Welsh music has its fair share of megastars (hello Tom, hiya Stereophonics) as well as plenty of cool indie artists (hey there Cate, ah, hi Adwaith), Melin Melyn fit somewhere kind of new. The six-piece band have just released their debut full-length album and it’s a melding pot of styles and genres, which if you were forced to describe you might call Welsh psychedelic country indie pop rock or Roc pop indie gwlad seicedelig Cymraeg. We caught up with Gruff and Garmon from the band to find out more about the music and world they inhabit.
Bore da Melin Melyn, easy question first, where are you right now, and what are you up to today?
Garmon: We are currently in our tour van from Heathrow Travelodge to Brighton. We’re currently on a UK Tour and we play DUST tonight, before The Dome, London tomorrow & Tramshed, Cardiff on Friday night.
Gruff: We’re having such a great time taking the mill on tour with us. Every place has been packed and people are determined to Save the Mill from destruction.
Introduce yourself to our readers.
Garmon: We are Gruff & Garmon – two of the six millers of the Mill On The Hill. Gruff plays guitar & saxophone & sings the songs, while I play bass & sing backing vocals.
Gruff: Each morning we – the six millers of the Mill On The Hill – walk to the top of the hill & write songs in our magical Mill, ready to blast them out to the villagers of Melin village and beyond. Big issue at the moment mind – there’s a greedy landlord trying to knock down the mill to build a car park on top of it, so we’re spreading the word to gather support to stop this from happening. Stop knocking down musical mills and leave grassroots venues alone!
I feel like we know each other now, so confide in me… tell me something about you that I don’t know.
Garmon: I saw former snooker world champion John Parrot in a Ponderosa in Florida back in 2001.
Gruff: I once played table football with Childish Gambino / Donald Glover. I had no idea who he was. We made a decent team.
My grandparent’s surname was Mellin, they were from Merthyr. What does being Welsh mean to you?
Gruff: Incredibly proud despite the rugby. Most of us are also Welsh speakers and learners at our gigs love practicing their Welsh with us. Some say they are learning because of listening to our music. And other bands too I’m sure.
How would you describe your new album, The Mill on the Hill, in two sentences?
Gruff: I love Sgt Pepper. I love theatre, I love narrative and I wanted to create a world. By setting the album inside our beloved mill we have ended up with what some people would describe as a concept album. The live show takes the audience on quite a journey and both the album and live show have a beginning, middle and end to it. I would also like to think that there is plenty of variety there! I find it tricky to summarise our music as we are influenced by many different bands and genres.
Talk to me about Melin Village.
Gruff: Melin Village is where we, the six millers of the Mill on the Hill live. The Mill on the Hill overlooks the village and is loved by everyone who lives there. Most importantly, everyone is welcome in the village. During the day, if the sails turning, it signifies that the millers are hard at work creating music inside the mill. The music can be heard throughout the day across the land.
Tell me about the first song you wrote for the album?
Gruff: I believe it to be ‘Running on MT’. It’s a stream of consciousness about someone struggling to get through their everyday lives. One day, they decide to change their appearance and their accent, which allows them to hide behind their problems and seize the day!
And what was the last one to make it onto the tracklist?
Gruff: It’s actually the titular song ‘Mill on the Hill‘. I wanted to write a song that could exist in the beginning, middle and end of the album as a sort of trippy theme song.
I love ‘Fantastic Food’ – what can you tell me about that song?
Garmon: I wrote this after being on a date with my girlfriend. She’d ordered the soup as a starter & implored me to try some myself as she claimed that it “tasted just like home”. Unbeknownst to me, it contained traces of shellfish, which lead to my face resembling a balloon. As she ran to the nearest Sainsbury’s to grab some antihistamines I sat in silence & this song came to me.
And ‘The Pigeon & The Golden Egg’ is another great song, what’s that all about?
Gruff: I’m frustrated by sentimental messages on people’s walls, cushions and fridge magnets. I don’t like them, especially as many of them can often be correct! I didn’t want to write a patronising song by a band saying “this is what you need to do if you feel crap.” So it’s kind of a song of solidarity to say, we get it, let’s just do the best we can and let’s dance. With a few references to Jack and the Beanstalk for good measure.
Beth yw’r gwahaniaethau rhwng ysgrifennu a chanu yn y Gymraeg o gymharu â’r Saesneg? (What are the differences between writing and singing in Welsh compared to English?)
Garmon: Cwestiwn da iawn! Mae’n rywbeth anodd i’w egluro, ond am ryw reswm mae rhei pynciau a rhei alawon yn gweddu un iaith yn fwy na’r llall. Mae’n rywbeth greddfol yn hytrach ‘na meddyliol. (Very good question! It’s something difficult to explain, but for some reason some subjects and some tunes suit one language more than the other. It is something intuitive rather than mental.)
What can you tell me about the studio environment you recorded in?
Garmon: It was a lot of fun. We recruited our good friend Llyr Pari to produce the record and he was incredibly patient and encouraging with all of our idiosyncratic ideas. We divided our time between Stiwdio Sain in Llandwrog and Llyr’s studio in Cardiff Bay.
Gruff: We’ve many guest appearances on the album too. It was a joy to collaborate with such talented people.
Where’s the most exciting place you’ve played live?
Garmon: Green Man Festival is always a thrill, no matter what stage we play. We recently played Trans Musicales in Rennes at the tail end of last year. We’d never played France before but we were greeted by a crowd of nearly 5,000 people in an enormous air hanger, live on French TV. What a laugh.
Gruff: We loved playing Glasgow on this tour as we’d never played in Scotland before. We are super excited for the Cardiff gig in Tramshed, we hope it’s going to be a special night for all as a sort of homecoming gig!
And where’s the absolute worst?
Garmon: The worst shows are the ones where the bookers don’t feed the bands properly. Without naming names, we turned up to a show once where the bands were given a loaf of bread & a block of cheese, while the gig goers were treated to a three-course meal. Never again.
Gruff: Without a knife to cut the bread or cheese. Logistical nightmare. It certainly wasn’t Fantastic Food – see what I did there.
What can you tell me about the album cover artwork?
Garmon: The album artwork was designed by the brilliant Edith Morris. What people might not realise is that the cover is a fully functional model-scale replica of our beloved Mill that she made out of paper-mache. It’s currently on the table in front of me in the tour van.
Gruff: And the sails turn.
That is pretty cool! With the poor £ numbers from streaming, what’s the best way for people to support you and your music?
Garmon: Without a shadow of a doubt the best way to support us as an independent artist is to purchase our album on vinyl or CD. We also have lovely merchandise for sale & of course attending our live shows helps us so much. It’s no exaggeration to say that we wouldn’t be where we are now if people hadn’t been so supportive in attending our gigs, buying our previous EPs & merchandise and spreading the word about us over the years. It goes straight into paying the electricity bill for the Mill.
If you could recommend one artist to listen to this week, who would it be?
Garmon: I’ve been enjoying The Late Great by Townes Van Zandt & Rose City Band’s latest record Sol Y Sombra.
Gruff: Garmon that’s cheating, that’s two! I’ll go with Jessica Pratt’s latest album Here in the Pitch.
What’s the question I should have asked you today but haven’t?
Gruff: Finally, how do you take your coffee?
Finally, how do you take your coffee?
Garmon: No hot drinks for me, thank you.
Gruff: Oat flat white please, Diolch.
Buy Mill On The Hill from Bandcamp and follow the band on Instagram. Their tour is continuing around the UK through April and May.
