The city’s two football teams may be having nightmare seasons, but things in the Sheffield rock ‘n’ roll garden couldn’t be rosier.
Jarvis Cocker’s back in top form; the Arctic Monkeys have sold obscene amounts of their album; The Long Blondes have just released one of the debuts of the year; and Richard Hawley happily continues to make a complete cult of himself.
A fifth reason for Sheffieldian music fans to swell with civic pride is the emergence of Milburn, a twangtastic four-piece with the ability to make the most mundane aspects of urban life seem unbelievably romantic.
Yes, their Well Well Well album does sound very like Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not, but given that they formed 18 months before the Monkeys and taught Alex Turner how to play guitar, it’s not them who’s doing the copying.
You’d think that this would be the cause of some inter-band friction, but nope, bassist Joe Carnall and drummer Joe Green don’t have a bad word to say about their higher-profile counterparts.
“They’re good lads, the Monkeys,” Carnall says inbetween sips of Guinness. “While I know from talking to them that they’re appreciative of the hyper-fame they’ve achieved, the speed at which it’s happened has left them reeling a bit. I think they kind of half-want the second album to be fucking slated by people.”
“They actually want some shit reviews!” chips in the other Joe. “The impression I get from Alex is that it’ll sound a lot different to Whatever People Say I Am.”
Given that the boy Turner told Hot Press that his current iPod favourites are Barbara Lewis, Esther Phillips, The Four Freshmen and Scott Walker, I’d say he’s right.
Unfair comparisons in the press aside, being mates with the Monkeys has its benefits.
“We always hang-out in their dressing-rooms at festivals ‘cause they get more free beer than us and better hangers-on,” Green chuckles. “The Strokes dropped into them one afternoon with Drew Barrymore who gave him (Joe) a kiss on the cheek! He hasn’t washed since.”
“It’s weird with film stars ‘cause you don’t know what their personalities are going to be like,” Carnall muses. “Noel Gallagher, on the other hand, you’d have no trouble going upto ‘cause you know he’s into his beer and football.”
Any other big celebrity moments?
“Getting straight off the bus and watching the Chili Peppers close-up at Fuji Rocks,” he beams. “We’d never been to Japan so everything about it was gobsmacking.”
Like the Monkeys, Milburn wouldn’t be the biggest fans of the London urchin rock scene.
“There are a lot of wankers there who are in bands just to be cool and get into the NME,” Green resumes. “My cousin’s been in rehab, so there is coke and smack in Sheffield, but it’s not common currency and glamorised like it is in London. If our tour manager knew there was a drug dealer in the vicinity, he’d kick off, he really would.”
A rather different scenario to a band we all know – and some love – who had a drug dealer for their tour manager. Are there any other places that Milburn would rather wank pigs in hell than visit again?
“You get some right retards in Middleton, which is the old pit village between Doncaster and Barnsley,” Green grimaces. “We played a gig in a club there that was straight out of Phoenix Nights. Inside the crowd were all 15 and bombed out of their heads on White Lightening, and outside you had gangs of Chavs waiting to pick a fight with ‘em. We wrote a song about it called ‘Civic’, which was one of our early B-sides. Doncaster’s a bit shit too, though hard to avoid ‘cause it’s got an airport.”
Were our readers to brave Doncaster Airport – Ryanair fly there from €0.002 return – and then shuttle-bus their way to Sheffield, where should they go for the ultimate local night out?
“Go and watch Sheffield Wednesday at Hillsborough and then watch the rest of the results come through in the Red Lion, which has a great pool table and pub grub between 12 and 2 that loads of pensioners come in for,” Carnall proffers. “After downing a few pints, catch whoever’s playing in The Leadmill and then go to the DQ Bar where the DJ always plays some good tunes. No matter where you’ve been before, it’s a legal requirement to end the night in Chubby’s in Cambridge Street where the specialty is burgers with sloppy cheese. There’s fucking loads to do in Sheffield!”