It’s almost forgivable to make cheap puns and golly-gosh-look-where-they-come-from remarks about the Delays; let’s face it, Southampton isn’t somewhere that springs to mind as a hotbed of musical talent. “But you never hear bands from Liverpool or Manchester being asked about their origins, do you?” says Aaron Gilbert, The Delays’ resident digital trickster, “Which obviously means that everyone thinks that Southampton is a shithole, right?” Maybe so, but ‘You See Colours’, their new magnum opus may just force a reappraisal of sorts. It’s a powerful blat of taut energy, a mile away from the pleasantries of their first album. We caught up with Aaron on the eve of their UK tour and the release of ‘Valentine’, the first single from the new album on Valentine’s day.
Happy Valentine’s Day! Did you get many cards?
Ah, happy Valentine’s Day, mate! I knew it was a deliberate thing.
Well, my excuse is that I’ve just moved… but I’m sure I wouldn’t have got any anyway.
‘Valentine’ is being released just after Valentine’s Day. Was this bad timing or a wry social commentary on the Hallmark Cards culture?
It was a very deliberate ploy not to release it on that day and be a cliché and be opportunistic. Our aunties thought it would be a fantastic idea if we released it today but we definitely did not want to do that.
You’ve had a very successful year – supporting the Pixies, playing the Isle of Wight festival… have you had a chance to sit back and take stock yet?
We actually haven’t, no. We went straight off and started recording the album in the studio It would be nice, but we haven’t had one minute to sit down and think, “Wow, we’ve just done that.” Hopefully we’ll get to it at some point this year and we’ll be glowing.
You’re kicking off a UK tour – what have you got lined up for the rest of 2006?
The rest of the year is basically gonna be touring and touring, but that’s going to change. Hopefully our set will too or people will get fucking bored. We’re off to Ireland tomorrow then back to the UK mainland – then off to Europe, America and Japan. So it’s going to be quite a cultural fest for us.
I gather you’re going to Miami for a video shoot?
I forgot about that! Yeah, as soon as we’re finished in the UK, we’re off to Miami to do the video for the next single, ‘You and Me’, which is gonna be great! The storyline is great too, although we did just see the word Miami and said, “Right, that’s the one.”
I understand that you wrote a lot of songs on the road… and then lost the only copy? (A similar thing happened when the recorder wiped the first version of this interview and it had to be re-done – The Curse of The Delays).
Right, yeah. That was my fault. I had about a hundred songs that we’d been working on a memory card, which I promptly lost. After which I became…bullied. And, er, abused. I don’t know that I can elaborate, I don’t know what sort of publication this is…
Are you worried that the songs will surface on eBay?
I’m going to have nightmares now, I hadn’t thought about that. I don’t
think that the person who finds them will have a clue what to do with them though. If they did – well, I’d probably just be flattered.
How different were the tracks from what you finally used?
They weren’t all that different. I’ve been using a lot of software synthesizers so they’re more weird and synthetic, but I’m also using some real nasty strings. Don’t know why, but I love it when people try and make a mock orchestra. So I’ve tried to do that a bit.
Making the first album was a famously taut experience. Was it more laid back this time around?
Yeah, it was. The first time around, Greg (Gilbert, Delays singer and brother of Aaron) was being a fucking twat – well, we say some really harsh things then fall out, then we’re friends five minutes later. The only time it got stressed this time was in the mixing process which is good, because he really pushes it – you know? He really pushes it for things that we maybe wouldn’t have done if we were rushing. We certainly took our time.
Two fighting brothers… you’re following the grand old tradition of the Sonics, the Kinks, Oasis…
Yeah, it’s becoming a bit of a cliché. But we’re perfectionists! We all want it to be the best it can be and Greg’s obsessive musically and eccentric. Which is good – it’d be boring if we were all sitting there going “That’s great, that’s great”
The new album is very punchy and powerful, and marks a real evolution for the band.
Well, it would have been boring to come back and do more of the same,
wouldn’t it? It wasn’t a conscious decision; when we made the first album we hadn’t done much touring and were developing as a band in the studio.
How do you think it’s going to be received?
Well, we couldn’t be happier with it. We made the album we wanted to make, more so than the first album. I don’t know – I want everyone to hear it, I want everyone to love it. You don’t get into a band to sell records, you get into a band to make music that people will love. I don’t want someone to listen to it and think “Yeah, that’s alright” – I want them to either fucking love it or hate it.
Now that you’re becoming touring veterans, what eccentric things do you have on your rider?
Ah yes. We insist on an air guitar on our rider – seriously – and a picture of the local mayor or dean, if we’re doing a university. Hang on, let me ask our tour manager… (Tour bus discussion ensues) No, apparently it got silly for a while, but it’s all very normal now.
‘You See Colours’ is out now.
Bad Horsey