Although proudly proclaiming themselves as ‘experimental drum and bass rock’ on MySpace, there’s actually little evidence of drum and bass in Lime Headed Dog’s music. Experiment they have in abundance, though – a motley collection of discordant-yet-melodic sounds that place them firmly on the out-there side of conventional…
“Lime Headed Dog I don’t know a huge amount about,” admits Matthew, “because they’re only just starting out, but this is someone Mica put me onto. They just turn out music constantly, and in all sorts of different styles… It’s almost like musical tourettes. But there just seems to be an inventiveness and playfulness that reminds me of the kind of attitude of The Fall. You know, that very private way of making music where you pursue your own ideas in your own way and then make them public as and when it suits you, and it’s up to other people how they engage with that.”
The brains behind the band, former Good Shoes bassist Joel Cox, picks up the story. “I left [Good Shoes] earlier this year when the going got tough,” he says. “I’ve made music since I was around fifteen, but only in the past couple of years or so have I tried to form it all into what is called Lime Headed Dog. I intend things to sound incredibly difficult and awkward but something always pulls me back to structured things that
people will recognise. I think I need to break out of that spell. All I know is that I don’t sound like what I want to sound like, and it’s incredibly frustrating.” “I’ve already recorded five albums,” Joel says, “and I’ve been trying to get people to be interested in them by giving them away free, but I guess I’m not very good at selling myself! The record label is called Volcano Attack and the first release will probably be a single – a taster of the album – called ‘Kfum And Kfuk’. That’s the plan anyway; setting up a record label is a pain in the arse! I think I’ve thrown the towel in when it comes to making money from music, but I am addicted to making and listening to music so if it can at least be made available for people to hear I’ll be happy.”
As well as setting up his own label, Joel and Steve from Good Shoes are also planning to release a single together: “The guys from the label asked us to give them a single; they haven’t heard it yet, so God knows what they will think – it’s pretty sicksounding”.
Listen to ‘Gandhi’ by Lime Headed Dog below –
