Interview The Cooper Temple Clause

Reading noiseniks The Cooper Temple Clause are currently on tour throughout the UK, and their next single, ‘Promises, Promises’ will be out soon. DIY caught up with the band’s Dan Fisher on their stop off in Leeds for a short interrogation.

So, how’s it all going?
Good. It took us a few shows to get going again, unfortunately one of those was the Astoria, but we’re back in the game now. Got the new stuff up and running live now, and considering we hadn’t played live for seven months didn’t take as long as we thought. We’re really starting to enjoy it again. We were rather nervy about playing the new material…

…What’s the new stuff like?
We’ve started writing tunes, something we don’t usually do. Trying to get some melodies in there. The feedback we’ve had suggests it’s a lot more listenable, and more focussed in comparison to the first album. There’s more electronics on the new material, but it’s been ‘fused’ better than previously. When it does go heavy on the new stuff, it goes heavier than we ever have before.

You’re letting fans download the Glasgow gig from the internet. Does this mean you’re pro file sharing?
Yeah. We’re not sure how it’s going to work, but eventually we’re hoping that fans can download a whole gig a couple of days after, and put their own camera angles to it. All the gigs will be filmed, and the sound recorded. Glasgow’s a kind of prototype for this. It’s our answer to the bad quality bootlegs out there, I think Pearl Jam did something similar a few years ago.

Do you mind being ‘lumped in’ with the so-called ‘New Rock Revolution’ bands?
I see us as different. I think the only reason we got caught up in it was because we emerged at the same time as these bands, and we have some loud, shouty songs. I don’t see us as part of it at all, I don’t think many of those bands have got the same amount of ambition as we have. It’s hard to see where bands like The Hives can go from where they are, The White Stripes have managed it, but if The Strokes lose their ability to write a good tune, that’s them up the wall. We’re quite happy to be the outsiders, doing our own thing off our own backs.

What do you listen to on the tourbus?
Eighties Matchbox B-Line Disaster is very popular. Last time we’d all bring our CDs, and so many were lost, scratched or broken that most of us now just bring minidiscs. As to what’s on, it depends who chooses. With Tom it’s anything from techno to Nirvana, Kieran’s in to his post rock, which isn’t too great at getting you going, but it’s good at about 4am when you’re all monged out! It does range, Didz is listening to Wauvenfold at the moment, that sounds alright.

What about before a gig?
It changes every day, we’ve got into the habit of putting stupid songs on, such as Shed Seven or Kula Shaker. Well we were children of the Britpop era…

How do you think it’s going to go tonight?
Good, Leeds is always good, last time we played The Cockpit, which was really good. We played in a charity football event at Anfield yesterday, so I don’t know whether we’re going to be able to move onstage! We got knocked out in the semi-finals by One True Voice. It was weird, we went along for a laugh, but everyone else was taking it really seriously! We had Ian Rush on our team, and played against Starsailor, who had John Barnes. We beat them! Nobody there knew who we were, they were all Smash Hits girls, screaming for Blue and One True Voice, and they’d got no idea about us. Us versus Blue in the final would have been interesting!

What do you think about Busted?
[seethes]. Argh. Can’t stand them. They are quite a contention. Urgh. Busted and Avril Lavigne and all that. At least with Blue etc, you know what they are, they’re not getting on the rock ‘thing’. Don’t get me started on Busted!

Upon leaving, Dan decided he’d not got ‘flu, but SARS. Typical male.