There is something in which to revel in when watching a band perform in Liverpool for the first time, especially when after they have finished, the sweat pouring from their joyful brows and the sound of the music still reverberating round the ears a week later. When it comes to Pontypridd’s Peasant’s King, the next great hope to come out of South Wales, that feeling of intensity, of gracious Rock abandon, is to hope that you get to see them perform again and again.
Ahead of their performance at Studio 2 on Parr Street, Danni Lafrombe Evans and Rhodri Parry left their band mates, Lewys Mann, Harry Lee and Josh Bowles to their own duties and found their way into the comfortable surroundings of the bar where over the subtle sound of the other band’s sound checking, I was able to catch ten minutes of their time and ask them –
How is the tour going?
Danni: “It’s going very well, where were we last night? What date are we on now? The eleventh date! We’re all feeling a bit tired, we’re in Leeds tomorrow now and we’re just loving every moment of it really. To perform in front of a crowd that’s really interested in your music and come up to you after a show and tell you that they’re now fans of your music, it’s great jus then to see the Twitter and Facebook reactions from all those fans.”
You were in Manchester last night? There can be a huge difference between Manchester and Liverpool audiences!
Rhodri: “We’ve found a lot of differences in audiences wherever you play, there’s always a difference, some better than others. It all just depends on the music scene where you are and to be fair a lot of these people have been coming to see Young Kato, the headline act but they are all people who are interested in finding new music. They’re all people who turn up to listen to the support bands and not just to the headline bands, which is almost what we rely on when we get onstage every night. I think we’ve been quite lucky because we’ve had those kind of people so far, people come to the shows to check out our music and a lot of them have liked it, audience wise, I think we’ve quite fortunate.”
What’s been the place or venue that you’ve enjoyed the most on the tour so far?
Danni: “Brighton was a very good gig, it was in The Haunt in Brighton, it was a beautiful stage, beautiful venue. It was my first time being in Brighton, it’s kind of kept its character and a lot of places are opening up all these fancy new shops and things and Brighton has kind of kept what it’s all about. Brighton show was brilliant and I really enjoyed the Bristol gig and I think Nottingham was a good one – it was rammed, it was a really good vibe. The whole tour has been a very positive tour, great crowds, even if its performing to ten people, 60 people, were very lucky that Young Kato have got to the point in their careers that they are bringing quite a good bunch of fans and like Rhodri said, they are there for the music and to support new bands coming through which is always great to see because especially as the age we are living in now with like digital music taking over everything, it’s very nice to see people caring about live music.”
Obviously, Liverpool is very famous for its live music, you’ve never played in Liverpool before have you?
Danni:“It’s going to be our first time, I think it’s going to be something that you’ll tell your kids you know – that you’ve played Liverpool. We’re back actually for Liverpool Sound City on 25th May and we’re playing a place called The Cavern – that’s going to be awesome just to say that we’ve played there.
Being on the road, especially the past couple of dates with the boys, we didn’t realise how much time we didn’t have. You wake up in the morning, you sort out the paperwork for the upcoming gig, you head off on the road, which is normally about one or two hours, depending on where you are, then you load in to the gig, do the gig and load out and you go home and then go onto the next place and so on. We’ve all said that it would be nice to stop and actually chill out a bit and spend some time in the cities in the future. We’re actually having some time off in Edinburgh, we’ve got a day off so we’re going to make the most of it and see the place and just actually enjoy a bit of a different experience than what we’ve been having as I said, we’ve been on the road all the time, constantly moving. It will be nice to chill out, enjoy the area, have a look around and see what’s happening.”
How much have you been influence by other Welsh music and your location?
Rhodri: “I think we’ve all been inspired by Welsh music one way or another. I think that we’re fortunate in that there has been a music scene when we were growing up to listen to. Obviously, that’s always beneficial and I think it has been a big part of growing up in these areas. There have been issues recently with cuts and stuff and all that’s happening but one of the best things that is happening in our area is that the people are there and are trying to keep it going like in most areas where people love music.
People won’t just accept that’s there’s cuts happening, people want to stand up and do something about it because they love the live music and they don’t want what they’ve had so far to come to an end so I think people are really up for that sort of thing in the area where we’re from. As I said so many people stand up for it and try and keep it going, as long as you’ve got one person who wants to make that stand then you’ll have another person and another person and that’s obviously the most important thing. If anything, for those people who really care about live music and stuff a struggle is only a reason to push on harder as opposed to just a reason to sit down and do nothing and accept what’s going on. I think the challenge is something that you have to see as more of a hurdle than a stop sign, if that makes sense.”
One last question if I may! Where do you see your music heading now after this tour and in the near future?
Danni: “I would like to see us progress, as individuals and as a band. Try and do something positive, there are a lot of bands at the moment, how can I say it in a polite way? They are very selfish, very much about themselves, very narrow-minded? We want to do something hopefully and write some music for the masses and to try and create something that actually people remember and who wouldn’t want everyone singing their songs back to them?
Not just any songs, songs that mean something and that people can understand and I think that’s the most important thing for us. Just being a part of live music and seeing where music is going, being part of it. There’s lots of things happening in the music industry like I said before, with the digital music taking over everything and retro-culture taking over now with vinyl players. It was really interesting to be involved with that (International Vinyl Day) at this stage in time and see where it’s going to go. I took the vinyl player that my mother gave me and she didn’t understand the idea why I wanted some vinyl, I wanted a vinyl player which to me was a brand new thing! As long as there are people who want the real thing, real music it will always survive but I get a bit worried which artists are coming forward and how long it might take for real music to come back.”
Rhodri: “What you said about the vinyl player is always going to be new to another person, there’s always going to be someone who wants to listen to vinyl, some might say that they are a thing of the past because it’s unfamiliar to them but I think as long as there’s that sort of circle motion can keep happening, that’s the sort of thing that will keep live music the way that’s it’s been going up until now.”
Ian D. Hall