After three years of touring, three studio albums and what is set to be their third sell-out appearance at Rock City on October 12th, Kids in Glass Houses are back and moving in a ‘radically different direction’.
The third single ‘Not in This World’ from their new album ‘In Gold Blood’ is set to be released on October 24th and the band are hoping fans will appreciate the organic sound they have been working on.
Looking forward to the upcoming tour Guitarist Iain Mahanty joined Platform for a chat about the band’s new sound, their epic stage shows and writing demos in his bedroom…
Platform Music: Thanks for speaking to us Iain, you must be jam-packed with your September/October 2011 tour of the UK about to start, are you looking forward to this as you have any other tour?
Iain Mahanty: We’re more excited than we’ve ever been – just so happy and proud of the new stuff we’re going to be playing. It’s been a mission to get everything we wanted to do out there but it’s been worth it, and we have a few things planned for the stage show which we never thought would be possible.
PM: You’ve been headlining your own tours for a while now, do you still get nervous?
IM: Not really anymore. In a sense it’s become second nature, once you get there and get on the stage its more about excitement than anything else. Headlining our own shows was something that we all wanted to do when we started out so to be selling out venues is incredible. I love the atmosphere of live gigs, whether I’m playing or in the audience. We’re looking forward to playing our new stuff this time and to get it played on the radio, just put it out there y’know.
PM: How would you describe your live performances?
IM: Recently they’ve become a lot more epic – with all of our club shows and arena gigs we always do try to put on an epic show. All we want to do is entertain the crowd, that’s the most important thing.
PM: You’re playing Nottingham Rock City on October 12 – how do you find the crowd here compared to other places?
IM: Ah man, we love Nottingham. Rock City as a venue has always had something special about it, it’s such a prestigious rock club, I’m gonna lose my mind! It’s always been special to us specifically as it was the first venue we ever sold out as a group. We were there in February last year supporting Lost Prophets and that sold out and then we came back ourselves to headline at the end of the year and sold out again. Rock City means the world to us.
PM: Your third album ‘In Gold Blood’ was released August 15 – you said to Kerrang! that you wanted it to go in a ‘radically different direction’ and that it was your ‘most mature album yet’ – why did you go this way?
IM: It wasn’t a fixed decision really, more of a natural progression. We were just recording and a more organic direction and sound came across in the way the album was mixed. It sounds more like we do when we’re playing live, which is more what we wanted to capture – no filters and pro-tools.
PM: Which is your favourite track and why?
IM: It changes really, but it always comes back to ‘The Florist’. I remember writing it and keeping it under my hat for ages because I just didn’t know what the boys would think. It is quite different to anything we’ve done before and I didn’t know what they’d say. It features a brass horn and some other extra instruments, but I when I showed them it thankfully they thought it was good. It’s strange to thing that it came from a little bedroom demo to being on the album.
PM: Which bands are you listening to at the moment and who inspires you?
IM: I’m the kind of guy who has a different playlist every week. But this week it has been Arctic Monkeys, I love their new album ‘Suck It and See’ and I like waking up to Blur. It will be someone else next week though.
PM: You’ve toured with some pretty big acts in the past, is there anyone else you’d like to work with?
IM: Ah man, I’d love to work with Prince but I can’t imagine he would ever want to. It would be incredible but with his knowledge of music he would probably hate us all.
PM: You’ve had a lot of changes to your line-up over the past few years – do you think you’ve finally got it right?
IM: I was the last member to join and when I did, that was it really – it became a lot more serious. I think for Aled it was a hobby that he used to do after school. School finished and we came through and started working a lot harder.
PM: Thanks Iain, anything else you want to say to our readers?
IM: Just see you on October 12th I hope! It’ll be an epic show. Thanks!
To buy tickets for the concert at Rock City click here or for more information about the band click here. Simples!
Sarah Mitchell – Platform Online
Tags: in gold blood, kids in glass houses, not in this world, nottingham, nottingham trent, rock city
