Band Interview: Red House

So first of how did you all meet?

Adam, Odhran and I (Darragh) went to school together for a few years but were never that close. Cazza and I went to primary school together and played in a jazz orchestra together and were also never that close. Then the original Red House (different lineup) lost a drummer and soon the three of them remembered I played the drums! We started playing together as the current lineup and sort of rediscovered all of these past links.

Where are you all from?

All of us live in and around Belfast with Odhran being just a little bit further from civilisation.

How long have you been playing your respective instruments?

I’ve been playing for just under 12 years, but I was pretty young so I don’t think those early years count!

What genre of music do you consider your work to be?

Indie Rock… Or indie pop and roll on a bad day!

What are your influences?

Adam and Odhran have their musical roots in good old fashioned rock music, AC/DC, Guns ‘N Roses and the likes. Caolan and I have the jazz background together and Cazza is our driving Indie force, I’ll be honest I’ve always been a funk man. Together our music can vary a lot because of these influences. Bands-wise our biggest influences are the Arctic Monkeys, The Strypes, Kings of Leon, Catfish and the Bottlemen and Muse at the moment.

Do you do covers and if so what’s your go to?

We have a cover set and will throw in a few choice selections in a show every now and again. The go to are always Are You Gonna Be My Girl by Jet with one lucky tambourinist selected form the audience.

What if anything does your name mean/why are you called that?

Not much to be honest! Red House is a Jimmy Hendrix song but that’s not really our style, one day we hope to buy a studio and paint it red though… maybe that’ll make our name mean something!

Do you have a process for writing your songs? /Which of you writes the songs?

We try and write as collaboratively as possible. Caolan has been our primary songwriter so far but we bring in ideas and riffs from everyone and most of the songs come from an idea being jammed for an hour or so and seeing where it takes us. We try our best to try different approaches and styles to song-writing to keep it interesting for ourselves and for audiences.

What are your rehearsals generally like?

I’d love to write that they’re super-productive and that we come straight in ON TIME and get to it, bashing through new material old sets and covers with no gaps and fully focused… not how it happens. Rehearsals are normally 3 hours long with 2 hours playing time, a snack break and Adam and I playing through everything Royal Blood have ever written on loop when Odhran leaves his bass down unattended.

Do you have any interesting/funny stories about gigging or touring?

We played a gig in the centre of Belfast in the late night slot on St. Patrick’s Day. The gig was packed out and loud and great craic and right in the middle of the crowd was a huge man, must’ve been about 6′ 4″/6′ 5″ and he was dressed in what I can only assume was a high end St Patrick costume, it must’ve been custom made for him to fit into it. He stood head and shoulders above the crowd for the whole gig shouting general noises of drunken enjoyment and was fairly amusing to watch while we were playing. At some point it all seemed to just become too much and St Patrick fell in full swan dive, holding the position of the statue of Christ in Rio as he fell. You have to imagine the scene in Shrek where the giant gingerbread man falls into the water in slow motion mixed with the Matrix… Irish rock and roll down to a t!

What song do you remember most from your childhood?

There’s a lot of Queen in there, lots of ABBA and AC/DC and Scissor Sisters and Dolly Parton but actually I think I’d have to go with an Elvis tune. My mum used to play me him when I was a baby, I think I’ll go with Jailhouse Rock or Hound Dog. We actually have Hound Dog in the cover set at the minute… what goes around comes around!

What has been your biggest challenge as a band? Have you been able to overcome that challenge? If so, how?

A while ago we had a pretty big issue with musical direction where we were split between an older more traditional blues, rock and roll style and a new more heavily indie mood. It caused quite the rift in Red House and it looked at times as if it were going to be irresolvable. Now we play a fresh mix of both in a sound that is influenced by both but doesn’t sound like either one. The new EP uses all old school rock and roll gear but sounds pretty indie to my ears. The problem was that we were trying to discuss our way out of the stylistic issue, what we needed to do was listen to more music and write more, we needed to get into a room and properly work on our sound. I would say for me that it wasn’t until this EP that we got to what we really want to be and the sound is still growing and changing with everything new we write.

How can fans-to-be gain access to your music?

We can be heard on Spotify and YouTube.

And you can also find us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. The best way to listen to Red House though is live, keep an eye on social media to see if we’re playing a show that you can come and see!

Have you released anything yet/if you have how has it gone down and are you planning anything for the near future?

We released one track ‘I Had You’ back in November 2017. It was super indie, recorded by me in the home studio where I did the artwork and everything. We had great fun with it and still love the track but we learned a lot, this EP was recorded in a great studio called Manor Park and we took loads of time over it. The lead track from this EP is Foreword and its coming with a music video by Greenhouse films and a Behind the Scenes music video by Mercer MacWilliam Hughes which we are super excited for. We hope to bring out some more accompanying videos to the EP after the launch as well as gigs.

 

First Published on: https://offtherecordblog.org/

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