Interview with Kieren before the band set out for Brazil earlier in the month
The View promise to burn São Paulo this Sunday!“The View, The View, The View are on fire!” During their recent headline performance at the HMV Forum, the customary homage to Dundee´s wunderkinds is belted out through London´s new music hub. The View never chased commercial success or acclaim, allowing their songs and faithful of fans to speak for them. That D.I.Y spirit put these roguish teenagers on the NME cover and led to huge worldwide sales as well as ever growing festival and gig performances.
And so it goes that they find themselves invited to play their most exotic shows yet – a trip to Brazil to showcase the UK´s ever interesting indie scene. The British Council´s Incubator Project aims to bring the most exhilarating of these bands to Latin America, to celebrate their independence from major labels and keep the exchange of art at the cutting edge. The View are absolutely in the spirit of the project.
Bassist Kieran Webster tells Incubator just how much the trip excites the foursome in this exclusive interview direct from the UK:
How thrilled are the band to be visiting and playing shows in Brazil? Is this your first trip to Latin America?
“Brazil is the one country I always wanted to go to. We can´t wait, we´re so excited. We have toured the USA, Australia and Japan before but never South America. Japan was completely different. I knew nothing about the culture before we went and now I absolutely love it. Hopefully Brazil will be even better.”
Do you know of a fan base for the band in Brazil? What are you expecting at the shows?“We don´t know too much about the trip. Our manager said to us we had an offer to go to Brazil and we were like ´F*#$ eh…let´s go!´ I didn´t think we had any fans in Brazil! We will put on good shows, the best show we have, and hopefully people will come and have a good time.”
How familiar are the View with Brazilian music and the indie rock scene?“We don´t know much about Brazilian music. We´ll definitely check out the local bands. I want to see traditional Brazilian music: I will take back instruments and some techniques. I want to learn, to check everything. We´ve seen footage of the White Stripes playing on the beach: that´s made us excited.”
You call yourselves ´teenage upstarts from Dundee´, how does it feel to be invited to perform in places like Sao Paulo?“It´s pretty cool. It´s a great opportunity that we get paid to travel the world. We appreciate the opportunity Incubator and all in Brazil have laid on so much. We´re just going to go for it…I´m pretty good at keeping out of trouble.”
You have just finished a huge tour through Europe, how did that go and what stood out for the band?“We supported Mando Diao, who is huge in Europe. We played a mixture of club shows and festivals. The best reaction was in Amsterdam, as it always is, which means we can go back a few times a year, which is awesome. The highlight was probably snowboarding in the Austrian Alps around the Snowbombing Festival.”
You kept your fans updated throughout the European Tour with a diary blog, will you be doing the same for this journey?“We will definitely be keeping a blog throughout the Brazilian trip. Our guitar tech wrote our European tour blog on the website. I would love to do it but I haven´t got a clue how…I don´t know how to use a computer! We really want to include everyone in our adventures.”
´Which Bitch (the View´s second album) was more varied than your debut ´Hats Off to the Busker´ – mixing orchestral, punky, and slower folk numbers – how will you recreate the songs with strings live? What direction is the third album heading in - will you be playing any new material in Brazil?“(I´m) Not sure what direction we´ll be going in with the third album. It´s all over the place like ´Which Bitch´. We´ll see what happens when we start recording. We´re just going to rehearsals and doing demos right now. When we´re playing in the UK we can afford to pay for strings for the tracks but we´ll play punked up versions of the songs in Brazil…we have no money to take strings to South America.”
Following the Coca Cola rock festival in Porto Alegre you travel to Sao Paulo to play the show for the Incubator Project. Have you got any special plans for the shows and what do you think the reaction will be? “We just want a big party with crazy costumes…Brazilian style. We´re not planning anything out of the ordinary…we´ll do a proper View show, really well. We´ll rock it and then have a big party after. The usual craziness: nothing changes – the View show will hopefully kick off in to a big party, Brazilians and us together.”
Will you have a chance to check out more of Brazil outside of the gig schedule?“We would love to check out Rio. I want to get to the beach and the big statue!”
Finally, have you got a message for the audience in Sao Paulo?“Just to expect a good show…come and show us a good time and we´ll give you a performance to remember.”
Following the hugely successful tour by Transgressive Records, who brought leading lights Young Knives and Johnny Flynn to Santiago, Buenos Aires and Sao Paulo, The View will play a one-off June show in Brazil´s sprawling metropolis to preview what music fans through Latin America can expect from the Incubator Project in 2009. The planned line-up is something special indeed.
The View´s live performance showcases their raucous and completely infectious brand of rock n roll. We caught a preview of the Brazilian adventure at the last of four May UK dates at the Forum in Kentish Town, London. A sweaty, beer soaked audience moshed and sang along to modern classics from ´Wasted Little DJs´ to ´Skag Trendy´, before the carnival atmosphere was wrapped up with a riotous trio including their biggest hit ´Same Jeans´. The View are primed for Brazil, but is Brazil ready for them?
Incubator Music, 2nd June 2009
Highlights from The View's performance last night at Glastonbury.
...Friend and singer with The View's Kyle Falconer thinks that ‘Pete’s a bit hard to speak to sometimes because he’s always got a lot going on, but he’s a great guy when you get to know him. The press talk up his bad points and they follow him about all the time, but I don’t think he cares who knows what about him. He just does his own thing.’...
See photos of The View's performance at Isle of Wight Festivall 2009 here.
