Chords for Biffy Clyro speak to Kerrang! Radio (Part 1)

_ _ _ _ Biffy Clyro, welcome [Ab] to Carangue Radio.
How are we doing Jake?
I'm alright, how are you?
Great, thank you brother.
Thanks for getting up this early in the morning.
I know, it's unnatural.
Certainly not the way we exist, it's unnatural.
I know, [F] well I spend every day doing it and it hurts me.
Oh man, you have that shadow man look in your eyes. _
Like I'm a bit broken, yeah.
Well I guess you haven't been used to it all of last year
because you pretty much declared you were taking the year off to give everyone a break.
Yes, exactly that.
[Gb] I made sure I wasn't up before [G] midday any day of last year, such is my wont.
But yeah, we took some time off, yeah it was kind of a conscious decision really wasn't it?
But it ended up going on a few months longer than we'd anticipated
and I think [E] our hunger to get back out there just started to grow and grow
so we ended up being quite frustrated that we'd wasted so much time.
It's not wasted, it's not wasted.
Well thank you.
Recharging the batteries is needed.
It's essential Jake, it is and I think we're [G] glad we did it now actually.
At the time it felt like, let's go and make the record
but now it's like, you know what, we're happy that we chilled out for a bit.
I think we needed that long lie.
What did you do with yourselves?
Did you just spend time with the family and just hang out at home?
Yeah, all those things that are fairly boring but an important part of life.
I mean our families aren't boring.
_ _ _ You just get that on record.
I mean you entertain yourself when you can, you know, pick wisely.
No, it took a few months just kind of lying on the sofa,
scratching our heads and wondering what to [Gb] do
but yeah, I think like Si said, I think it was an important time to recharge
and kind of get the hunger back.
The only difficult thing was watching other bands go out and play [Abm] shows
and play festivals and really feeling we wanted to be a part of it.
Yeah.
Did you go out and watch any other bands yourself?
No.
_ I don't think we did.
I mean, did we go to any shows?
I saw a few shows in Glasgow.
I'm going to see Marmoset.
They seem to be in Glasgow every bloody week.
[C] Great band.
I think I saw Deaf Heaven round about that time.
[Abm] We went to see Mineral, one of our favourite, in fact I don't even know when that was actually
but it feels like last year.
Mineral, one of our first serious influences as a band.
They got back together and we kind of reminisced at that.
We were like, oh!
_ We were so young once.
Things got [G] a bit emotional.
Yeah, yeah, as they [Eb] should at all good gigs.
So what happened then when you decided to get back in the studio, get back writing again?
How did that all come about?
When was that?
Well, I guess that's a constant kind of thing.
We don't like to stop creating and to be honest it was the first [G] time
where I didn't feel very inspired for the coming off tour after Opposites.
So that was kind of what slowed us down.
There was no point in us rushing and just writing songs for the sake of it.
We had to feel that there was something special there.
So it took a few months to get the first handful of songs.
I went to California with my missus and just kind of recorded in a few studios
and wrote some songs with some friends just to try and kind of clear the tubes,
clear the [Eb] pipes, as they say, not to get too medical.
_ And then when I got back home we kind of started playing a few of the songs around
and they just felt right and it felt like time.
It's kind of strange.
It's like there's an inner alarm clock that kind of says, right, you know,
you're ready to kind of create and you can't really _ set it by yourself,
which is frustrating.
And as I say, that was the first time we'd ever had a backlog of ideas.
So it was a wee bit of a struggle for a few months.
Oh, well, and you got back into it and you did amazingly well
because the album went number one.
Yeah, unbelievable.
I know, still, we're not too big to say that we really appreciate that.
[Ab] It means, you know, it's not why you make the music,
but it sure as hell makes you feel good [Gb] when you kind of hear it.
And especially with the way the charts are these days, you know,
it's just so full of the same kind of pop nonsense.
So it's quite nice to kind of edge some of that out.
I was wondering, actually, I was going to get onto this later,
but it feels like a good time now.
What do you guys actually think of the state of music at the moment?
Because, I mean, this is pop nonsense,
but one of your fellow countrymen, Calvin Harris, has recently just said
he's never going to make an album again, just do singles.
Right.
I think there's different areas of music, really.
You know, someone like Calvin, and I'm sure he'll be the first to admit,
I mean, it's about the songs, it's about having a summer hit and all that.
And the way that people are kind of consuming that,
but the streaming, you know, there's not as quick a turnaround
because people listen to a song for, I don't know, like 180 times in a row.
You know what it's like when you're really young,
you just keep pressuring, repeat.
But for us, the art form of the album and everything,
it's a different, hopefully we inhabit a different space than that.
And, you know, it's kind of up to the bands and the artists [Eb] out there
to make people still [Gb] be interested in albums and [Ab] things
and make sure that every song in the album is the best thing you've ever done.
And, you know, and don't just put filler on there.
But, you know, I can understand Calvin's idea.
But [Eb] the thing is, like Drake apparently has just broken, like,
the number one record, you know, longer than Wait, Wait, Wait or something.
I don't think I've even heard the song.
And that's where the disconnect is.
Like, how can a song be number one that probably all of, well, maybe,
I don't know if you guys have, you know, never heard the number one.
And that's when you know it's a wee [F] bit weird.
It's like, who's listening to this nonsense thing?
It's just all the streaming, isn't it?
Which is kind of confusing things.
But yet you've managed to do it based predominantly on physical sales.
Which is incredible.
Yeah, thank you.
I mean, we're really lucky that, I guess we are [E] fortunate that we kind of started
just when the internet was really kicking off in terms of a place to get your music.
And [Eb] so we do have people that kind of want to complete the collection and things.
And we're very appreciative of that.
And we really go as far as we can with artwork and everything
to make it worth people's while.
But the world is definitely changing.
But as I say, I think it's up to the art that you present.
If you present something good enough and that's a complete package,
then people will be interested, you know.
Well, let's get back to Ellipsis now.
When you guys write songs, what are you thinking about?
Are you going out to deliberately create the most catchy hooks known to mankind?
[Em] Or does that just come with your style? _
Fortunately, that kind of just seems to happen, I guess.
You know, [Gb] again, last year, the problem when I started trying to write the songs
was I [F] was thinking about the big shows and all that.
I was thinking, right, I need to write a song that fits this festival or something.
And we've never written songs like that.
And you can tell when something's forced.
So thankfully, we actually threw some hooks away.
We had a funny conversation with a Richard producer.
And he was like, we said there was too many [E] hooks in this song.
He's going, you can't have too many hooks.
We're like, you can't have too many hooks.
So we ended up using just the four hooks in the song instead of five.
But I think that our history of growing [F] up on melodic rock music still influences.
So those hooks are there, I guess.
It's good to know [E] you've got some in the back pocket.
[Gm] Yeah, exactly.
If you want a hook, give us a call, [Gb] guys.
We've got a hook in here for you.
That's it, yeah.
In the future, you can just start selling hooks.
Just have your house in Malibu and just sell hooks.
Just three or four words and [Gm] just one.
And we do do do do do do.
Millionaire.
Watch the [Eb] royalties roll in.
So I want to play Howl now.
It's your current single.
Do you guys want to introduce it?
Give us the backstory on what it's all about.
Yeah, Howl is one of those songs I wrote in California.
There was a couple of those songs that I thought were too good to not put in the record.
And the boys really agreed.
So Howl was one of them.
And it's about losing control of yourself and not recognizing who you are,
but seeing it coming, wishing you could stop yourself, be a certain, you know, control yourself, I guess.
And it's probably the poppiest moment in the album.
Oh, yeah.
Oh, yeah.
A bit 50s going on here.
Snap your fingers, guys.
Let's get it on.
_ _ _ _ [N] _