The Enemy are used to scaling slopes.
Hailing from the Midlands, the band made their name the old fashioned way – heavy touring. Playing virtually every flea bitten toilet venue in the country, The Enemy’s hard graft paid off with the spectacular success of their debut album.
Second album ‘Music For The People’ continued their love of pounding indie anthems, and was followed by a typically mammoth tour.
Currently heading back to the UK from Snowbombing, ClashMusic watched The Enemy tear through a typically explosive set at a venue on the top of a mountain. Wearing the brand new Umbro England away shirt, the band were on joyous form.
Combining rock music with a spot of skiing, The Enemy were keen to talk about the festival, their hectic schedule and of course the possibility of a third album.
Andy Hopkins reveals all…
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Clash: You played Snowbombing last night. How was it?
Andy: It was amazing. I’d probably say it was the best festival ever. I think there’s a lot of DJ fans here so it was quite a hard crowd but we won them over in the end. It was absolute quality. Compared to places like Glastonbury, it’s completely different but everyone’s loving it. They know they’ve got the next day to get up on the slopes and stuff. I can’t really explain it. Instead of walking around in mud, you’re walking around in snow.
Clash: Have you been on the slopes yourself and had a go?
Andy: Yeah. I learnt to snowboard before I came out. It’s seems easier on tarmac, but then you get onto real snow!
Clash: Have you been down to the village?
Andy: Yeah, there was a street party not yesterday but the day before which was really good. It’s just everyone dressing up in fancy dress. There’s a hell of a lot of that going on which is weird.
Clash: How did you get involved in Snowbombing?
Andy: Well we knew the person who put it on. We’re always out drinking with him and he was like ‘yeah. Come and play.’ We’d done it three years ago, which was completely different because no one knew us. We didn’t go up to the slopes three years ago though!
Clash: How did you feel when your first album, ‘We live and die in these times’ went to No.1, especially being so young?
Andy: It was absolutely brilliant. When we first found out I was actually asleep. We’d done a massive gig in Coventry and we were on the way up to Scotland, we were in the van and for some reason I had fallen asleep. The next minute, they woke me up and said ‘our albums gone to number one.’
Clash: Lots of bands come out each year but don’t succeed. What makes The Enemy different?
Andy: I think there’s a lot of bands that sound good on the radio but then you see them live and it just doesn’t sound right. I think we actually sound better live than we actually do on record. On our first album, the recording of the sounds isn’t as big as they should be. There was nothing we could do, we just couldn’t afford it. It’s really hard to get the right sound, but it’s more raw live, it’s bigger sounding and that’s what we’re going to try and create on the third album.
Clash: So what are you doing in 2010, The third album?
Andy: Well no. That’s the thing. We’re having no deadlines this time. We’re thinking of taking as long as we want, maybe an album out by the end of the year, maybe not. We want to release an album that we all love and we want time to be able to do that. There’s no point releasing music that you’re not happy with. You can’t force someone to write songs otherwise it’s not natural.
Clash: Is it hard being on tour and spending all your time together as a band or are you still enjoying the experience?
Andy: Well, touring’s the best part of it but everyone argues, if they didn’t it would be weird. But we’re all still best mates and we haven’t changed.
Clash: Lastly, what’s all this about Tom getting poisoned by a lily?
Andy: Basically, we were on the Oasis tour, we were doing Saturday at Wembley. We were all dead looking forward to it, couldn’t wait. But the thing is, Tom’s allergic to lilies. It’s really bad. If he’s at home and his mum’s got lilies in the house, even then it can happen. We didn’t ask for it or anything, obviously, but there was lilies in the dressing room. His throat closed up and he couldn’t sing so we had to cancel with Oasis. I was absolutely fuming and he was gutted, but there just wasn’t anything he could do about it.
Clash: So Tom was foiled by a flower. Who would have known?
Andy: Ha, Yeah. Wimp…
