Queasy Does It
Thanks to slacker pop anthems like ‘Get Sick’ and ‘Turn Away’, this Dublin foursome have squirmed and spazzed their way into many an indie lover’s heart, and all without the use of a single synth. Celina Murphy finds out how, in less than a year, Bouts have created one of Ireland’s favourite lo-fi live experiences.
Celina Murphy, 04 Sep 2012
After two rapturously received mini-releases, one heart-melting karaoke-themed music video and a whole lot of gigs (40-odd in the last six months alone), everyone and their slacker pop-loving cousin is wondering when garage rock aficionados Bouts are going to deliver their debut album, unaware that... well, it actually already exists.
“It’s the album that nobody knows about,” bassist Niall Jackson says of 2010 LP New Ways Of Saying No, “but it’s kind of a different band now, really.”
“It’s almost like before you read a book, you have a prelude,” guitarist Barry Bracken adds.
Although the band’s first release was uploaded to Bandcamp almost two years ago, Bouts as we know them have only been around for nine months.
“Myself and Daniel (Flynn, drums) started off in the second half of 2010,” Bracken recalls, “and we actually didn’t play any gigs, we just rehearsed, got a bunch of songs together and recorded them and we put an album out for free and that’s what we did.”
“Barry thought we were going to do a thing where we all played different instruments than we normally play,” Flynn says, “but that totally fell through.”
“I was in a band before that,” Bracken explains, “so I think it was a case of just trying to rejuvenate it and mix it up a little bit and trying to get excited about playing again. The idea was that I'd play bass and go from there, really. We thought we’d release an album and then release another album and just be this studio thing, but it didn’t really turn out that way and it’s for the better.”
It certainly helped Bouts make an impression when their self-titled debut EP dropped in October of last year.
“A lot of people rush into getting songs out and you’re only on the first draft,” Bracken reflects. “You have to work through songs and get to a point where you go, ‘Yeah, this is better.’ Then you also have to know when to stop as well, ‘cause that can be a problem…”
“I’m not as much a bass-player as Barry’s sub-editor,” Jackson jokes. “He has an amazing knack of coming up with a song every hour.”
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