Everyone might be raving about the Hives at the moment, but Exile Inside are our favourite new band. Born from the ashes of My Life Story, lead singer Jake Shilingford's former band, they burst on to the music scene, via the net, last year,
and have since released three net only singles.
The band are about to release their debut album on August 12th, and Co-founders Jake Shillingford and Aaron Cohill kindly took the time out to answer the following questions.
gc: Exile Inside’s first album is uniquely funded by investors who found you via the internet - do you see this as being more and more the future of independent music? And do you think Exile Inside would exist if it wasn’t for the net?
Aaron: Well, time will tell whether the Internet is used in this way – we’d definitely like to see more people going the independent route as we have, and the Internet has obviously been an essential tool for disseminating information about the band.
Also we have been able to release three free downloadable “internet singles” from our website in order to give people a taste of what we sound like. Getting the recorded music to a potentially large audience in this way would have been a
lot more difficult without the web.
Jake: ExileInside would still have existed by signing to a small label except we would not have control over our :-
Music
When and how regularly it comes out
How many albums we could produce
We wouldn’t own our music
We wouldn’t be able to sell it on our own website or at our own concerts
We would probably have to give a percentage of our merchandise profit to the label
We have replaced the role of the record company with our friends and fans, they know more about what ExileInside should be about than a record company that focuses it’s attention randomly on it’s roster of bands. Our fans have endorsed EI but investing their own money, we see this as a blueprint for many bands to follow.
gc: What will you do if the band are offered a six or seven figure deal by a major record label?
Aaron: Just say no. It’s been hard work producing the album by ourselves, but we’ve come too far to just allow ourselves to be swallowed up by some corporation. The only corporate backing that we might possibly consider in the future would be some form of sponsorship whilst we retained our independence. Signing a record deal just goes against the whole ExileInside ethos of autonomy.
Jake: The great thing about owning the rights to our music is that we can ‘licence’ our albums to any record label in any country for a fee. The company will distribute our work to record shops in that territory and pay us for the albums sold. This way we retain control over our work and use the record companies for what they should be doing. Selling records for US!
gc: So how does it feel going back to playing smaller stages, like the Dublin Castle and the Water Rats?
Jake: It was important for us to start back right down at the bottom and work our way up, a fresh clean slate. But it was hard work being first on to 3 bands in the circuit venues, but you get treated like an equal and I didn’t want people to think that EI were riding on the back of MLS.
gc: Was it a difficult decision to end My Life Story after so many years?
Jake: Yes it was because we had been going for so long, the longer the time the harder it was to wrench away but ultimately the past counts for nothing if the present doesn’t feel right.
gc: What were your highest and lowest points during the MLS years?
Jake: Highest, Astoria on election night with our Swingometer - Lowest, Ben having to leave the band because of Tinatus
gc: In the online diary you mention singing along with Moby and Mick Jones at the Groucho club – you just have to tell us more about this!
Jake: It’s a very long story but it also involves, Bernard Summner, Wayne Sleep, Love Missile F1-11 played on a broken upright piano and a blonde.
gc: You quote Eraserhead and Buffalo 66 as influencing the band – what else would you say has? And why?
Aaron: Loads of things. Anything done with truth and passion, whether it’s a record, a poem, a film, a painting or whatever.
Jake: I don’t tend to get too influenced my music these days, musical influences enter me buy some kind of non cerebral osmosis, these days I don’t try, I just let things happen, that’s one good thing about not being tied to a label.
gc: Do you have any idea what will happen in five years time, after the band has released the promised five albums?
Aaron: No idea. I’m not even sure what will happen tomorrow. We don’t have a “blueprint” as such for the five year/five album plan. The only thing I’m sure of is that we will continue to have new ideas for EI as time goes by and the album releases will reflect this.
Jake: sleep
gc: Finally, what musically would you consider as essential listening at the moment?
Jake: Felix de Housecat, Capitol K, Schneider tm vs kpt.michii.gan - The Light 3000, all of Clint Mansel’s film scores, Martin Gore’s forthcoming solo album, Client and unsigned band Mistover.
Related links:
Exile Inside's Official Site
12 Reasons Why - MLS Fansite
Our Live Review of Exile Inside's gig at the Dublin Castle in Camden.
Alex Finch.
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