News Fixers

The tempting thing to do when you start talking about any band is to try delving into the area they come from as a means of understanding them. When a band comes from Oxford and makes pop music that is even vaguely challenging, the urge is multiplied tenfold with the swell of recent local history almost possible to ignore.

Fixers don’t really deserve to be judged against those who they happened to be brought up in a similar proximity to. They’ve been around for about 18 months or so now, and have been making waves pretty much since day one. They “all met from older bands, growing up together,” admits Jack, the band’s keyboardist, “We all used to be in heavier bands when we were kids.”

Of the many adjectives to describe their current project, heavy is one of the few you’d leave out. It’s almost psychedelic but without all the wankery that implies, pop music that remains far from saccharine, doused in drama without being melodramatic. ‘Crystals’ does more to sum it up than any prose is likely to, starting out with boundless energy before turning into the kind of twinkling pop that many try but few ever actually master like Fixers.

Indeed, most people have been struggling to pigeonhole them with any amount of luck. Jack: “The NME compared us to Silver Apples which was very complimentary” – whilst other publications have been a bit further from the mark. How about being put alongside the jaunty, tip-toe pop of Everything Everything? “I don’t like Everything Everything at all - these kind of bands don’t excite me in any way whatsoever.”

You can understand the frustration, the two acts only marginally inhabiting the same sonic space. Brian Wilson is a marked influence, as is Van Dyke Parks – “[his] relationship with words is so beautiful, they take on this unworldly aesthetic of their own within any track” – but there’s some altogether more eclectic material appreciated by the band. “She may be an overnight blast, it’s hard to foresee or predict at this early stage, but she’s certainly made a good impression on me” confesses Jack, about the internet phenomenon that is Rebecca Black.

Whether or not they’ll ever earn the 100 million or so hits that ‘Friday’ has managed is still up in the air, but the grounding is there. The band have already had a 7” put out by Young and Lost Records and have featured across the board on Radio 1, and despite having a new EP - ‘Here Comes 2001, So Let’s Head For The Sun’ - coming out on 9th May, it’s comforting to know that the highlight of their career remains getting “Free Nike”. Foals probably say the same…

Crystals by Fixers.

Fixers play Dot to Dot Festival in Bristol (Saturday 28th May), Nottingham (29th May) and Manchester (30th May) - check out dottodotfestival.co.uk for full event info and ticket details.

Dot to Dot is a multi-venue music festival taking place across three of the UK’s most appreciative cities for music and culture. The travelling three-date music event helping to propel bands forward on their way to barnstorming careers and welcoming in some of the coolest acts from around the world across the second May Bank Holiday weekend.