Get Inuit @ SXSW 2016, ei8ghtball Media Lounge (Photo: Paul Bachmann for Live4ever Media)
Can you introduce yourselves?
I’m Jamie, I’m the singer. I’m James and I’m the guitarist. I’m Oliver, I play bass. I’m Rob and I play the drums.
Where are you from?
We all went to the same school in Sittingbourne in Kent. It’s a small town in the Garden Of England just south of London. There’s little bits and bobs of scenes in Kent that we tagged along with.
How did you form?
(Jamie) I was working in a warehouse for two years because I decided I was bored with music and stopped for a bit, I was being a bit of a loner. And I just wanted to mess about again, so that’s why me and Ollie started messing about together…musically. We showed it to Rob, who’s the only drummer I know, and he showed it to his brother, who’s the only other person Rob knows, and that was it.
How varied is the music that you all listen to?
Pretty varied. We have stuff that we all relate to, like middle ground. Really obvious choices like Weezer, Nirvana; nineties bands that we all grew up with. And then everyone has their own little tastes.
How much touring have you done in the UK?
We’ve started doing a fair bit. We’ve done a tour with a band called Broken Hands, they’re Kent boys as well, great band. And then we’ve done a couple of our own headline shows; gradually building, going out, working hard.
Live4ever:
Surely SXSW was conceived as a paradox, much like Get Inuit themselves? Only Get Inuit’s particular peccadillo is one of the tougher ones to achieve in music. How to sound sincerely cynical. Simple, if you’re childlike and mature all at once.
It’s an extraordinary line to walk, especially when recording such fascinating records, that is unless you are a ‘narcissist’ (why would that help? more later). But achieve it they do, as on 2015’s powerful ‘Electrify’ or recent single, ‘My Oh My’. On these records, and others, they hit hard with the debauched, decadent intelligence of bands like Suede and My Bloody Valentine.
But this is subverted yet further by having a vocalist that, like bands such as Hibou or King Tuff, sounds infinitely more naive than it seems conceivable for a rock star to ever be. Only this time he’s British. In having this almost pre-pubescent Johnny Rotten, everything somehow sounds more urgent and powerful.
