Ronson Team Up

Dundonian pop bandits The View stormed 2009 with a new album, some hits singles and the odd moment of controversy or two.

Never ones to leave the bottle half empty, The View careered around Europe like a band possessed this year. Second album 'Which Bitch?' saw the band push the indie template until it cracked, adding in orchestras, folk rhythms and even the odd bit of rapping.

Alongside this the band pushed themselves to greater heights in the live arena. Always a group to give 110% The View found that sometimes it was difficult to match partying to the rigours of touring life.

Settling down in Liverpool to begin work on their new album, ClashMusic caught up with singer Kyle Falconer backstage at the Nordoff Robbins awards to talk about their plans.

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Kyle, how are you?
Good man.

Apparently the band have moved down to Liverpool, what brought this on?
The band's been living apart from each other for a while, but we'd always get back together to work in Dundee. But we've found there's just too much distraction in Dundee. We'd set up our equipment in this big aircraft hanger, locker type thing and it was just no use. It was great for skatingboarding on, and everybody was getting out their cars. It was good for skidding about on, but we couldn't get anything done. So we ended up moving to Liverpool to get more concentrated.

Did you enjoy life in London?
Yeah I loved it. I was there for three years, since we got signed. I had loads of pals down there, and it was great but recently it's been all smackheads in London.

How has life in Liverpool changed the band?
It's great! We've all been running. I'm not saying we haven't been getting drunk and shit, just being a bit more creative and working. Before, me and Kieran wouldn't see each other for months at a time then we'd come back and it'd be like "that's what I've brought" and then like elaborating on people's stuff. Recently it's been like the whole band sitting in a room and experimenting - the drummer playing the piano and loads of other different stuff.

Like back in the Doghouse in the early days?
Yeah yeah exactly.

Apparently you've got The Zutons living next door.
The Zutons have been rehearsing across the road from us, aye. Good lads, we see them shooting around on their bikes. We're just trying to be more cosmopolitan! (laughs). We got more than enough tracks for our new album, in fact we've got about three album's worth. Right now we're just trying to pick the best tracks and start rehearsing them, get them recorded. We've been trying to find different producers, we've been speaking to Youth who seems pretty good.

So you're not using Owen Morris again?
Owen has gone on a different path, he's just re-married again. Heard he's trying to get into politics which is a bit strange, like! But we're still keeping in touch, we're going to his wedding well he's had the wedding, he done it like on the sly but we're going to this big party he's organised - hired a big castle in Edinburgh as well.

Will you be playing?
Aye. Most likely!

There's also been a lot of rumours about you working with Mark Ronson?
He's just got like some tunes that Dave McCabe has been writing. I've been helping them out a wee bit.

So is it a Zutons project
It's Mark Ronson's project. A lot of people are involved and I'm one of them, so I just come out and like sing for them. He's dead nice, he's not very hands on in the studio - he'll just say what's going down. He's not the kind of producer that if you lived in a school singing he could tell if you were missing out a semi-tone or if you are missing some sort of minor scale he'll go "no you're getting it wrong". Sometimes when you're getting a bit pissed off he'll step in, he can be a bit sort of hands on I suppose, but he knows what's going down anyway. A lot of people kinda mess him but he's the nicest person in the world and he makes fucking fantastic records as well.

I've heard Owen Morris prefers to work on guitars, rather than your voice.
Owen just loves going over and over the guitars, and it never gets frustrating for us because it's like we wanted to be when we started out. We wanted to be like what Oasis sounded like so on 'Definitely Maybe' so it never gets frustrating for us.

Will you have a selection of producers for the third album?
I dunno, we're seing a few people at the moment - we're kind of being slappers to be honest! We'll need to see, there's a few people we've had in mind but we'll need to see what's happening.

Transcription by Lindsey White

clashmusic.com, 4th Deceber 2009