Sheepy are a punk pop indie rock band, a group of musicians with a self confessed propensity for absorbing the music they love and whittling out hooky tunes and familiar melodies. Latest record Wild EP was released last week, and to find out more about the band and recording, I had a chat with Luke Jones (vocals and guitar) Ollie Fontaine (drums and vocals) whilst Villy Raze (bass and vocals) was busy planning world domination.
Punk pop indie rock – that sounds like you can’t decide. Do you like all kinds of music?
O:We do like all kinds of music. Villy is the Punk, Ollie is the rock and Luke is the pop song writer. But we get classified with lots of genres.
L: we may have a dance/hip hop album out some day.
Tell me about the album – how have you progressed since the last and is there any evolution in your music?
L: Wild EP is the new 4 track album. The songs have more of a groove and are a bit longer in length than some of the fast paced punkier stuff on our last album. The last track Life Is Like A Ghost Train is one of the first I recorded and it’s spooky sound works well with the other songs.
O: When we were making the last album we had dozens of tracks to choose from, which came from our live gigs. The new EP we didn’t narrow it down and we hadn’t played these songs before.
Do you think Liverpool has had any influence on your music?
L: Yeah. I think most cities have a ‘sound’ and we used to grow up playing and listening to other local bands. One of the new tracks Jeremiah Horrocks is about a 17th century astronomer who lived a mile from me In Liverpool. Songs like Glum are influenced by the people and places around me. But Liverpool most definitely isn’t glum.
You’re involved heavily in the music scene outside of playing in a band – has this helped you musically? I feel like the more collaborative and involved people are, the greater input they are prepared to put into their success, is this the case?
There is a great underground music scene in Liverpool, we try to go to as many local gigs as possible and get bands over to play when we can.
L: We’re also getting to know a lot more of London musicians and bands, where our label are based. This is just something we’ve always done. Musicians should look after each other, not try and compete.
What is success for Sheepy?
Success is being able to tour and play for a living. For where we are the next level is getting a booking agent and playing bigger gigs and festivals regularly. We’re not motivated by money, just the love of gigging, making music and seeing people enjoying the music we’re doing.
Who are you listening to at the moment?
L: Wonk Unit, Slaves, and Jungle.
O: Alabama Shakes, Spring King, Happiness and Saves the day
13 albums in what, 7 years, is prolific. Is it an urge to create, a desire to be heard, tons of ideas, or lots of fun? How do you check the quality and decide what to release?
L: I’ve always had a constant urge to write music since I was young. When I hear a song, I want to write a song. We’ll usually jam out some of my ideas and Villy and Ollie will take it to another level. We’re all songwriters and we are now writing more collaboratively than before.
Here some of that songwriting on new EP Wild, out now.