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INTERVIEW: BLUE MEAN EYES

To celebrate the release of their ace debut EP, Through The Mill, B-Side’s Seymour Quigley caught up with Lauren Bradford and Toby Powell of Bury St Edmunds-based alt-rock four piece Blue Mean Eyes, shortly before teatime.  

B-SIDE: Hello, Lauren.  Hello, Toby.  How are you this fine afternoon?

LAUREN (vocals, bass): I’m very good thank you, keeping busy, yourself?

TOBY (guitar): I’m very well thank you, had a busy one playing around with some new ideas, how're you doing?

B-SIDE: I’m very well too.  In fact, I've just got back from Peppa Pig World.  Have you ever been?  If you're looking for a place to have the best band photoshoot ever, I highly recommend it.

TOBY: Peppa Pig World? Where has this safe haven been hiding all this time? I've never been, but we'll definitely think about chasing that up. Also to get Peppa Pig Merch.

LAUREN: Definitely have to give it a visit, totally just for the photoshoot though...

B-SIDE: At risk of drifting into unwarranted hyperbole, you really can't beat it.  Grandpa Pig's Boat Ride is the very definition of ridin' dirty.

TOBY: If Grandpa Pig was here he'd be thrilled.  Tickets will be being purchased soon, trust me!

B-SIDE: Grandpa Pig is ALWAYS watching.  Now, as you're probably aware, you've got a new EP out.  For a band who've been gigging for less than a year, it sounds very assured.  How quickly did things fall into place when you started playing together?

TOBY: Yeah, super duper excited about the idea of that! Just the fact we have an EP is craziness to me. Things fells into place for us very slowly but surely, piece by piece. We started out as just a couple mates - me, Ben (Saunders, guitar) and Ell (Rodger Brown, drums) jamming out some tunes that we thought could've worked. Then Lauren came along and things skyrocketed almost instantly and before we knew it, we had a few songs which we were happy with.

B-SIDE: It does feel as though each time I see you play you get tighter and stronger, like magical sock elastic.  Was there ever a grand master plan, any particular artists you really aspired to be like?  Or was it just a case of getting in a room together and seeing what happened?

TOBY: It's really a weird and wonderful combination of all of our accumulated tastes: Ben is a lover of all things indie, soft sounds and ambience - Mac Demarco, Whitest Boy Alive, Oasis and Liam Gallagher; Elliott pretty much loves absolutely every genre of music under the sun, I have honestly never seen someone so loving and appreciative of all kinds of music in my life. I'm am a MASSIVE ÜBER SUPERFAN of Biffy Clyro - heavy distorted guitars, stabs, ledge-cutting guitar riffs - and the three things just combine in an almost seamless intertwining of all of our influences combined.

LAUREN: Yeah, I think we all have our own individual inspirations. I personally listen to a lot of female fronted bands, mainly an Australian band called Tonight Alive for inspiration in melodies and lyrics

B-SIDE: So with all these influences, how do the songs come about?  Is there a main songwriter or do you take a collaborative approach?

TOBY: The way we approach writing songs has evolved since we first formed. In the beginning, we each came up with our own ideas and brought them to rehearsals to run by the others and come up with different parts etc, but now we tend to get together with just the instruments, no vocals, and record everything structurally as it would be with lyrics. From that point the writing of the lyrics and coming up with melodies is down to Lauren, for which she seems to come up with almost instantly, which is brilliant. It's a very strange way of doing it, but it's a way which has always suited us and worked out!

B-SIDE: There seem to be a recurring theme in the lyrics across the EP, with a lot of allusions to the restlessness borne of frustration that a lot of people feel growing up in places like East Anglia; although, perhaps oddly, very few lyrics by local artists really touch on it, certainly not quite so affectingly.  Lauren, do you ever consciously approach specific themes in your lyrics, or is it an unconscious process for you?

LAUREN: Yeah, I guess I do (approach themes consciously). Most of the earlier songs were written by both me and Toby together, and with those we just sort of came up with a title and tried to tell a story with that, and it just turned out being about random stuff! The ones I write myself now, just spout from whatever emotion I'm feeling at the time, so for instance I'll jot down what's making me angry or frustrated, and then turn it into a poem type thing and then fit it into a melody. With the new songs me and Toby are working on at the moment, I'm taking a lot of inspiration from what's happening on TV around the world, just to try something different and see what kind of an impact it has on our audience.

B-SIDE: There are a couple of fascinating titles on the EP, which pose important questions. Firstly, what is the Brixton Shrug?  I've googled it and found no results, so I presume it's something you made up.  I won't lie, I'm desperately hoping it's the long-overdue British answer to the Harlem Shuffle.

TOBY: Brixton Shrug I suppose is more of a metaphor for guys and gals that like to party, have fun, shrugging off the negative aspects of whatever's going on in everyone's lives and just enjoying the moment, like a “shrug” to life itself. The actual way it came about however is totally different: Elliott was wearing a 'Brixton' clothing brand, and I said to Ben “Ben mate, we still need a song name,” and he just shrugged. The Brixton Shrug was then born, in that simple moment - maybe there's a dance move in it somewhere, we'll have an experiment and surprise you.

B-SIDE: I now feel duty-bound to invent a suitable dance for the song, which I will of course be claiming as my own intellectual property so I can drown in the inevitable riches.  There's also a song called Meteor Shrimp - is that a real creature?  I've trawled the lyrics for coded warnings about an unseen extra-terrestrial aquatic threat to mankind, but if they're there, I've missed them.

TOBY: Meteor Shrimp is actually a ghastly deep sea monster ready to emerge at any given point in a fantastic sequel remake of Godzilla 2 featuring Ben Brown from SuperGlu as the Shrimp... this is the whole truth, I promise.  Meteor Shrimp was actually a name devised from a weird combination of words which we'd never heard before, because we really wanted it to stick in people's heads. The song itself is about someone who is meticulously lazy and always putting off tasks which have to be done to move up the industry ladder. It's a listen-and-learn kind of song, up for people's individual interpretations!

B-SIDE: Thanks for clearing that up, although of course now we're now duty bound have to make the "Ben Brown from SuperGlu as planet-saving Shrimp" movie happen, because that would ACTUALLY BE AMAZING.  Finally, what's next for Blue Mean Eyes?  Do you have any gigs, future releases or miscellaneous announcements you'd like to share?

LAUREN: Well, this debut EP is now up on Spotify, iTunes, Google Play, Deezer and Groove Music for everyone to listen to on the go on their cellular devices. Our next gig as the original Blue Mean Eyes four-piece (following the recent departure of bassist Harvey Baldwin) with Ben on guitar, Toby on guitar and vocals, Ell banging the ol’ drums, and myself on bass and vocals, will be at the Washing Machine event on the 16th of September in support of A Horse Called War, which we are all very much looking forward to. We are also writing a bunch of new material to be recorded and shared with you on our first full-length album to be released within the early months of 2018. Hopefully from listening to the EP it will give you an idea as to what we are setting out to achieve as band with our music.

TOBY: My goal for the foreseeable future is raising enough money to make a film directed by Steven Spielberg casting only Ben Brown from SuperGlu as all of the main characters and extras... please donate generously at www.BenToBecomeTheShrimpVSGodzilla.com  And Ben, if you happen to be reading this, it WILL happen. The time. Is. Coming.

THE LOWDOWN: BLUE MEAN EYES

Members:  Toby Powell, Lauren Bradford, Ben Saunders, Elliott Rodger-Brown From: Bury St Edmunds Listen to: Their debut EP on Spotify here! See them live at: The Hunter Club in Bury St Edmunds on Saturday 16th September, supporting A Horse Called War Keep up with them on: Facebook - Twitter

Photo Credit: Richard Rose