MOJO Bar - Music for the people

So yesterday was a bit special in OSA world.

Firstly we found out that we had won Steve Lamacq’s rebel playlist with a whooping 81% of the vote against The Holloways and The Futureheads, which was an amazing moment. This means we get played on 6 Music everyday. We felt very proud of our song!

Then if that wasn’t enough excitement Lauren Leverne played us as well…and then…

Well then Zane Lowe played us as part of his Fresh Meat feature on Radio 1!! That’s national Radio 1 at 8pm in the evening. It’s a wee bit frightening how many people may have heard that!

Anyway, we’re nearly mixed. 4 more days to go, then a week of going ARGH YES NO MAYBE, then hopefully it’ll all be done.

Here’s a bit more from my diary during the recording.

So we’re now well over half way through recording. What will the world be like for the Official Secrets Act when they finally see the outside world? Will London still be in one piece, will our friends and loved ones remember us, will we have missed the Cold War Exhibition at the V&A, will Celtic still be in the Champions League? (Yes, maybe, no, probably not)

We spent a lot of time on Monday working on a song called Hold The Line, which has a Bowie meets Breakfast Club thing to it (hopefully), it references the 80s synth pop kings Japan and Tears For Fears so it was a bit special when Liam pulled out a Prophet 5 synth that he had bought off of David Sylvian of …. Japan!!! for us to use on it!! This made us all very happy. Now we just need a song referencing Radio Free Europe and The One I Love and Liam might be able to get Peter Buck from REM in to play on one of our songs, or at least lend us his guitar. (A 360 Rickenbacker I think Mr Buck). We also worked on a song called Under The Flightpath which has a feel that makes me think of the urban wastelands (High school poetry 101) where West London meets deepest darkest Suburbia. There is a bridge over a railway line that i used to walk over everyday on the way to school and all the planes for Heathrow fly over it, and when it’s a really crisp winter evening all their smoke trails freeze in the sky for hours.
 
We’re getting near the end of the main tracking and decisions over what might make the album are starting to come into play. So we’ve written all the song names and pinned them up on the wall so people can make their own tracklistings. It’s like a DIY tracklisting kit. Well no it’s not like that, it is that. We’ve also got a sheet of paper up for prospective album title ideas. We had a couple prepared before we came in, and some of them are evolving out of what’s going on in the studio.

Team crossword is currently hard at work. They are upset that i filled in some answers in lower case, it seems these are the actions of a madman. Understandable. Team Ping Pong is also still training hard, learning ever more skills. We played some dates with Operator Please before we came in the studio. If they had a pound for every time we sang a little bit of “Ping Pong Song” in the studio they would have enough money to buy a nice second hand typewriter off ebay or maybe a meal at Pizza Hut.

The studio detritus is also developing. Alex is reading Metamorphisis by Ovid, I’m reading Please Kill Me by Legs McNeill about the rise of Punk Rock in New York (Very good it is too!) there is also a Viz annual, a Kaoscillator synth (check these things out they are like your own personal disco) sleigh bells, cow bells and conkers scattered around the mixing desk. I’m also sitting next to a French Horn while i write this.

We have some old band friends coming round for dinner tonight. We don’t see the outside world much and we lock ourselves away when we are working so it will be nice to sit down for an hour to catch up on what’s happening with our pals. But we’ve got a lot to do so it’ll be a brief brake before getting back into our lovely lamp lit live room, which is starting to look ever more like our bed rooms at home. (This means basically it’s a tip with guitar pedals and microphones scattered into every corner)

We are starting to sort out Tour dates for when the record is finished and the thought of taking all this out to people is  exciting, if a little scary. When we toured earlier this year it felt like we were never out of Denise (our lovely battered Transit Van) and now we’re not even sure where we parked her (Mike? Alex? Any idea?). Al and Mike will get to go back to Scotland to start the tour and we’ll get to visit Leeds and Manchester again which are kind of home from homes for OSA. In Leeds we’re playing the Cockpit, which is where I used to go and watch gigs when I was studying. Indeed the “Best Gig” I’ve ever seen was Mars Volta their a few years ago. Omar is just the sexiest guitar player on the planet and they were so intense on stage that night. Just thinking of it brings a big punk prog smile to my face. (Check the footage of At The Drive In on Jools Holland, Omar and Cedric’s previous band. It’s just insanity)

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 19th, 2008 at 7:39 pm and is filed under News & press. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.