The Dish - 16/01/06

INTERVIEW

Envy and Other Sins (a band who dress like titanic ship builders and have invented their own game, 'Pheasant') have just come off stage at the Brixton Windmill, and I'm sat with Jarvey and James (Keyboards and Drums) in their van outside the venue. Munching on McDonalds fruit pieces, we start the interview.

 

How do you think the gig went tonight?
Jarvey - There appeared to be different perspectives on that. Certainly fun, but technically not our best performance.

Purely down to the bass player?
(Technical troubles during the first couple of songs)

Jarvey - No, no, no! We were all responsible for fuck ups at some point. It was good fun though.

You're supporting okgo at the moment, how's the tour with them going?
Jarvey - Really good, they're friendly nice guys. Obviously they're a good band as you've heard, actually, as you're not hearing! There's a fair overlap between our stuff and theirs, so it's going really well. We're really enjoying ourselves.

Any plans for a headlining tour this year?
Jarvey - It's possible. We're hoping to put a new single out at the end of March/April. We haven't recorded it yet, that should have happened last year. We've been on the road fairly constantly since September, so we haven't had a chance to get anything recorded.

James - We like doing these supports. You get to play to people who wouldn't necessarily come to see you otherwise. And there are always loads of girls there.

 
I did notice the front few rows!
James - All in okgo T-Shirts!

What bands are you listening to at the moment? Any tips for this year?
Jarvey - Mark (bassist) got the Brakes album for Christmas, that's fun. Nothing terribly original, we're hardly on the cutting edge.
James - We Are Scientists, big fan of them.
Jarvey - I like the Mystery Jets single 'Alas Agnes', but I don't know any of their other stuff.
James - You don't want to pin your colours to them in case they're rubbish!
Jarvey - You can never tell, they could be a 'one not shit wonder'.
James - (Laughing) Arctic Monkeys, I've heard good things about them! 

Jump on the bandwagon!
Jarvey - There should be a veto on tipping the Arctic Monkeys because they've clearly already been successful. Unfortunately, being in a band, we spend all our time and money being in a band. It leaves us no time or money for checking out new bands and music and stuff.
James - Thank god for Zane Lowe, or we'd be completely cut off from the world!

Are there high hopes for pheasant to be included in the 2012 Olympics?
James - They're not high hopes, we were talking to the people on the council the other day and they said, "Yeah, man".
Jarvey - It was the Spark Hill and Spark Brook city council though.
Jarvey - It's more of a summer sport, pheasant. It went down very well at the festivals over the summer. I hope there'll be more sightings this summer.

Will there be a World Championship this year?
James - The pheasants seem to be striking their revenge on us! We did our single launch at Bush Hall, and on the way down we hit a pheasant at 70mph!

Surely a sign?
James - We might as well have shot the albatross we saw earlier on. And then my van got hit by some woman, and it turned out she lives in Pheasant Road. I don't think they respect the way we're using their name.

Rename the Sport?
James - Fuck the Pheasants!
Jarvey - That's a headline! It could be a tagline on the website!

Related to the style of your band, do you think Hillary really conquered Everest?

James - Do you think he cheated? (Laughing) That's the best question we've had so far in an interview.

Jarvey - I'm fairly confidant that being British, he couldn't possibly have lied and cheated his way to the top. That's not what the empire was built of!

Which member of the band is most likely to fall foul of the trappings of fame?
Both - Mark.

He was a quiet chap on stage. Was he hiding something?
James - He was, his bass! Or lack of.
Jarvey - His guilt.
James - He certainly gets the most female attention already. He's got a sexual (air/heir) to his throne.

Have you seen girls taking off okgo T-Shirts in front of him?

Jarvey - They never do it in front of us. There have been rumours. We went to a lovely burlesque evening last year. He ended up in a hot tub with two burlesque girls next to him. And I think there were prawns involved. None of us have got that in their veins.

James - Rock just flows through Mark.

Jarvey - Mark is just a thoroughfare of Rock.

James - A rock conduit.

 

What do you insist on for your rider?

Jarvey - The true rider is whatever we get.

James - Our actual rider does feature earl grey tea bags, port and real ales. We've only had that once.

Jarvey - It was good when it happened.

James - But then we discovered that nobody likes earl grey. Slight error we made there.

 

Any of the band ever had a run in with the law?

James - I got credit black listed for not paying a bus fine when I was 16. Which is all fun and games now until I try and get a mortgage!

 

If I told that to Pete Doherty, he'd be impressed!

James - Don't even look at me Pete!

Jarvey - We do have diplomatic immunity though, so that helps.

 

Would you take a bullet for her majesty?

James - In the leg, a flesh wound.

Jarvey - Or a buttock.

James - I would happily take a bullet in the buttock, provided it wasn't travelling too fast. A slow moving ricochet that barely bruised me.

Jarvey - Potato gun?

James - I would definitely take a spud gun to the arse for her majesty. For King and Country.

I can see MBE's coming up!
Any suggestions for how to cope with yob culture in British Youth?
Jarvey - Penal servitude. If you just send them to Australia. It's worked in the past. It would give Australia culture, though yob culture. I've got family in Australia so I can say that.
James - Just kill them.

Kill yob culture. Anything in a hoodie...?
James - Not necessarily. I own a hoodie and I don't deserve to be killed. Just, you know, if you do something wrong, then you die.

An eye for an eye?
James - An eye for a dead.
Jarvey - We're currently parked on a double yellow line by the way. So I'm gonna kill Jim now.

 

What's on the horizon for Envy and Other Sins? Album plans?
Jarvey - Hopefully if we can get in the studio. We've played a lot, so we'd like to get an album down and out, for discerning members of the public to turn a deaf ear to.

James - We never seem to get a chance to sit down as a band and record. Just five minutes to do that would be very satisfying.