Dead on arrival

“That’s about as close as we’ve even been!” Scimon Tist proclaims, as Zombie Computer emerge from their very first Hot Press cover shoot, “We’re never doing that again!” Luckily for a band obsessed with experimental new wave electronica, professional photo shoots aren’t on their daily schedule.

“This is just too big a competition not to pay attention to,” Tist tells me, as we settle down for our second interview this year (I chatted to the producer in July, just as debut album Indian Summer was about to hit the stores). “Between all the press and the exposure, it’s a pretty sweet package. Even at this stage, we’ve gained so much from it – and we’ve only played one gig!”
Tist makes it sound like child’s play, but there was a lot riding on last week’s performance at the Play On The Day Regional Finals in Cork.
“The standard was very high,” programmer Eoghan Reid remembers. “When Dead School came on we thought, ‘We have to bring our A game!’ because they were just giving it socks on stage. Everyone was pulling it out of the bag.”
“But everybody was cool, too,” Tist adds. “When we were called out as the winners it was all, ‘Well done’, ‘Best of luck’ and ‘Do the South proud’.”
An unconventional mix of classic instruments and fancy programming doohickeys instantly set them apart from the other contestants, but according to Reid, it almost lost the attention of a few punters along the way.

“We were talking to one guy afterwards and he said, ‘When you got up on stage and opened up the two Apple laptops, I thought it was going to be awful’!”
“We converted a very straight-edged guitar rock fan!” singer Vince Murray laughs. “I mean, we do have some very big rock influences but I don’t think we’ll be using an acoustic guitar anytime soon.”
Zombie Computer was formed just over a year ago, when Reid grew tired of making music in his bedroom.
“I can’t even sing,” he says. “I thought I could at the time, but I quickly realised that I needed someone else, so I got in touch with Vince, who was singing in another band. Then Scimon heard us and he approached us. So he joined the band from there and we locked ourselves up in his studio for three months and made the album!”
Nods to New Order and Kraftwork are easily spotted on Indian Summer, but Zombie Computer have just as many contemporary influences. MGMT, LCD Soundsystem and Twin Shadow are all on the van stereo.
“We all like Paul Kalkbrenner and Health are a big band for us these days.” Murray adds. “We went to see them with Crystal Castles and they blew Crystal Castles away. There’s something so visceral about them but at the same time they know exactly what they’re doing.”
Amid all that distorted electro-rock, the standout moment on Indian Summer is a silky spoken word intro by legendary Marvin Gaye, Michael Jackson and Quincy Jones cohort Leon Ware.
“He’s just a cool dude and he embraces everything with regards music and technology,” Tist gushes. “The beauty of spoken word is that you can fit it over any tempo. We sent it through to him and his wife Carol and they were like, ‘Yeah, we really, really like this, you have our blessing to put it on your album’.”

Indian Summer may have gained generally glowing reviews, but the band are quick to point out that there’s more to the ZC sound.
“We knew it wasn’t going to be a major classic album,” Tist says. “It’s like a calling card. But it was a huge achievement as well, because it was the first album for all three of us.”
“In this day and age with no money, can a band actually release an album in the space of a couple of months?” Murray asks. “It was a good confidence boost.”
What can we expect from record number two?
“The new stuff’s more coherent,” Murray assures me. “The songs fit together better.”
“We want to get across the live feeling as well,” Reid says. “When we do it live, the songs just have more balls.”
“We always thought of ourselves as an after-midnight type of band, you know?” Murray muses. “We want to give people the opportunity to dance.”
“And to provoke the thought in someone that there’s other things out there,” Tist adds. “Music is not all black and white.”

Indian Summer is out now on Psychonavigation Records. Zombie Computer play the Hard Working Class Heroes festival on October 7.