We’re not up to International Standards!
While some bands take 5 years to recover from their first big hangover, Johannesburg alternative rockers The Black Hotels have taken the last half-decade to establish themselves as a credible force in the South African music industry, touring the country up and down, having their singles chart on national radio stations, and even being compared to the likes of Arcade Fire, REM and Interpol.
Gaining the plaudits
Just recently, they opened up for US sloshers (oops, I meant to say rockers. Or did I?) Kings of Leon on their South African tour. In fact, some even said that the local band seemed to capture the imagination of the crowds more than the international headliners. “It’s a huge compliment,” frontman John Boyd says. “If that’s the way people feel, that’s a good thing. I sometimes feel that South African bands aren’t always up to the standard of international acts. I think we try make out we’re a lot better than what we actually are. As soon as you’re on a circuit with top international bands, you realise why they’re where they are, [because] they rehearse, they’re tight, their songs are together, their musicianship is together… so, if people are saying that, it’s a great compliment… [but] I say that about ourselves, as well, I often don’t think The Black Hotels are up to scratch internationally, or to compete internationally.”
Not quite up to scratch
At this moment, I’m left slightly flabbergasted by John’s brutal honesty. I mean, really, a South African musician who doesn’t have his head up his own ass and thinks his band is beyond cool, due to every Cape Town blogger professing their love for their “amazballs” music in a badly written post? This surprises me. John explains in a winded conversation how he has seen bands like The Beats and New Model Army perform live, and how they just have a powerful presence on stage, and he isn’t sure that many South African bands measure up to that. Undoubtedly, I decide to probe, and ask him why he thinks The Black Hotels aren’t at that level and what he thinks they need to do to reach it.
“I think we need to write better songs. We need to be a lot tighter when we perform. We need to play more,” John says. “When you’re in America or Europe, you have a massive circuit. You can be busy all the time as a band. You can be playing and playing and playing. Whereas in South Africa, our circuit is very small. You basically have Johannesburg, Durban and Cape Town; you got a couple of things in between – but how many times are you going to play in Jo’burg a year? 15? 20? It’s too many times [for one city], I think. We don’t play enough. We’re not busy enough. If bands are really serious about their music [and want to make a living off of it] – especially if you’re an alternative band – you’ll need to make an effort to move to England or America, and find an agent, book shows, get on the road, playing and playing and building up a following.”
Local love
Whilst John is obviously looking for The Black Hotels to improve, the local folks already seem to be digging the band’s latest offering, Honey Badger, which has been described as an all-round great effort – even if it was a departure from the sound of their debut album, Films for the Next Century.
“It was a natural progression. Matthew [Fink] played a more prominent role on this album; as it was a lot more synth-driven. But we’re also influenced by many different kinds of music – anything from soul to reggae to punk to alternative ‘80s – so, the idea is that you don’t really want to make the same record over and over; you want to try new things. So, with that, we just thought let’s see what happens if we push the synthesiser a bit more and that’s what came out,” explains John.
In closing, I ask him what the key things are that he learnt from the Kings of Leon experience, as they prepare to write a new album in 2012. “Good songs will get you respect, recognition and an audience. The Black Hotels do this [perform and write], first and foremost, because we love playing music, but we always want to improve.”
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