Klammer - From The Cure and The Mission to Klammer

AÑO: 5 | NÚMERO 48

THE 13th UN A R E V IS TA IM A GINA RIA

KLAMMER FROM THE CURE AND THE MISSION TO KLAMMER

[ Interview with Steve Whitfield from Klammer by Diego Centuriรณn.

Photographs: Lesley Whitfield, Steve Dutton and Steve White. ]

FROM THE CURE AND THE MISSION TO KLAMMER

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I only mention three albums: Wish (1992) by The Cure. Neverland (1995) byThe Mission. Brilliant Mistakes (1996) by Flowers of Romance. Common Denominator: Steve Whitfield played a critical role as producer. In 2014, Steve founded the band we are featuring today, Klammer, who just released their third album "You Have Been Processed". And we took the opportunity to contact Steve and talk about this record.

Hello Steve, thank you for answering our questions today. To start with, let’s address your work on the albums I mentioned. What can you tell us about your career as an engineer and your role in these excellent albums?

Although I have produced many many records, I have to just correct you on the records you’ve just mentioned above.On ‘Wish’ and ‘Neverland’I was the engineer and the mix engineer on ‘Brilliant Mistakes’.

I was very lucky early in my career to meet The Cure and the first thing I did with them was produce and engineer ‘Hello I Love You’ with them for Elecktra Records Rubaiyat album.

Robert, Wayne and Mike are three great people to work and talk with, andI’m very happy that I’mstill in touch with all of them.

I’m grateful that the first half of my career was all analogue (tape machines and big mixing desks) and the second half has been in the digital era. I’m really glad I know both of these ways of working. My preferred option would be the best of both. Analogue in (great sounding desk and pre amps), mixing in the computer (Pro Tools) and then mix back through an analogue desk (summing mixing).

A top end tape machine sounds great but it is a very slow way of working compared to the computer, although I do miss all those conversations that people used to have as the tape was rewinding! There was also something very Zen about cleaning the tape heads every morning before anyone else arrived at the studio.

I understand that you foundedKlammer in 2014 and I’m not aware of any separate music project you had before this. In any case, you've taken some time to put together a band. What was the reason you waited so many years to write your own songs?

We have all been in many bands before but none of them came to much.

The difference with this band is the writing partnership with Poss, my music and his vocals/lyrics just seem to work really well together! This is the first band I’ve been in where I’m just a guitarist, I actually started as a synth player! I think I’ve also learnt a lot from all the bands I’ve worked with in the studio, sometimes what to do and sometimes what not to do!

What does Klammer mean? Is this a German word?

We started of thinking about ‘Clamour’ (a loud and confused noise) and then changed the spelling. We found out later that it means peg or clamp in German.

"You Have Been Processed" is your third album, preceded by "Auslane" and "Klammer." What differences do you find in this new album compared to the previous two?

I think it’s our most consistent album, I feel that all the songs sound like they’re from the same band and album,yet it’s not just the same song repeated 12 times. Also maybe

the punk movement left as a legacy. You have that refinement and that energy. How would you yourself define Klammer’s sound for those readers who have not yet discovered your music?

Well we’re not quite punk, not quite goth and not quite rock but a bit of all of them. I guess if we put a label on it, then we are post-punk with the spirit of punk coursing through our veins. Still angry, still trying to experiment and still doing it our own way.

It’s strange when you get your records reviewed and the journalists start mentioning and comparing you to bands that you’ve never really listened to.

I feel I’m influenced by everything I’ve ever listened to, from Bowie and early Roxy Klammer’s sound takes us to the post- Music to The Stranglers and Joy Division, punk of the early eighties, where all sounds to Kraftwerk and Boards Of Canada, to new became hard but were much more refined bands like Hookworms. I listen to BBC 6 than punk, whilenot losing the strength Music a lot when I’m cooking, it’s great for it’s a little heavier than the previous two.

I started experimenting with Dadgad tuning and that’s on a couple of songs. I also bought a Fender Vi baritone guitar as I started writing this one. It makes me write riffs rather than chords.

There’s still plenty of experimenting going on to. At the start of Coast To Coast it’s not keyboards but a wall of guitar feedback recorded and then slowed down to half speed, it gave it a really eerie and organic sound.

I also did much more backing vocals on this album, something that’s still quite new to me.

I’m really enjoying doing them live to!

Poss’s vocals on this album are really strong, he really nailed recording them.

5 hearing new stuff.

Today technology has advanced so much that the DIY ethics that punk imposed is more alive than even in those years. The "home studio" has a quality similar to that of the recording studios. And the internet made it possible for pretty much any musician to record, mix and master their own musical output at home. You have

been on both sides of the counter.How do you see this growth of DIY possibilities?

I still love being in a big studio, with all the amazing hardware equipment and the energy of the band all being there together.

But the advance in technology has made it more accessible for everyone to record by themselves at a fraction of the cost. So I guess that is very much in the original punk ethos.

Although I do hear a lot of pretty band mixes,

which is why I set up a studio at home. I do get a lot of work coming in now where the band has self recorded but can’t get the mixes sounding as they want them.

All our records have been done on a small budget. We go into a studio to record the drums for a couple of days and then everything else is done at my studio at home.

I spent January and February this year with amps and microphones all over the house recording bass, guitars and vocals for the album and then March mixing.

If you had to explain to us the current situation with the record industry is (in terms of records and the freedoms that artists have regained to their music andof the possibilities that we have today). What are your thoughts on this?

It’s true bands probably have more artistic and financial freedom than ever before, and anyone can upload tracks up to the internet.

The flip side is that bands now have to be experts with recording, mixing, graphic design, social media, promotion, selling their music online, etc. This all takes time away from writing, rehearsing and gigging, which in the old record industry was pretty much all they need to be good at. I come across some

great bands with great music, but have got nowhere because they weren’t good at all of the above.

Also it’s important that you get a good publicist if you can afford one. We hooked up with Shameless Promotion PR for this album and it made a wide world of difference, earning us recognition in more than 60 countries and opening up all kinds of doors for us. Words of advice: Pick your team players accurately and don’t throw your money away.

What plans does the band have for this year?

The album has just come out and we’re trying to plan a tour of the UK for early next year, and looking at coming to play Europe.

So if there’s anyone out there with good contacts for gigging in Europe please get in touch with us!

And to end this interview and thank you for the space you have given us, would you like to add anything for our readers?

Thanks you for the interview Diego and for anyone who’s taken the time to have a read. If you check out our album, I hope you like what we’ve been up to!

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The13th U NA R EVISTA IMA GINA RIA