Crystal Fighters: Interview

Image by Kirsty Mitchell

Crystal Fighters are hard to classify, have probably forgotten more about their intricate influences than most bands will ever know and are justified in the belief that they are doing something avant-garde musically.  Based on a merger of music from Basque folk roots and sonic electro beats and synthesisers, they explore above and beyond the usual genre-mash up that leaves many punters cold, whilst defining their own sound that brings together anything from punk, to funk, to dance. 

Fresh onto the London party scenes their lovelorn lyrics doused in passion and substance have instigated high-energy sound collisions saturated with basslines, heavy programmed beats and provoking vocals.  Initially live shows took the format of a musical opera of sorts to convey the story of each song and bring about evocative reactions in their audiences through the vehicle of performance art.   Now with the live facets stripped down as an art form, yet bigger than ever through the musical prowess, their reputation as one of the UK’s most forward-thinking, carnage-inducing live acts is continuing to build and build.  Moreover the undercurrent of Basque folk traditions steadily progressing through each Crystal Fighters track invites notions of intrigue, compelling enough to encourage their audiences to explore a heritage and it’s mythology, sadly once upon a time suppressed.  

Debut single ‘Xtatic Truth’ immediately lures in the listener with its delicate folktronica intro before metamorphosing into a manic pummeling of fast electronic dance rhythms and exotic stabbing synths all existing amidst gorgeous boy/girl harmonising.  Forthcoming second single ‘I Love London’, again a Kitsuné release, is a heavier sounding affair, built around rhythmic percussion, progressive beats and chanting female vocals with a shuddering synth that comes at you like a jabbing fist.  In fact this is the track that initially garnered attention, being voted one of the top 100 records of 2008 by Mixmag.  An impressive feat considering theirs was the only unreleased entry in the entire list.

So now mid 2009, a mere 12 months or so into their existence as a band, a self-funded and produced album is in the pipeline, comparisons to Baraka Som Sistema have been made in droves and the carnivalesque live experience that has taken Europe by storm is weighty enough to grab attention with or without a label.  Crystal Fighters own manmade history could in fact bring the customs of Basque music to the vanguard once more, and with that an alluring buzz of witnessing something fresh, something euphoric and something beautifully vociferous.

200-300 years in the making but worth every second of the wait, Crystal Fighters are Sebastian (lead Vocals), Mimi (vocals), Laure (vocals), Graham (programming) and Gilbert (synths, txalaparta).

  
4TR: There seems to be a lot of mythologising about Crystal Fighters and the concept behind your beginnings, so how would you put that in your own words?
Sebastian: Well most of us had always been individually making music in London, playing in loads of different bands. But then Laure came back from the Basque country where she had been sorting out her grandfathers belongings and brought back this book, which was a sort of notebook manuscript of his writings in which was an unfinished opera called 'Crystal Fighters'.  It is this bizarre poetical opera about Basque music, Basque mythology and his experiences in the Basque country when he was growing up and around the world.  It was written in his last years and she was transfixed by it because she had no idea it existed before he died.  So she showed it to us because she knew we’d be interested in doing something with it musically.
Gilbert: We started writing music around the book and learning about Basque culture and how the music and history has evolved.  From there we decided we wanted to finish the opera and do a live show that would get across some of the amazing, crazy prosthetic stuff that was in this book.  So we crafted this live show around the book and wrote new music based on its directions and looking at Basque music as a whole. Now that is sort of our starting point when we are making new music.

4TR: You mention the whole operatic format of the music you create which correlated with your live shows.  Is that still the case?
Sebastian: Well not so obviously anymore, because we are trying to do it as a musical thing now rather than a theatrical thing.  In the beginning we had one of our singers, Mimi, come on in a mask with a sign that would be telling what was happening in the opera.  It was a sort of physical theatre style thing; but now because we are making a record and we want that record to portray an opera like journey we cant really do that live.  Plus we prefer to stick to the music side of things more, so whilst its still a big live stage show we don’t want people to be thinking too much about the forced actions going on on stage.
Gilbert: Or worrying about not following an actual storyline that we are trying to get across, because it gets much more complicated.

4TR: So I am assuming the lyrics follow the story line as well as the music if you are employing an operatic ethos?
Gilbert: Oh Yeah definitely.
Sebastian: [Laura’s Granddad] he wrote about love and about quite general things that we can actually write about, so a lot of it works out well because we are finishing the story.  Most of his stories are based on the kinds of things that we would have experienced emotionally.
Sebastian: His themes are grand, therefore in our songs we try to stick to them.  Plus in the same way he is addressing things in this kind of crazed emotional and passionate way, and portraying the larger themes of life, we are continuing to follow on from that.

4TR: As with an opera there are always different themes, emotions and sounds conveyed from song to song to tell the story.  Therefore Crystal Fighters in the same way are very hard to categorise into a single genre because you are influenced by so many different things as a continuation of the opera theme.  So how would you describe your sound?
Sebastian: I would say on the one hand it’s a sort of genre blending of different dance music but then with the constant reference to Basque music.  But also Spanish pop music and dance music from the 80’s influences the music, plus we try and have a sort of inflection of London to bring a modern element.  Currently in Spain there’s a lot of cool music going on and there has been in the past, but we don’t feel anyone is making this kind of Spanish music so we want to expose as much as we can about the brilliant musicality of the region.   And we do this by bringing in a new dance element and writing at speeds that are almost punk but with a more electronic edge.  [Laughing] So yes it’s hard to pinpoint, but it’s all about blending genres that people wouldn’t usually have put together.

4TR: When you started were you writing more with the live show in mind rather than for recording purposes, and if so has it been difficult to translate?
Sebastian: Yeah well we're working on that at the moment for the album which is about ¾’s done and it’s a good point actually because it has been very tricky in some ways because we had been creating this huge thing live, but then on record you have to do more complex songs and different songs for it to sound good.
Gilbert: Yeah there’s lots of different things that you can do live which last like 20-30 seconds but is not a full song, so we are trying to develop them into full songs, and that has made things become very interesting especially because we have been moving between certain genres and styles that you probably wouldn't mash.  So hopefully it will be a good listen [laughing]

4TR: The album is nearly finished, so how has the process gone so far and has it met your initial expectations?
Sebastian: Well we’re doing it all ourselves and the 3 boys in the band all live together as well so as you can imagine we do it all day every day, it's intense.  I don’t know what we expected though…
Gilbert: Our only real expectation was to have it evolve in ways we wouldn’t necessarily have chosen.  I think when writing an album you cant really assume its going to go this way or another way, it’s the hardest thing to do and it will change as it goes and we have found that.  Its like an evolution is happening at every stage.

4TR: ‘Xtatic Truth’ came out on Kitsuné as will ‘I Love London’ which is released in October.  After that will the relationship be continuing?
Sebastian: No 'I love London' will be the last single on Kitsuné and then we are intending to finish the album and look for a label to put it out.

4TR: How did Kitsuné get involved with Crystal Fighters?
Sebastian: Our manager sent them ‘Xtatic Truth’ and immediately they came back to us and said they loved it and wanted to put it out and put it on the compilation.  Then we suggested they listened to a couple of other songs like ‘I Love London’ and they thought that was great too, so the suggestion was to put out 2 singles through Kitsuné.  They seem to do that with a few other bands just to see how it goes and then obviously the music behind the scenes is progressing whilst that is going on.

4TR: Let’s talk about ‘Xtatic Truth’ because it’s become a bit of a summer anthem, with Radio 1 picking it up (Nick Grimshaw’s show) and it being remixed and played in clubs all over Europe.  Big deal?
Sebastian: It’s amazing that that has happened.  Like the tune is nearly a year old now and we haven’t had singles out before so it was our first release.  Also it’s not a normal song so we were not really sure if it would be picked up to be honest, but people seem to like it, which is great.

4TR: Is the writing process a collective effort within the band, or with their being so many different aspects to the vocals, instruments and sound does everyone have a specific role?
Sebastian: It’s absolutely collaborative, I mean we all have our strengths within the band but because it’s all written pretty much in one room in Hackney [laughing] it all gets vetted by each other.  Then maybe one of us might go off and do something new and bring it to the rest, so there’s very much a lot of tooing and froing of opinions and a collaborative relationship going on at all points of the process.

4TR: In that case with 5 people all with expertise and their own opinions, does it ever get a bit fraught?
Sebastian: [Laughing] sometimes, the girls don’t mind so much it’s mainly the 3 of us guys.

4TR: Remixing has played an important part in the success of your music with a huge amount of different remixes available already.  How did you get people on board to work with your music in that capacity?
Sebastian: Yeah it’s definitely played a part and we are always talking with our manager about who we can get on board.  Like we asked people like L-Vis and Arcade to do it because those were relationships we had before through doing tracks but then we ended up with a shit load of remixes, even more than you are currently seeing out at the moment.  [Laughing] I think there’s something like 25 but we weren’t intending that; we like to think its because people like the song and were keen to remix it and just sent it around to their friends, so it’s great for us.

4TR: Any particular favourites?
Sebastian: We really like all the Kitsuné ones and the MayBB one on the single, which is a big electro thing that actually turns out to be by Benney Banassi but he doesn’t reveal it.  So that’s kind of fun and there's big satisfaction there!  Arcades’ is really good, L-Vis’ is cool, but they are all different that’s the important thing.

4TR: And similarly you have been quite prolific in remixing for other bands.
Sebastian: Oh yeah, we have done a bunch of remixes for other people.
4TR: Was that off your own back or the result of them coming to you and requesting your expertise?
Sebastian: In the beginning we had a few people coming to us because they liked the production on 'I love London' and 'Xtatic' and thought that we could remix.  Then as time has gone on we did one for CSS and the Magic Wands and that’s done us some favours, especially in terms of exposing our sound.  When we are remixing we are sticking in Spanish guitars and live percussion over the song, but still making it banging so it’s an interesting angle on remixing.

4TR: Crystal Fighters stage shows are notorious for being exuberant, loud and frantic in both the live environment and club night environment; was that always the intention even when you were pursuing the opera style performance art or has it been a progressive thing?
Sebastian: Well we are definitely trying for that cross-over, because for example with dance music you can go and see a dj who is in a booth, so you dance all night and just watch him there kind of doing nothing, which obviously can be amazing.  But if you have a live performance where you are playing the same kind of music the whole experience then changes into a rock show and so much more besides, so we’re trying to make people experience dance music in a new way.  I mean we are not the first band to do it but we think it’s a great concept.
Gilbert: I think in the beginning the way we did it was really ramshackle sort of hard, experimental, electronic punk.  But in the end we were like what the fucks going on because certain bits were really banging and other bits were different, so it was very confusing.  Now it’s a tight thing so if you want to rave to it you can or if you want to just watch as a more visual thing then you can. Hopefully now we could play in a punk club or in a dance set up and rock it both ways.

4TR: With the album almost finished have you got label interest?
Sebastian: Yeah there are people sort of sniffing around but we’re not really going to give them anything until we have done the whole record.  It takes up a lot of time talking to people about releasing songs and so it’s great for us that we’ve got this single thing down because we can just concentrate on the album for the time being.

4TR: So the next few months will continue to be a busy time for the band in the lead up to the single and album.
Sebastian: Yeah we’ve been doing loads of European festivals this summer and then potentially there are some tour spots coming in September and ‘I Love London’ is out in October.  It’s all very exciting and there’s a lot for Crystal Fighters to look forward to in the future.

Watch the video for 'Xtatic Truth' Here...

www.myspace.com/crystalfighters

Words: Francesca Strange

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