We had a chat with Ollie from British acoustic heroes Stornoway about their UK headline tour, the world’s loudest wind instrument and using screwdrivers in self-defense.
Your UK Tour kicks off on Friday! Are you excited?
We can’t wait! We just sold out the first night of the tour and we’re all really excited. It’ll be the first time we’ve played to a paying crowd for about a year, so we’re just dying to get onstage.
How are the rehearsals going?
They’re going well – it’s really good to play the songs live and plugged in. We’ve been in the studio for a year recording the album, and we’ve played a few unplugged gigs around town to ‘stay in the groove’, so to speak, but it’s just fun to play the songs plugged in and as a live band.
What’s the best thing about playing live?
I just find that you can be totally transported when you’re playing. Everything I do just leads up to being onstage – you can just escape all your worries for a small period of time. It’s almost like being on some sort of drug. You just zone out!
What’s your favourite song to play live?
It’s possibly one of the new ones. It’s called (A Belated) Invite To Eternity and I get to use some really crazy effects on my bass, so it’s fun to play. We recorded it with some weird instruments, like a whole string section and a harmonica, so we can’t really reproduce that live – I’m just using loads of pedals to try and get around the obvious difficulties. It’s just a massive wigout and it doesn’t really have a chorus, so it’s all good fun!
Your second album is called Tales From Terra Firma – what’s the story behind the title?
The album title represents this thing called Terra Firma, which means ‘solid ground’ or ‘Planet Earth’, so the term Tales From Terra Firma for us represents the various emotions and feelings people get when they visit these places on our planet. In their time on Earth a person will go through a few experiences that they will want to write home about or that they will want to make a note of, and these nine tracks are nine very special memories or experiences that we’ve had and that we want to share. We just want the fans to be able to share our experiences with us.
What’s your favourite track on the album?
It changes a lot. When we first got the songs written my favourite was A Bigger Picture – I just liked the melodies and the rhythms, and it was the first song we recorded on a twelve-string guitar. The whole thing just lent itself to South African music, and as my brother and I are from South Africa we both particularly liked that one. It seems to have evolved into a Western pop song – weird, but I still like it. I just love music that is powerful and energetic.
You guys obviously spend a lot of time together on the road, but which member of the band has the most annoying habit?
Well, we haven’t been out with Tommy yet (he’s the new guy), but he’s got a lot of stories about this wind instrument he owns that he says is the loudest instrument in the world. I’ve got a funny feeling that it might get a little bit annoying if he decides to bring it in the van…
Is it true that you brought a screwdriver to the first audition for the band in case they were actually planning to murder you?
Absolutely! I found out about the band through an advert on the Internet so I didn’t know what to expect. I just decided to play it safe…
Describe yourself in three words?
Garage soul stories.