Yorkshire rockers The Kaiser Chiefs release their new album on 26th February:
A new kind of Chief's in town
Kaisers ... 'we wanted to prove a lot of people wrong'
Ricky Wilson - lead vocals, tambourine, cow bell
Andrew 'Whitey' White - guitar
Simon Rix - bass guitar
Nick Hodgson - drums, backing vocals
Nick 'Peanut' Baines - keyboards
By SIMON COSYNS
FEBRUARY 16, 2007
KAISER CHIEFS
Yours Truly, Angry Mob
Rating - 4.5 (out of 5)
HE confesses to curling up in front of Midsomer Murders and worries that “people will think I’m a saddo!”
He’s charming, funny, engaging, not too modest, not too arrogant, but Ricky Wilson is fed up with being called Rock’s Mr Nice Guy.
The Kaiser Chiefs singer says: “We’ve always been portrayed as being nice guys and when you get tarred with that brush, people think they can walk all over you.
“It’s such a blow to them when they find out we’re not like that. We’re a gang and I think we’re quite intimidating.”
He is discussing new Kaisers song My Kind Of Guy, which he says is “about knowing what you want and getting it”.
It’s one of the take-no-prisoners tracks on their second album, Yours Truly, Angry Mob, which finds Ricky and Co with any number of big issues to get off their chests.
Let’s just say it’s time to say goodbye to the smiley faces and stripy blazers that arrived with monster-selling debut Employment and welcome the new, meaner, moodier Kaiser Chiefs.
The five-piece from Leeds are back with a bold new musical vision, packing stadium-sized riffs and mazey synths into songs that retain trademark singalong choruses and incisive writing.
Always been portrayed as nice guys ... Kaisers
Two songs in particular see them railing against the blandness and mediocrity apparent in Britain in 2007 — The Angry Mob and Everything Is Average Nowadays.
I ask Ricky who exactly the angry mob are and discover they are you and me — people who read newspapers every day, including The Sun.
He says: “Actually, they’re the kind of people who believe everything they read. The Press like to keep us panicked.
“Bernard Matthews (turkey producer whose turkeys have bird flu) destroys the United Kingdom — who’d have thought it? It’s like the Marshmallow Man destroying New York City.
“But I’m not looking over this going ‘Tut, tut, why are these people believing in everything?’ I do it just as much as the next man.
“Of course, I believe everything I read about Lindsay Lohan, and everything about Pete Doherty is definitely true.”
:On Everything Is Average Nowadays the Kaisers hit back at some of the music dominating the charts, which, they feel, represents the bland leading he bland.
Ricky, 32, says: “Music’s weird at the moment because you see bands conquering America and being the biggest in Britain based on the sole fact that they are bland. Basically, if it’s bland enough, more people will buy it.
“The gap between the underground and the mainstream is being watered down. Nothing is shocking any more.
“You see bands on the front of NME looking ridiculous and you walk down the high street and they’re in the window of HMV.”
New album ... Yours truly, Angry Mob
Ricky also believes it’s not just about the music and says: “It’s everything. If you go out to dinner, it’s average. If you see a new building, it’s average.
“A hundred years ago, buildings could take 25 years to build and were spectacular. Now, if a new building pops up on the outskirts of town, it looks like a furniture warehouse.”
I wonder if he thinks Kaiser Chiefs are managing to stick two fingers up at mainstream music, keeping things interesting while still selling shedloads of records.
Ricky says: “We’re trying to address the balance — at least we’re giving it a go. And there’s nothing wrong with selling lots of records.
“It just means getting our music across to more people.”
He won’t be drawn on which bands really annoy him, saying:
“I don’t really think most of them deserve having me slagging them off.
“It just gives them more column inches in your newspapers.
In any case, we’ve also got the best person to do it and that is Liam Gallagher. He’s brilliant at it and I’ll leave it to him. I usually agree with everything he says.”
But there’s a big difference between Ricky and the younger, louder Gallagher, and he adds: “Liam doesn’t give a s**t. I wish I could say I don’t give a s**t but I do. I think he’s got a thicker skin.”
So does criticism upset him? “No, not really. The only thing that p***es me off is that you really have a right to reply. You’d be ringing up every journalist that had been s**tty about you, like waging a war.”
It’s been a meteoric rise for the Kaisers and I can’t help pressing Ricky on how he copes with the trappings of fame in his home town of Leeds. Is a stroll outside a bit like if the Gallaghers decided to saunter through the Arndale Centre in Manchester?
He says: “I think most people in the Arndale Centre look like the Gallaghers. They’d just blend in.
“And the good thing is that I can go out in Leeds and do what the hell I like. I could fall out into the gutter and not appear in the pages of the papers.”
It’s a healthy state of affairs for a band leader who can hold the festival thousands in his sway. He’s also untroubled by the so-called “pressure” of producing a second album in the wake of Employment’s towering success.
Say goodbye ... to the smiley faces and stripey blazers
“We don’t have a hard time writing songs. Some blokes write an album every year, some every two. It’s only like 12 or 13 songs and it’s not as if we have anything else to do.”
Ardent fans will be keen to know how much material was considered for Yours Truly, Angry Mob.
Ricky explains: “We tend to have quality control as we go along. We don’t just finish 80 songs but we did record about 20 with no pressure from outside.
“Like the first album, the only pressure that spurred us on was the desire to do the album. We wanted to prove wrong those who thought we only had one album in us.”
The album was recorded in the sumptuous surroundings of historic Hook End Manor in Berkshire. The website for the studios says: “This beautiful house boasts 11 superb bedrooms, one with a four-poster bed, seven bathrooms (four en suite) and is set within 25 acres of wonderful English countryside.
“There is a gym, heated swimming pool, tennis court, snooker and pool rooms. This facility really needs to be seen to be believed!”
I ask Ricky how he found it. “When we did our first album, I thought the studio was the best place in the whole world.
But this was more the manor house style. I grew a big curly moustache!
“And I liked driving my Mini around Henley. I’d pick up my girlfriend and we’d hire a boat. I’d say to her, ‘I might even treat you to an ice cream.’”
Ricky says the band realised the need to move on. “In the first place, our songs were done in front of a couple of hundred people, then it was a couple of thousand, then we started headlining festivals.
“If you want to fill these spaces, you’ve got to entertain people and you become a bigger and better band.
“You discover that you enjoy rocking out more.”
With typically refreshing honesty, he also dispels three Kaisers myths:
Americans think the band are desperate to crack America. Ricky says: “It’s not America we’re interested in. It’s more the world!”
Ricky doesn’t follow Leeds United that much. He says: “I don’t really understand it (football). When I’m with a group of fellas I’ll try to talk about it.”
After Employment, the band will do one more album, then retire. Ricky says: “You might get to the point where you can’t be bothered but the next day you’d realise you were having the time of your life.”
Finally, I ask Ricky the question that, apparently, every interviewer has asked him recently — who is this Ruby in the new hit single? He says he gives a different answer to everyone but this one is the TRUTH.
“You see someone and you like them, then there’s that gap between seeing them and getting to know them or finding out their name, where it’s literally perfect and anything could happen.”
So was Ruby a real person? “Er, no. All the names have been changed to protect the innocent.”
The single, Ruby, is released on Monday. Yours Truly, Angry Mob is out on February 26.
thesun.co.uk
A new kind of Chief's in town
Kaisers ... 'we wanted to prove a lot of people wrong'
Ricky Wilson - lead vocals, tambourine, cow bell
Andrew 'Whitey' White - guitar
Simon Rix - bass guitar
Nick Hodgson - drums, backing vocals
Nick 'Peanut' Baines - keyboards
FEBRUARY 16, 2007
KAISER CHIEFS
Yours Truly, Angry Mob
Rating - 4.5 (out of 5)
HE confesses to curling up in front of Midsomer Murders and worries that “people will think I’m a saddo!”
He’s charming, funny, engaging, not too modest, not too arrogant, but Ricky Wilson is fed up with being called Rock’s Mr Nice Guy.
The Kaiser Chiefs singer says: “We’ve always been portrayed as being nice guys and when you get tarred with that brush, people think they can walk all over you.
“It’s such a blow to them when they find out we’re not like that. We’re a gang and I think we’re quite intimidating.”
He is discussing new Kaisers song My Kind Of Guy, which he says is “about knowing what you want and getting it”.
It’s one of the take-no-prisoners tracks on their second album, Yours Truly, Angry Mob, which finds Ricky and Co with any number of big issues to get off their chests.
Let’s just say it’s time to say goodbye to the smiley faces and stripy blazers that arrived with monster-selling debut Employment and welcome the new, meaner, moodier Kaiser Chiefs.
The five-piece from Leeds are back with a bold new musical vision, packing stadium-sized riffs and mazey synths into songs that retain trademark singalong choruses and incisive writing.
Always been portrayed as nice guys ... Kaisers
Two songs in particular see them railing against the blandness and mediocrity apparent in Britain in 2007 — The Angry Mob and Everything Is Average Nowadays.
I ask Ricky who exactly the angry mob are and discover they are you and me — people who read newspapers every day, including The Sun.
He says: “Actually, they’re the kind of people who believe everything they read. The Press like to keep us panicked.
“Bernard Matthews (turkey producer whose turkeys have bird flu) destroys the United Kingdom — who’d have thought it? It’s like the Marshmallow Man destroying New York City.
“But I’m not looking over this going ‘Tut, tut, why are these people believing in everything?’ I do it just as much as the next man.
“Of course, I believe everything I read about Lindsay Lohan, and everything about Pete Doherty is definitely true.”
:On Everything Is Average Nowadays the Kaisers hit back at some of the music dominating the charts, which, they feel, represents the bland leading he bland.
Ricky, 32, says: “Music’s weird at the moment because you see bands conquering America and being the biggest in Britain based on the sole fact that they are bland. Basically, if it’s bland enough, more people will buy it.
“The gap between the underground and the mainstream is being watered down. Nothing is shocking any more.
“You see bands on the front of NME looking ridiculous and you walk down the high street and they’re in the window of HMV.”
New album ... Yours truly, Angry Mob
Ricky also believes it’s not just about the music and says: “It’s everything. If you go out to dinner, it’s average. If you see a new building, it’s average.
“A hundred years ago, buildings could take 25 years to build and were spectacular. Now, if a new building pops up on the outskirts of town, it looks like a furniture warehouse.”
I wonder if he thinks Kaiser Chiefs are managing to stick two fingers up at mainstream music, keeping things interesting while still selling shedloads of records.
Ricky says: “We’re trying to address the balance — at least we’re giving it a go. And there’s nothing wrong with selling lots of records.
“It just means getting our music across to more people.”
He won’t be drawn on which bands really annoy him, saying:
“I don’t really think most of them deserve having me slagging them off.
“It just gives them more column inches in your newspapers.
In any case, we’ve also got the best person to do it and that is Liam Gallagher. He’s brilliant at it and I’ll leave it to him. I usually agree with everything he says.”
But there’s a big difference between Ricky and the younger, louder Gallagher, and he adds: “Liam doesn’t give a s**t. I wish I could say I don’t give a s**t but I do. I think he’s got a thicker skin.”
So does criticism upset him? “No, not really. The only thing that p***es me off is that you really have a right to reply. You’d be ringing up every journalist that had been s**tty about you, like waging a war.”
It’s been a meteoric rise for the Kaisers and I can’t help pressing Ricky on how he copes with the trappings of fame in his home town of Leeds. Is a stroll outside a bit like if the Gallaghers decided to saunter through the Arndale Centre in Manchester?
He says: “I think most people in the Arndale Centre look like the Gallaghers. They’d just blend in.
“And the good thing is that I can go out in Leeds and do what the hell I like. I could fall out into the gutter and not appear in the pages of the papers.”
It’s a healthy state of affairs for a band leader who can hold the festival thousands in his sway. He’s also untroubled by the so-called “pressure” of producing a second album in the wake of Employment’s towering success.
Say goodbye ... to the smiley faces and stripey blazers
“We don’t have a hard time writing songs. Some blokes write an album every year, some every two. It’s only like 12 or 13 songs and it’s not as if we have anything else to do.”
Ardent fans will be keen to know how much material was considered for Yours Truly, Angry Mob.
Ricky explains: “We tend to have quality control as we go along. We don’t just finish 80 songs but we did record about 20 with no pressure from outside.
“Like the first album, the only pressure that spurred us on was the desire to do the album. We wanted to prove wrong those who thought we only had one album in us.”
The album was recorded in the sumptuous surroundings of historic Hook End Manor in Berkshire. The website for the studios says: “This beautiful house boasts 11 superb bedrooms, one with a four-poster bed, seven bathrooms (four en suite) and is set within 25 acres of wonderful English countryside.
“There is a gym, heated swimming pool, tennis court, snooker and pool rooms. This facility really needs to be seen to be believed!”
I ask Ricky how he found it. “When we did our first album, I thought the studio was the best place in the whole world.
But this was more the manor house style. I grew a big curly moustache!
“And I liked driving my Mini around Henley. I’d pick up my girlfriend and we’d hire a boat. I’d say to her, ‘I might even treat you to an ice cream.’”
Ricky says the band realised the need to move on. “In the first place, our songs were done in front of a couple of hundred people, then it was a couple of thousand, then we started headlining festivals.
“If you want to fill these spaces, you’ve got to entertain people and you become a bigger and better band.
“You discover that you enjoy rocking out more.”
With typically refreshing honesty, he also dispels three Kaisers myths:
Americans think the band are desperate to crack America. Ricky says: “It’s not America we’re interested in. It’s more the world!”
Ricky doesn’t follow Leeds United that much. He says: “I don’t really understand it (football). When I’m with a group of fellas I’ll try to talk about it.”
After Employment, the band will do one more album, then retire. Ricky says: “You might get to the point where you can’t be bothered but the next day you’d realise you were having the time of your life.”
Finally, I ask Ricky the question that, apparently, every interviewer has asked him recently — who is this Ruby in the new hit single? He says he gives a different answer to everyone but this one is the TRUTH.
“You see someone and you like them, then there’s that gap between seeing them and getting to know them or finding out their name, where it’s literally perfect and anything could happen.”
So was Ruby a real person? “Er, no. All the names have been changed to protect the innocent.”
The single, Ruby, is released on Monday. Yours Truly, Angry Mob is out on February 26.
thesun.co.uk