Artist: A Futurist Theatre
Source: Naomi McArdle
Ruairi Hickson sings and plays guitar and keys in A Futurist Theatre, which began with three other members in 2006 before evolving into a club-night behemoth, Futurism, in 2009. The debut album Caviar To Pigs was released earlier this year, quietly garnering a clutch of positive reviews. Unlike many other musicians working through the Irish rock scene, Ruairi is not one to mince his words. Drop-D futurised his opinions on music into web-space....
Drop-D: Can you pigeonhole your tastes into one particular genre or do your preferences spread through an array of influences?
Ruairi: I can absolutely pigeonhole my musical tastes, but that taste changes on a regular basis. I’ll go through lengthy periods of hating a certain style of music or band that I really don’t have any reason to; one song sounds great one day and terrible the next. Today, I’m in an indie-hating mood and I’m solely listening to Atari Teenage Riot. Tomorrow, it’ll be different again.
Drop-D: What triggered your musical infatuation? Was it a certain band/person/style/age?
Ruairi: I first picked up a guitar when I was 7 and promptly put it down again. After learning a handful of songs I just lost any desire to ever play music again, let alone write my own. Shortly afterwards, I contracted multiple eye infections at once and spent the next eight years in and out of hospital, submitted to a dozen operations to save my sight. When your eyesight starts to fade, it flicks a switch in your brain that makes the sanctity of your hearing absolutely crucial to your life. Two weeks before my fifteenth birthday I came around from the anaesthetic and was blind for three days. You start to think ‘Oh fuck, what if this is permanent?’ and when visiting hours are over, you’ve only got the radio for company.
Don’t ask me what station was on, but they played Been Training Dogs by The Cooper Temple Clause. It was exciting and it was dangerous! Nobody was making music like this, at least not to my untrained ears. The next day I had my brother [Bob Hickson - also of AFT] pick the debut album up and I heard so many creative, brilliant and original songs. I reached home and all this exciting music was around from bands like Ikara Colt, The Eighties Matchbox B-Line Disaster, The Murder Of Rosa Luxemburg, Blood Brothers, The Icarus Line, At The Drive-In, Refused, TV On The Radio... I realise most of those have split up now, but all with good reason – great art has a definite lifespan. I made it my mission to find new bands, never stopping to listen to the old ones. I was raised on a steady diet of Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, Tom Petty when my age was still in single digits, but now I was discovering music for myself, without being introduced by another fan and that was when I picked up a guitar again.
Drop-D: Is there any kind of music you'd like to know/hear more of?
Ruairi: I think the world of music goes through barren phases, particularly recently, where there is no real quality control, so many bands and yet so little focused genius. To my memory don’t think a truly great band has emerged in the last five years from anywhere, which is worrying.
I would love to hear more world music. No one’s really grabbed me since Ali Farka Toure passed away, so I hope someone will impress me soon. And I need to hear way, way more punk. As a teenager I basically never listened to punk or metal and I realise that it’s something most everyone else has and I feel like I’ve missed out on some huge part of regular human gestation. Can you recommend me an album or two?
Drop-D: What influenced your decision to choose a career in a band?
Ruairi: Performing music is the thing I am best at in this world and it’s what I love most. It wasn’t a hard decision.
Drop-D: How much time do you spend listening to music now? Has it de/increased over time?
Ruairi: I’m sad to say it’s decreased. I find myself running around a lot these days and as a result, I’m lucky to hear even one new album a week. It’s even more disheartening when that album turns out to be ‘disappointing’. I want my money back, Titus Andronicus!
Drop-d: Do you prefer live music or listening from home?
Ruairi: Always live music. When your hear something special that makes you go ‘oh wow’, you only lived that moment once and it’s never going to happen again, but you lived it and nothing else will compare. You can listen to an album and feel the same, sure, but then you listen to it again and the same buzz isn’t there, even if you can appreciate the music more as a whole. Live music is dangerously addictive.
Drop-D: How often would you spend at gigs that aren't your own?
Ruairi: I do go to as many gigs as my wallet allows, which is up to two a week now, I’m happy to say.
Drop-D: Would they be Irish or international bands? Any genre more so than the other?
Ruairi: Gigs by Irish bands generally tend to be more affordable and less crowded (happy/sad). The trouble with Irish bands is there’s usually a very narrow range of what’s available every night. I don’t particularly like by-numbers Indie, which you get an awful lot of. But every so often you hear a little spark of genius that makes it worth it.
Drop-D: Where does Irish music come on your playlists?
Ruairi: I do listen to a fair amount of music on MySpace and I get to hear a lot of Irish artists this way. We’re always looking to find a really good, talented band to play with or promote. That said, I sympathise with the many bloggers or agencies that get bombarded with material from all angles with requests for reviews and exposure, because a lot of these artists are not very good. Recording music is easy and cheap, so many slip into a trap of recording music without any love or forethought and place something that could have been great but now should never be heard in the public eye/ear. But this happens worldwide. I’m not specifically picking on Ireland here.
That’s not to say there aren’t Irish artists who do good music the right way. There are, of course. I am big fan of Channel One, God Is An Astronaut, ABAM (really brilliant), And So I Watch You From Afar, iPhoenix and a good few others. I’m really excited to see Arcadia and Butterfly Explosion live too.
Drop-d: What do you think of the climate of the Irish music scene? Is it a good place to be a musician right now?
Ruairi: I don’t think so. No, not really. I think the channels through which a band can start making a name for themselves are too few and there is a certain bias in some of those to make it even more difficult. Ireland’s music has always had a climate of backslapping and ‘it’s who you know’. I don’t know if this exists in other places, but I know it happens here for sure. There are plenty of talented individuals around, though, and I am an optimist, so I live in perpetual hope that the best will rise to the top.
Drop-D: If you could choose a musical era to experience, what would it be?
Ruairi: The one in ten years’ time. I think we’re in a slump at the moment, but that will pass. It’s happened before and will happen again. The future is always more exciting than what’s already been known and done.
Drop-D: Choose some albums you find timeless and explain why....
Ruairi:
Refused – The Shape Of Punk To Come: Just a stunning, stunning album of political intent, amazing technical ability and fury in abundance. The album sleeve was an entire goddamn manifesto! The music flows like lava into your brain and dareIfuckingsayit melts the gooey stuff inside. It’ll be too long before we see another album like this.
Manic Street Preachers – The Holy Bible: Then again, (see above) the Manics were capable of this sort of quality years ago. I’m really excited to hear their new album, even though the recent ones haven’t been so good, just because they say it’s the spiritual successor to this one.
Joy Division – Closer: Unknown Pleasures is probably the more familiar album, but the songwriting on this was just more complete. Songs like Colony and Isolation are just so much more compelling than most of the debut.
Jeff Wayne - The War Of The Worlds: A very brilliant girl introduced me to this a while back. Chock full of prog nonsense and over the top structures and vocals (Thunderchild) with an amazing Richard Burton narrating. It’s indirectly related to the title of our album too [Caviar To Pigs].
Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds – The Lyre Of Orpheus/Abbatoir Blues: No other artist on the planet can rhyme 'Orpheus' with orifice and not sound up their own hole. Get Ready For Love is one of the best songs ever written too.
Asian Dub Foundation – Enemy Of The Enemy: I got the same feeling from Fortress Europe for the first time as I did when hearing Been Training Dogs. They also introduced me to reggae, hip-hop, electronica and how to put on an eventful live show. Their latest album, Punkara, is amazing too, but this one has sentimental value.
Drop-D: Now choose some modern tunes that you've really enjoyed.
Ruairi:
Heiruspecs – Hip-Hop Nerdism
The Automatic – Steve McQueen
Bear McReary’s version of All Along The Watchtower
Ungdomskulen – Ordinary Son
We Are Scientists - Ghouls
Drop-D: Who/what do you find absolutely awful crap, rubbish, dross?
Ruairi: Arcade Fire are one. I used to be swayed by their songs but it’s just becoming clearer to me every day that their melodies are thin and layering them with hurdy-gurdies won’t make them good. Bloc Party are another. I can applaud nonsensical, Morrissey-like vocals, but the music and ideas are absent now. Is every band going to try and remake Kid A when they don’t know what to do next? My bandmates will lynch me for saying this, but I’m not a massive Pink Floyd fan either.
I don’t necessarily hate a bad Irish act when I hear them so much as get disheartened because everybody is ignorant to their own quality, high or low. I find it counterproductive to start an Oasis vs. Blur-style slanging match with anyone, because it never ends well for either party.
But while we’re on the subject, any band who, in the advent of aforementioned Canadians, picked up an accordion, donned a waistcoat and bowler hat onstage is only fooling themselves; any band whose singer has a thick Dub accent and sings like Alex Turner can never be original; any artist who just writes love songs has nothing interesting to write about; any band who have been inspired by Embrace are on a long downward spiral to nowhere; any band who are just bandmates and not friends aren’t ever going to be happy.
Most bands I dislike have split up by now anyway. More emerge all the time, but I’ll give them a chance. They may come good yet.
Drop-D: You've hijacked RTE at prime time and the DJ's tied up in a corner. Choose five songs you think the nation HAS to hear.
Ruairi:
Ennio Morricone – The Ecstasy Of Gold
Temple Of The Dog - Hungerstrike
The Dillinger Escape Plan – The Perfect Design
Masafumi Takada – Sweet Blue Flag
Zig and Zag – A Tijuana Gypsy Stole My Personal Stereo
Futurism night club takes place in Eamon Dorans on Wednesday 1st April, featuring iPhoenix and A Futurist Theatre. 8pm, €5.
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