Wednesday 12 February 2014

TURBULENCE: Our review of 'The Jackal', the brand new EP from Two-Bit Sister, and a little interview as well!

 
Below if our feature on Two-Bit Sister's brand new EP 'The Jackal'! Scroll down to see a review, an interview and a track by track! Enjoy!
 
To stay up to date with future interviews like our facebook page at the following link - https://www.facebook.com/aldorabritainrecords
 
 
PART 1 - AB SAYS...
 
Below AB Records talks you through the EP!
 
"Two-Bit Sister were one of the first ever bands to feature on this blog and it's been great to see them mature and now release their brilliant debut EP. The EP is entitled 'The Jackal', taking its name from the first track, and is a fine piece of art. Everything from the artwork right down to the tunes are spot on. The EP kicks off with the title track which is a fine slice of melodic pop which also features a fine guitar solo to conclude. The song has touches that are reminiscent of Irish indie pop band General Fiasco which is no bad thing at all! The following track, 'Turbulence', is a completely different affair. This track is far more towards Kurt Cobain grunge than General Fiasco pop! Again, no bad thing and the track demonstrates Two-Bit Sister at their most rocking on this EP. Meanwhile, 'Wanna Know' is alternative rock at its best with a great sing-along chorus and some fine fills on the drums. The set comes to its finale with the much more laidback 'Times'. However, 'laidback' is not something that Two-Bit Sister do well and when the drums kick in they're back to their rocking old selves! And then the song breaks down into a blues-influenced bridge halfway through a la Jack White, bringing another dimension to the Two-Bit sound! In conclusion, a fine debut EP which wears influences as varying as General Fiasco, Foo Fighters, The White Stripes and Nirvana proudly on its sleeve. A debut to be proud of!"



PART 2 - TWO-BIT SISTER SAYS...

In this section of the feature, Two-Bit Sister talk us through the EP track by track!

The Jackal

Connor: "Generally speaking, Leon will have a riff or a chorus and then we’ll work through it adding new bits. However 'The Jackal' was pretty much a finished piece, so once I’d put down some drums it was good to go, with the exception of the solo at the end."

Leon: "Yeah I actually wrote the song in one go on an acoustic guitar, while I was sitting on my bedroom floor. I was going through a bit of a Bob Dylan phase and didn’t really expect it to become a Two-Bit Sister tune, which is probably why it sounds pretty different to the rest of our stuff."

Turbulence

Connor: "If I remember correctly, this one came about as the result of jamming in our garage. It went from an initial riff to a song pretty quickly. It’s always good when a song just ‘happens’ especially after you’ve spent a lot of time agonizing over another one."

Leon: "Definitely. Weirdly I always felt like this was quite Pink Floyd inspired, even though it doesn’t sound it. Chris (producer) was quite influential, in a positive sense, with how this turned out on record. He was very encouraging in terms of just trying stuff to see if it worked, so there are some subtle bits in the song that came about as a result."

Wanna Know

Leon: "This was one of those guitar riffs that I just stumbled across while playing and really liked the sound of, as it had a nice punk rock bounce to it, which isn’t something we tend to associate ourselves with. The rest of the song seemed to come quite easily, which is always nice."

Connor: "Yeah, it’s a song I always enjoy playing. I grew up listening to a lot of Blink-182 and so this sound feels very natural to me. Leon was a little worried it was a bit ‘too happy’ though!"

Times

Connor: "I was actually in France, last summer, when Leon sent me the intro and riff of this song, so it’s always had a summery vibe to me. That heavy breakdown was hammered out in practice a while later on, and just seemed to fit."
Leon: "I think we’d struggled for a while to really make that main guitar riff sound how we wanted, as we had quite a strong idea of how it should come across in our heads. That’s something I ‘m glad we achieved on the recording."



PART 3 - THE INTERVIEW

What was your earliest musical memory and what inspired you towards pursuing a career in music?
 
Leon: "I'm not sure what my earliest musical memory is but I remember the first time I heard AC/DC, my friend played me 'Back In Black' and 'Highway To Hell' and I just ended up listening to them over and over."
 
Connor: "I think my earliest musical memory must have been watching Rush's 'Live In Rio' DVD (my dad's a big fan) and just thinking that Neil Peart must be from a different planet, I was really blown away by his playing and that was way before I ever sat behind a kit! In terms of inspiration for a career in music, it was really the fact that there was nothing else that ever compared. It had to be music for me."
 
 Where did the name Two-Bit Sister come from?
 
Leon: "In Wes Anderson's film 'The Royal Tenenbaums' there's a line 'and no damn two-bit, chartered accountant is going to change that', I was watching the film one day while we were trying to think of a band name and I decided I liked the idea of two-bit something, and we eventually decided on sister."
 
How would you describe the sound of Two-Bit Sister?
 
Connor: "Difficult to pin down for us at the moment I think, we just like to call it rock but there's all sorts of influences in the mix."


 
All pictures in this feature are taken from the Two-Bit Sister official facebook page!

The interview excerpt in Part 3 is taken from our interview with Two-Bit Sister last year, this can be found at the following link - http://aldorabritainrecords.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/the-jackal-interview-with-rock-band-two.html

Thanks to Leon and Connor for chatting to us!



Hope you enjoyed this feature on Two-Bit Sister! Check out our previous feature on The Modern Means!


Check out Two-Bit Sister here - http://www.twobitsister.co.uk/

Grab yourself a copy of 'The Jackal' at the following link - http://two-bitsister.bandcamp.com/

You can also like our facebook page to keep up to date with all future interviews at the following link - https://www.facebook.com/aldorabritainrecords
 
AB RECORDS

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