cigarettes and Cap Guns, but how do you feel about the older material? Do you feel it still represents you in some way?

 

Sean: I would say the first record sure doesn’t represent me now from a song-writing standpoint. I wrote those songs when I was 17 and 18, and I didn’t really care about offending anyone or hurting any feelings. These days I do care, but I’m still happy that I got to write that first album so that I could understand myself a little bit better by the second album. So I’m proud of it, but I’m not going to be playing many of those songs!

 

Miri: What was the first gig you guys remember going to?

 

Sean: Ben’s got a good one!

 

Ben: Yeah, my first one was actually Smashing Pumpkins and it was really cool. It was a big stadium production on the tour for the Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness album, which is a really good album. I revisited it earlier this year and it really holds up. So there’s that one and then a week later my sister, who’s five years older than me, was going to this punk show that was happening in the small town next to the small town I grew up in. So I went to go see that and it was so much different because it was in a community centre with like 5 people watching... and the first band, I think it was their first show too because after the set one of the guys just put down his guitar, ran to the bathroom and vomited a whole bunch... So yeah, my two first shows were wildly different. Sean?

 

Sean: The first concert I went to, I was a child and I went to this travelling festival called Country Thunder but I remember hating that ‘cause it was all loud and I was a baby... and babies don’t like loud stuff... or rednecks. But then the first show I went to of my own volition was a show at VFW Hall in Rochester, Minnesota and I was probably 13 or 14. It was all local bands. There was a pop-punk band and a band called The Apocalypse who were an all-female goth band. It was a really fun show, with all these different acts coming together in a small rental hall. So those were my first shows.

 

Miri: Some of your influences are pretty clear to see in the music you guys write and the songs you cover, but do you have any inspirations that you think wouldn’t be so obvious to the average listener?

 

Sean: What a great question... I’d say so, yeah, probably! One of my biggest inspirations is this band called Xiu Xiu...

 

Miri: You collaborated with them on Coffin Dance, right?

 

Sean: Yeah, Jamie sang the verse and we got to work together which was fantastic. I don’t feel like people would assume that we are Xiu Xiu fans, unless they listened to the sense of reference that they have, and the silliness... What about you Ben?

 

Ben: Hmm... Well I really like Toy Dolls and Queen a lot. I think the surprising thing would be, especially among all of us in the band, we cover so much territory in the music spectrum. We have a lot of things in common, obviously, but if you start going through the individuals... Deacon, our drummer, is a jungle DJ

 

Sean: He’s really excited to be here!

 

Ben: Yeah but he’s also a real punk kid and I play in a metal band with him, too. And Sean listens to like, gangster rap and hip hop.

 

Sean: That’s pretty obvious, I guess.

 

Miri: You did a split album with Ghost Mice years back, and one with Oh Pioneers!!!, but if you could collaborate or split with anyone, who would it be?

 

Sean: Anyone ever? Hmm, shoot for the stars: Neil Young.

 

Ben: Yeah I was thinking a Neil Young 7” would be pretty tight. It could happen too! I mean, it’s NOT gonna happen, but it actually could. Things are getting crazy these days.

 

Sean: We live in a world where St Vincent and David Byrne are collaborating...

 

Ben: Not to say this is a good one, I haven’t actually heard it but: Metallica and Lou Reed? That happened.

 

Sean: On paper that’s amazing. If it was ‘80s Metallica and ‘80s Lou Reed... if they just started a band back then... that would’ve been badass.

 

Miri: Off the new album, what would you say your favourite song is to play live?

 

Sean: Probably Best Friend for me.

 

Ben: Yeah, Best Friend is fun. This trip I’m playing electric bass and I’m really enjoying just playing that and not the upright. It’s always there when we record and oftentimes we tour with it but I was happy to not take it this time. It’s so fragile and temperamental so it’s hard to play live... but sorry, back to the question: Linda Ronstadt, especially the string section. 

 

Miri: There was a number of cool songs on The Digitising album that was only available to those who donated to the Tour Van Campaign a while back. Are there any plans for any of those songs?

 

Sean: I wouldn’t mind #Armageddon getting a proper studio recording with some lush instrumentation, that’d be fun. Pink Floyd it out.

 

Miri: You’ve played Bristol before, I remember you saying it was great seeing Banksys everywhere in a previous interview with Jeff Rosenstock... How does it feel to be back here?

 

Sean: Oh it feels great. I had a very emotional experience the first time we came to Bristol, because it was my first time outside of North America ever. I was jet-lagged and just in love with everything; it was like being in a movie – being in England for the first time. And yeah, there were Banksys everywhere, and Lou [from Caves] opened up for us, playing a beautiful song, and during her song I remember crying a little bit. I was just excited that our band had got to cross the ocean to play some shows. We were super-excited, super-optimistic.

 

Ben: Yeah it’s that moment when you’re actually there at the show, because before that ity seems so far away, there’s such a journey between the two places, it’s significant when you’re travelling internationally. It was such a big jump. Now if we were to go to another country it wouldn’t be the same, that was our first international experience. And Bristol is such a beautiful place. We got to walk around earlier, went to St Nicholas Market and were very excited by the hot sauce emporium! There’s a lot of people who have come out of Bristol and done really cool things and are on the world stage so... Respect.

 

For more information about Andrew Jackson Jihad visit www.andrewjacksonjihad.com or connect with the band on Facebook.

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