Chester trio Peaness have been carving a niche for themselves since the release of their ace garage-pop debut EP ‘No Fun’ about two years ago. Spiky, witty, smart and smeared in personality, it exhibited a girl gang with the tunes and chops to back it up. They followed this up with the melodic toe kick in George Osbourne’s nuts ‘Oh George‘ that showed they had as much in common with Elastica as they did the likes of the Vivian Girls.
At the start of the year they released a double single ‘Same Place’ and ‘Seafoam Islands’ as part of the Oddbox singles club. Both tracks showed a progression in their songwriting, Seafoam Islands angular rhythms and twitching percussion woven with their three-part vocal harmonies, possesses the kind of songwriting nous exhibited by the likes of Belly or the Breeders. It sounded marvellous. They released a new EP ‘Are you Sure?’ with Alcopop earlier this year, so we thought we’d get to know them a bit better with our 20 questions.
Hi how are you today what’s the weather like?
Hello! Jess here. It’s Monday 19th June and it’s mega hot. It was the hottest day of the year yesterday.
How did you meet the rest of the band ?
We all met whilst at Uni. Balla and I were in the same year and Rach was the year below us.
Have you ever been starstruck?
Not really, but maybe that’s because I haven’t met anybody super famous!
The Royal Family: should they stay or should they go?
Well I don’t think we should kill them or anything, and they do bring a lot of tourism, but they’re pretty pointless and the money spent on them from tax payers is stupid and wasteful.
You wrote an ace song about George Osbourne, any more political pop songs in the works?
Thank you. A lot of our songs are focused on frustration towards politics in this country and the state of the world. ‘Ugly Veg’ (which is going to be our next single) is all about that. The chorus is: “I want to see oceans clean / I want the world to stay green”.
If you weren’t doing this, what would you like to be?
Something creative that’s for sure. A tattoo artist probably.
What’s your favourite book?
Sarah’s Scribbles comic book haha.
What were you like at school?
Pretty well behaved – I was an average student, but I did bunk off to the music block for pretend guitar lessons when I had RE.
Being a female three-piece have you encountered much sexism in the music biz?
We get booked by nice people and play with nice bands, so for the most part, no. Occasionally dumbasses will say stuff like “Can you sign my 7″ Peaness?” when presenting a single after a live show which is followed by a straight blunt face and a “no” or shout Peaness related puns to which I usually say “yes, very good sir” down the mic and then they feel stupid and don’t speak again. A blogger recently described us as “sweet and petite sweet peas” so we didn’t share it. -sigh- just don’t, okay.
Best gig you’ve played so far?
That’s a tricky one. We’ve done a lot of shows! (53 since July 2015 to be precise) But playing in Telfords Warehouse, Chester, is always great. Focus Wales and Carefully Planned Festival were also lovely.
What do you listen to in your tour van?
There’s an endless selection of CDs in the van. Ranging from the latest Ryan Adams album, to Grimes, Daft Punk, Biffy Clyro, The Shins and St Vincent.
What were your favourite bands growing up?
I had an obsession with Red Hot Chili Peppers when the ‘By The Way’ record came out – I was 12, but that has since disappeared completely. I also loved/still love Radiohead because everybody from Oxford must love and appreciate them.
Vinyl, CD, Download or stream?
Vinyl
When was the last time you cried?
Two days ago watching interviews with local residents of the Grenfell Tower tragedy.
Tell us about your recent EP?
Our recent EP titled “Are You Sure?” (IT Crowd fans S01EP02) came out May 5th and it’s our first 12″ record. The vinyl version has both our debut EP and our new one included. The talented artist Akbar Ali did the artwork for us (he did our kitty tee shirts too) and we’re so happy with it. As for the music itself, there’s 5 tracks of some older songs that we’d been gigging for a while (Oh George, Seafoam Islands) and some new tunes we only just finished before we hit the studio (Skin Surfing). It’s a summer record and we hope it makes people smile.
Have you started work on an album yet?
We’ve started writing again, yes. The plan is to write a lot of tunes over the next year.
Are you playing any festivals this year?
We are indeed. We’ve played a couple already, but coming up we have 2000 Trees, Truck Festival and Indietracks. We’ve got a very busy July coming up.
