“I’d been doing Death In Vegas solidly since I was at art school,” says Richard.

“Because I was doing the artwork and the videos, it felt like it was taking over my life. I didn’t feel like there was anything else. Everything got a bit heavy. Our tour manager died while we were on the road. I just needed to step away from it, which was at least part of the reason I went to New York. When I got there, I went to college, to study large-format photography, which has been a big influence on this record.”

Some of Richard’s darkroom favourites include Alec Soth, Joel Meyerowitz, Stephen Shore, Philip-Lorca deCorcia, William Eggleston, Larry Clark and Diane Arbus. He explains how studying influenced his music:

“Desolate Americana landscape work was mainly what I was taking and doing a lot of traveling on the road. This always has an effect on me musically as your traveling such long distances, thinking so much.

These huge panoramic views go on forever, Long songs which are not over-crowded with music that it giveS you space for visual thought. I think there’s always been that sense of space in my music, like that open expanse of light you don’t get anywhere else but in those wide open spaces. I think it’s in all the music I like, and those great American photographers I like.”

However Richard believes you have to go way back to the 60‘s to find examples of bands that mix music with stunning visuals to produce exciting live shows. “I think you’d have to go back to Grateful Dead and early Pink Floyd. [I] can’t think of anyone who’s blown me away with a visual performance. Lots of people spending shit loads of money but the visuals are just crap.
But as for record covers I think it would have to be Robert Frank’s cover for Exile on Mainstreet. I would spend hours looking at it when I was a kid, the edgy Americana photography interspersed with band imagery; it just looked so fucking cool. In fact the photo that I shot inside the cover of Scorpio Rising was a direct homage to that sleeve.”

Having worked with a host of guest vocalists on earlier albums Fearless was keen that the new release wouldn’t be bogged down by the cult of celebrity. “I was sick of getting questions about what it was like to work with Iggy (Pop) and Liam (Gallagher)  and felt like that overshadowed Scorpio Rising. Obviously it was fantastic to work with such people but it wasn’t all the records were about. So yes I decided to hand in an instrumental record and it be purely about the music. Then I did Black Acid, started to sing myself, and made a conscious decision not to work with a load of guest vocalists on this album.”

So, why the decision to make a new Death In Vegas album now? “I have amassed so much material over the last seven years it seemed the right time to gather it all up and start putting out some records. While I was living in NYC I was putting stuff into two camps; Black Acid and Death in Vegas. As soon as I moved back to London from New York, where I’d been living over the last six years or so, I realized I wanted to release again as D.I.V.”

Trans-Love Energies is released on 26.09.11.
Death in Vegas are on tour during early December, 2011.

The last of our SXSW coverage is from our final day at the event – Saturday 21st March.Having popped in to see the Yorkshire Showcase at the British Music Embassy we managed to catch the rather charming Rolo Tomassi on stage. I am not sure I will ever get how such a sound can come out of a pretty girls mouth.

We had spent all week looking for a suitable place to meet some friends but during South by restaurants are so busy they refuse to take bookings. However we managed to twist the arms of the kind people at The Iron Cactus on 6th Street to let us invite some friends and our West Midlands delegates for a few hours of food, drink and networking.

UKTI West Midlands helped support 10 delegates to get out to SXSW 09 and Fused were asked to organise an event that would give the delegates the opportunity to meet some new people. So luckily for us some people thought it was a nice idea to get out of the midday sun and away from all the music attacking the senses and join us for a bite to eat.

After all the networking action and winding down it was time to fit in our last few showcases.

We popped over to Pangaea a ‘classy’ joint in the warehouse district, where tables are reserved for the moneyed people of SXSW, to catch ex Death in Vegas frontman Richard Fearless with Black Acid. The psychedelic show, complete with strobe lighting, was one of the highlights of the 4 days.

From Pangaea it was over to Mexican Restaurant Rio Grande, the waiters of which offer up a mean line in Margaritas and Tequila’s. However that was not what we were there to sample (well maybe a bit) but it was The Gin Riots who were the pulling power. An odd setting for the band who managed to shirk off film posters of the good the bad and the ugly along with giant neon cowboys to play to a small but very grateful crowd – most of which were wearing the bands t-shirts and hung around to get posters they had taken off the walls signed.

The showcases may finish at around 1.45pm in Austin but when you are on the right guest list, and can muster up the stamina to stay out, there is plenty happening until the early hours. As it was our last night of SXSW 09 we worked our way to the Red Bull party – out past the suburbs and on an industrial estate.

Red Bull had set up a stage with an impressive list of acts over 4 nights. However we weren’t so successful that night. Having passed through some tight guest list procedure, had a fake and much too large tattoo pasted on to our arms – settled in with free Vodka with (yes of course) Red Bull we waited for the bands to arrive. First was a set from Shout Out Out Out Out, which was pretty unimpressive or dull dull dull dull, then queen of the chavettes Goldielocks came on stage. Unfortunately for her two to three songs in and the whole thing was shut down by the local law enforcement.

Not too much of a problem given now it was about 3am however over a thousand people leaving an industrial estate at the same time, most headed in a similar direction, and with no taxis to find meant a long long walk home.

If you want to see more of what we did at South by South West then take a look at our video.