Features Menace Beach: ‘We’re Doing As Little Of The Rubbish Stuff As Possible’

Bands always come with a hazard warning. But not like this. Ryan Needham, one half of the core behind Leeds group Menace Beach, is currently waiting for a builder to come and fix a broken window. The fault lies with Pulled Apart By Horses’ Rob Lee, one of the many contributing musicians who help (we say help, but if ‘help’ involves wrecking houses… ) adding force to the project belonging to both Ryan and Liza Violet. “One person might not want to go to practice or a gig - I wanted to get rid of that whole part of it,” he says, dodging gusts of wind trying to infiltrate his flat through the shattered glass. “It loosens it up, this way. It’s better for the creative environment, I think.”

Ryan and Liza spearhead the project, but based on the new democratic ‘Lowtalker’ EP, the more outside influences getting involved, the better. Rob Lee’s just one of several faces contributing to the new release. There’s also Hookworms member and go-to producer ‘MJ’, Sky Larkin’s Nestor Matthews, You Animals’ Matt Spalding and on the odd occasion, Mansun’s Paul Draper. Often big, ever-growing projects like this tend to wretch at the tag ‘supergroup’, but Ryan isn’t so irked by the term. “Me and Liza write all the songs, but it’s nice that it takes the attention away from us in some sense. It makes it more of an even spread.”

‘Lowtalker’ is a colossal, driven beast, benefiting from its wide cast. The fact that it was recorded in MJ’s Leeds’ studio is a miracle in itself. Ryan used to be the recipient of snarky reviews from the very same guy. “He fucking hated my old band, used to slag us off on forums,” he laughs. “You’ve probably read what he’s like on the internet…”

Recording in Komakino and a couple other projects out in Derby, before eventually landing up in Leeds, Ryan and Liza used the band as an excuse to make new friends (“we didn’t really know anyone, so I thought we’d go out and about”). Eventually, Ryan had 100 or so songs under his belt. It was his first stint as a songwriter (“I’d been the singer but I’d never written anything”), and when it came to whittling tracks down, he turned to Menace Beach’s current crop.

There’s a clear ideal behind the band, even if it’s subject to the odd revolving door effect. “I’ve been in bands before where the obligation aspect ruins it,” he says. “We’re trying to do as little of the rubbish stuff as possible. We spent so many years doing pointless gigs in a weird outskirt of London…” Now that Menace Beach is starting to look like an actual, big prospect, he’s having to dodge the logistic side of things. “It’d be great to keep everyone on board now but Pulled Apart By Horses are doing another album now, Hookworms are doing a new album. It’s the same with festivals: We’re looking at them now and we’re trying to figure out how to do it…”

As things stand, Menace Beach has been built on a casual approach and very little else. It’s already got them this far - even if the offers continue to pour in, Ryan’s landed himself with 100 or so songs under his belt and, undoubtedly, a queue of familiar faces who’d do everything in their power to get involved.