Erotic Secrets of Pompeii Chat New Album At Rough Trade Launch Show

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We chat to Erotic Secrets of Pompeii at Bristol’s Rough Trade, for the album launch show of ‘Pitchfork Libra’

After a last-minute merch/vinyl crisis, me and Erotic Secrets of Pompeii sat in the darkened side of Bristol’s Rough Trade ahead of their album launch show for ‘Pitchfork Libra,’ out now. I found the band eager, excited, and champing at the bit to get going. 

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I’ve just got into your band, what have I missed?

Thomas Hawtin: 5 years of hardship, the release of our debut album, and before that we had an EP. We’ve just released a new album, so you haven’t missed that!  The heartache, the toil, new band members. Endless touring.  Lots of fun with lots of experimentation, becoming better musicians 

Is it intense when you have to play a new song in front of a crowd for the first time?

Tom Hackwell: That is actually a very incredibly apt question, as we have four new tracks that we have never played in front of a crowd before to play tonight and the build-up to that has been intense.

Thomas: We can concoct these things in the studio then have to figure out a way to play them live, that is the rollercoaster. It’s intense for me in many different ways, as I have to remember the lyrics. I struggle right up until the end of the recording, we are crossing things out, and sometimes you realise that you’re practising the wrong lyrics and have to start again! 

So when you’re writing the lyrics, do you ever think “how am I going to sing this?“

Thomas: Usually we start with demos and I sing over those and it usually works, but there are definitely times when someone else brings a demo in. When Tom brings a demo in and sometimes it’s out of my range, so sometimes we’ll have to change the key or get these guys who are better singers than me to hit the high notes. We are very different singers. They are like maleficent angels.

Tom: The thing that I would struggle with in your shoes is the copious amount of words to remember, there are A LOT of words.

Thomas: My setlist for tonight is covered with little with notes and little reminders. 

Do the lyrics inform the music or is it vice versa when you’re writing?

Thomas: Every song is a bit different; it’s a bit of both but if it starts with a musical demo, I’ll sift through my books of old poems and ideas.  Sometimes the music is written before the lyrics and it will inspire a vibe or a particular image. For ‘Ten Ton Delirium‘, I’d always wanted to write a song about the dancing plague and I was waiting for the right tune. Tom dishes out demos and this one turned up, and it acted as a springboard for the ideas that I already had of a medieval fever dance.

How long have the songs on the new album been around? Is it old material that you developed, or is it all fresh for the new album?

Thomas: So, the first song that was released from the album, ‘The Hand That Did the Deed,’ was released mid-last year. We released that as a bit of a placeholder between albums, but we knew that it may end up on the album as well. So that must be one of the oldest songs we have.

Tom: Nothing is really older than two or three years, but with the first album there was a lot of material that we were playing around with for a long time.

Thomas: The original demo for ‘The Hand That Did The Deed’ was written by Jules our old bass player when he was 18 so it’s been around a very long time. 

Jake, tell us about the drums on the album.

Jake Cheeseman: Everyone loves drums!  I think on this album there are lots of different influences from different styles, such as afrobeat and also some live dance music things like Louis Cole and The Prodigy, I’ve watched a lot of live videos of them, so it was a case of creating those sounds acoustically and fitting them into our sound.

Thomas: This album has definitely got more of your personality and fingerprints in the sound. 

So you guys are off to Europe next? That’s exciting isn’t it!

Thomas: Yes, we did it this time last year and I’m really excited about doing it again. We’ve got some new venues that we haven’t done before in Switzerland and Croatia. Last year we did Italy, Germany and France and we’re doing those again but different places within them. We’re headed we’re heading to Milan, it’s very exciting and we can’t wait to do it,

Tom: The build-up to this show and the new album coming out has been so exciting so once this is done, we can properly look forward to the tour ahead.

Listen to ‘Pitchfork Libra’ here:

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