Moving hearts

The title of Desert Hearts’ debut album Let’s Get Worse sounds like fighting talk from a band whose career trajectory couldn’t get any better if they had scripted it themselves.

After forming four years ago, the Belfast-based trio cut themselves adrift from a floundering local scene by creating a musical aesthetic that fused the lo-fi, layered guitar dynamic of Daydream-era Sonic Youth with the hushed-up harmonies of Scottish indie legends the Pastels.

While their peers were concentrating on sounding more/less like Ash/Undertones, Desert Hearts simply concentrated on being able to play all of their beautiful, complex songs live. One of these tunes – ‘No More Art’ – was all it took for Rough Trade to headhunt the ‘Hearts and before long the record label who signed the Strokes were offering Belfast’s arbiters of avant post-rock a deal.

“It all started when we did a one-day recording session with some local bands at a place called Catalyst Arts in Belfast,” explains singer and guitarist Charlie Mooney. “Will, from Life Without Buildings (Scottish band signed to Tugboat), came over and he passed our tape on to Tugboat. Then I got this phonecall from Rough Trade saying they’d heard ‘No More Art’ and wanted to sign us. The next day this big parcel of records came through the door.”

Naturally, there were no arguments over their choice of debut single. When the wailing, wandering guitar-driven grandeur of ‘No More Art’ was released over a year ago it seemed like aeons ago that a Belfast indie band had won over the British music press with such surety. Suddenly, Desert Hearts found themselves appointed torchbearers of a scene which, according to Charlie, they were never really a part of.

“We’re nothing to do with the music scene in Belfast. People probably think we’re a bit aloof. There are bands here but everybody is trying to make the same kind of music. It’s all hard rock. We’re proficient players and our sound varies. Sometimes it’s mellow, sometimes it’s just a noisey stream of consciousness.”

It was this wish to disengage from a distinctly ‘local’ aesthetic that led Desert Hearts to follow in the footprints of Snow Patrol and relocate to Glasgow to record their debut album. The ten tracks that comprise Let’s Get Worse are a schizoid blend of haunted and desolate melodies punctuated by sharp bursts of pure, unadulterated noise: an album too skewed-up to annotate a specific place or tradition.

“If you record in the studios in Belfast you end up sounding doubly Irish,” explains Charlie. “We wanted something different so we recorded the album at the Chemical 19 studios (owned by the Delgados) in Hamilton, Glasgow. Most of the sound was recorded in three days but we spent a lot of time mixing it. Andy Millar of Mogwai recorded the whole thing and Life Without Buildings made sure the guitars and drums sounded good.”

Sounding good in a live capacity is something that Desert Hearts have been working on. Charlie Mooney, Roisin Stewart (bass) and Chris Heaney (drums), have a reputation for being an unpredictable and often temperamental live band. However, rumours that Desert Hearts started a ruckus with David Kitt when he was on the same bill as them in Belfast six months ago are unfounded.

“I’d like to clear this one up once and for all,” states an exasperated Charlie. “I’ve nothing against David Kitt, I actually like the guy. What happened was his people took two hours to soundcheck and then walked off and left their equipment on the stage. So when we were on stage we were jumping around a lot and some of it got trashed accidentally.”

In fact, Desert Hearts are the perpetrators of a much more heinous crime against Kittser, committed that very night in a dingy venue of deepest, darkest Belfast.

“We did something really, really bad to David Kitt that night,” says Charlie with the conspiratorial tone of someone who has just pulled off his first large-scale heist. “We stole all his Guinness.”

Watch out for Desert Hearts: not content with letting their cinematic sounds steal your heart, they’ll swipe your pint if you let them.