Doves Interview (with Jimi Goodwin) - 7th May 2002 (Doves in general)

Member Name: r.burns

Product:	Doves in general
Date:	19/07/02 (70 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Class Bloke, Gave me a beer, and some fags!

Disadvantages: none, really!

You started off as a dance act…

Yeah, Sub Sub.

Would you like to say a few things about that?

That’s fine, I’ve got no problem with it; we did some really good stuff. We play a song at the end of our set tonight called Space Face, which was the first thing we ever put out. It was a white label.
We got to number three in 1993 with the song Can’t Get No Love. Without that we wouldn’t be here now; it gave us the money to… to grow into Doves.

Was it as the current line-up?

Yeah, it was me, Andy and Jez.

Your new album, The Last Broadcast, is currently at number one. Do you think much has changed since Doves debut album?

Erm… A lot’s changed. Two and a half years of touring. We’ve seen a lot of the world, y’know, and maybe our attitude has changed a little bit. It’s just a bit breezy. The album’s a bit more… upbeat is too bland a word… erm… I dunno, it’s just life experience. Y’know, Lost Souls was made under a bit of a qualm I suppose, not all of it, but for that intense period we hadn’t played live for four years. In Sub Sub we were frustrated – didn’t know what we were doing – wanted to get somewhere, but didn’t quite achieve it. That’s why, in Doves, we thought we’d give it one last-ditch attempt to get good - to do something we really wanted to do.

You found your feet then?

We found our feet. It’s nice that Lost Souls did well, y’know, got reviewed well, got a bit of a fan base going and lots of gigging. We went to America a few times. Its bound to have influenced the second album. When we wrote it we’d just come off tours, back in the studio, back on tour again. It leant it a bit of an urgency maybe.

Doves is a popular nickname for ecstasy. Is that where the name came from?

The name came from,
erm… us all just agreeing on a name that we liked. There was talk of Swans at first, but there was already a band called Swans, way back in the eighties. An American band. So we thought, well, we can’t have them, and I think Andy said, “well what about Doves?” We ruminated it around the three of us and went, well, it’s not so bad, it’s all right.
It’s not about E’s, although a lot of people think it is. We did used to be quite familiar with the brand, y’know, ourselves, but it’s not a drug reference. It’s not even about peace and all that bullshit! It just felt right. It’s as simple as that!

You said earlier that you’ve been touring America quite a bit, and you have just come off a tour supporting Travis. How do all the different audiences compare?

Well, the Travis tour in England… they were quite good to us. The venues were pretty much full every night. It wasn’t like they were just waiting for Fran and Dougie and whoever they do have in the band. It was a really mixed crowd. It was a good experience for us to play in arenas – we hadn’t done ‘em before. I’m not sure we want to do ‘em again, to be honest! We got to play four or five tracks off the new album, and not necessarily in front of our own crowd. So we’ve now got our heads round ‘em. You develop them. It was good for us to cut our teeth on these new songs in front of not necessarily our own crowd, and hopefully we’ve picked up a few more fans on the way.

Okay. So, Leaves (the support band for that night) have been getting quite a bit of hype in the media, and have recently co-headlined a show with The Strokes. Do you think they will get as far as The Strokes, and if they do, how would you feel?

I don’t know really. I’ve heard the album’s first three or four tracks – I don’t know it really well R
16;cos I’ve been listening to a lot of new stuff lately.
When we sit down and pick bands to support we get a lot of CD’s through, but I liked a couple of the things I heard. I’ve seen one or two tracks live. I’m gonna check out the whole set tonight, fully, for the first time. I’ll be honest with you; I’ve not seen the set from start to finish. But, any band who means it and is passionate deserve to go as far as they can go… whether I like them or not! If you fucking mean it, and kids are into you, and people wanna listen to it, then good luck to you. Y’know.

So what’s going to be happening with Doves in the next year or so?

I think were going to be doing an incredible amount of touring. A lot of work really, but that’s all right – as long as we get time to kick back and get home, and just be normal for a while… ‘cos it gets a bit intense, if your just on the road all the time. If you can’t write on the road, then you can just come home and be normal. That’s when your ideas come.
As far as ambition and all that - obviously we wanna do as well as we can do.

Would you ever want to crack America then?

It depends on what terms it means. If it means seven months on the road, then no. If it means a month here and there, on our own terms hopefully, then we’d… well, we’d like to go back as long as people want us to play. But not back breaking! I mean, I know friends in bands who’ve nearly destroyed themselves doing six, seven months on the bus. You’d go fucking mad! It’s not worth it. Especially, I’m 31 now; I’m not 20! I haven’t got the desire to spend my life drinking Jack Daniels on the back of a bus! I can get drunk with the best of ‘em, but it’s not the be all and end all of life. There’s a lot of other things.

What do you prefer then: touring or bein
g in the studio?

Well, when you get sick of touring, you wanna go and write a new album… and when your sick of writing a new album, you wanna go out and tour again. They’re both great, but you can’t tour without good records.

<Jez Williams walks into the dressing room>

We’re nearly done here, man!

Okay, just a few more questions; you’re doing quite a few festivals this year…

Yeah, Glasto, V2002, T in the Park…

Any plans for Reading?

Well, we’re doing V2002. I love reading as a festival, I think it’s a great festival, but… its always been a rock festival, but I think it’s gone really, really, really, rock. So, I don’t think we’d really fit in, to be honest.
I think it’s gone really young. They’re all great bands, but I don’t think we’d really go down there, so we kinda decided to go for the other one this year.
We’ve played Reading a few times. I used to go as a kid, y’know, I like it. It’s a really good festival.

Okay, so you’ve been compared to both Oasis and Radiohead…

Absolutely nothing like those bands! I don’t understand that!

Do you often find that you are grouped with bands that you have nothing in common with?

Well, journalists have to… it’s all relative. I think certain records can sound like a track… but I know what the influences were for the track, and if I said that to someone else, they’d go; hang on, I don’t get that at all! Essentially, it goes through your own filter, and comes out the other side sounding like you.
All the new Radiohead recordings… I mean, what’s up with the old ones?

Yeah, personally, I preferred the earlier albums…

Well, I think they’re doing fine as they are. I think they’re doing great! <
br>
Do you think experimenting like Radiohead have is brave then?

I don’t think it’s that brave, man! It’s not like they’ve invented dance music. They’re just doing something that intrigues them right now.
They do care about their audience, but every band has to write for themselves, first and for all. That’s apparently a cliché, but it’s fucking true!
It’s like if it was you, and your friends, or your circle of people. You do stuff, and other people dig that.

Is that what you try and do – keep within the mainstream boundaries?

You can’t think like that. We try and make great albums. It’s not for demographic reasons. A certain amount of people go, like; we’ll write this for them. If you think like that, then you’ve lost it. You write what fucking moves you! It’s not to fit a criteria – you’re doomed if you think like that.

So finally then, what is the best gig you’ve ever been to?

Oooh… it’s gotta be The Clash, maybe, about ’78, ’79, at the Apollo in Manchester. That was my eighth birthday present. The Ramones. I used to go see loads of funk bands with me dad.
The Clash, The Ramones, erm… Troublefunk, at a place called The International in Manchester. That was a great gig. Also, Slaying Robbie at the same venue in about 1986, which was just really good dub reggae for three hours. Just Genius!

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