The Shark is Rising

The last 12 months has seen Joe Gideon and the Shark support Nick Cave, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Seasick Steve and release one of 2008’s overlooked gems, Harum Scarum.

The brother-sister combo of Gideon (vocals, guitar) and Viva Seifert (drums, piano and everything else) peddle an intoxicating blend of lo-fi noisy blues-rock, festooned with bizarre lyrical tales of a country & western hue. Remarkably, Viva also represented the UK at the Barcelona Olympics.
“She was doing modern rhythmic gymnastics,” explains Gideon. “She was really into dance but kept putting her knee out and had to give it up. That’s pretty much how she ended up a musician.”
The siblings’ first foray into the music world saw them sign to Bella Union as members of post-rock combo Bikini Atoll.
“At the time we were really into that apocalyptic end-of-the-world-is-nigh thing,” Gideon smiles. “Bella Union was just starting out. Dirty Three drew us to that label. We were so happy to get on their roster.”
Impressively, the band recorded their second long-player with legendary producer Steve Albini.
“Steve was just great. He doesn’t suffer fools gladly and has quite a brusque sense of humour,” remembers Gideon. “He’s amazing at what he does. To be in the studio with him for a couple of weeks was something else.”
Moving on to another Steve, how did they come to support the Seasick one?
“We played at the Mojo Christmas party and Seasick Steve was the mystery headliner. He caught our set, and during his, he announced us as support for his upcoming tour. It was the first we’d heard of it!”
The Nick Cave gig materialised in a much more mundane manner.
“Their drummer Jim saw us playing earlier that year. He really liked the show, so he came up to us afterwards and asked if we’d be interested and we were like ‘Of course!’”
Another luminary who was similarly impressed by the pair was Elvis Costello, with whom they crossed paths on the BBC’s Loose Ends.
“That was pretty surreal. During soundcheck, we were pinching ourselves because there was only one other guy sitting listening to us and it was Elvis Costello. There was an audience of one and it was him!”