The British band Nothing But Thieves gave an impressive concert at the Eurockéennes 2018. We had the chance to meet them when they left the stage. We tell you!
At the Eurockéennes, there are surprises. As soon as their concert was over, we had an appointment backstage to meet Joe Langridge-Brown (guitarist) and Philip Blake (bassist) of Nothing But Thieves.
After freshening up (and a little game of Fortnite to relax), they join us with a glass of beer in hand to answer a few questions:
You've just come off stage, how was it?
Joe Langridge-Brown: The concert was good but I had a lot of problems. All my equipment is dead… We just came back from Ukraine and, I don't know what the airline people did, they had to throw away our equipment and everything was dead.
Philip Blake: They see too many guitarists…
Joe Langridge-Brown: (laughs) Everything went wrong. I broke a string, my guitar broke… But the concert was good, we had a great time.
We realized nothing in the audience, if it can reassure you…
Joe Langridge-Brown: That's good to know, thanks!
You're on tour right now. You still have dates to come. What is your best memory on stage on this tour?
Joe Langridge-Brown: We're in festival season and it's just started for us…
Philip Blake: We played in great places but today was the best. The audience was great!
What's the craziest thing you've ever done on stage?
Joe Langridge-Brown: Well… It wasn't particularly crazy, but we played Glastonbury last year. It was our sound engineer's birthday. It's called The Nail. We wanted to offer him a pint and we made him go through the crowd so that he could pick it up from the stage… It took a monster amount of time for the pint to reach the control room. We had time to play a few songs before. When he finally got it back, he took a sip and he said those lips went a little numb, so I think someone put something in the pint during his trip…
Philip Blake: The audience was very generous that day!
There are plenty of great artists playing today, in addition to you of course. Which ones would you like to meet?
Joe Langridge-Brown: I'm a huge fan of Tom Morello playing with Prophets Of Rage tonight! I've seen Rage Against The Machine many times live, but I haven't seen Prophets Of Rage yet. For me he is one of the greatest guitarists. He's unique: he doesn't treat his guitar like a guitar, but… I don't know… as something with which he creates sounds… It's more than that…
As if the guitar was part of him…
Joe Langridge-Brown: Yes, that's right! What about you, Philip?
Philip Blake: Sorry, I just freaked out! I just saw Tom Morello. There are the Prophets Of Rage right there!
We turn around and indeed, the Prophets Of Rage are right in the middle of the Backstage space of the big stage… greeting Trent Reznor who has just arrived. The three of us tape ourselves like the fans that we are…
Joe Langridge-Brown: Yes, it's right there! (laughs)
Fanboy! (laughs)
And is there an artist you'd like to collaborate with?
Joe Langridge-Brown: With many… but I think for me it would be mostly with Dave Grohl. He's the reason I started writing songs and playing guitar. Everything he touches, he magnifies it…He's great! He has been part of Nirvana, Queen Of The Stone Age, Foo Fighters ; He produced so much stuff… He is a talented man.
Philip Blake: For me it would be with Simon Neil from Biffy Clyro: he has this incredibly characteristic scream and I think it could really work to have Conor 's angelic voice duet with Simon's piercing scream.
Joe Langridge-Brown: Yes, it could be downright cool!
Philip Blake: He could teach us so much about tempo.Because you can't just sit down and be taught it, you can't just learn it like that.
Joe Langridge-Brown: Because we're kind of stuck in 4/4 (tempo)
You've done a lot of covers lately… like the one on Nina Simone's Be My Husband …
We did one today!
Yes the one on Immigrant Song by Led Zeppelin, it was cool!! I saw a few people who must have been 60 screaming and singing the lyrics by heart…
Joe Langridge-Brown: Really? That's super cool! I love it!
Philip Blake: They must have found out in School Of Rock (laughs)
Joe Langridge-Brown: We cover songs that we love to play. We recorded one not long ago: a cover of Crazy by Gnarls Barkley. It's pretty fun to do this kind of stuff from time to time.
Philip Blake: Yes, I think it's quite interesting to see a band come out of their own titles…
Joe Langridge-Brown: We don't really play like other bands do when we do a cover.
When you do a cover, do you choose something rather far from what you do to make it more Rock?
Joe Langridge-Brown: Not always. With Crazy we do something quite dark… We did a lot of covers in the end. We should be a cover band (laughs).
Philip Blake: Do you think we'd be successful?
Joe Langridge-Brown: We'd be the best band for weddings!(laughs)
If I get married, I'm thinking of you!
What do you have planned for next? It seems to me that there is a tour at the end of the year again?
Joe Langridge-Brown: Well… Yes, we have planned a few dates in Europe at the end of the year… And some have not yet been announced… But since we are in France… Presumably…
… Some will be here..
Joe Langridge-Brown: Maybe… it could happen!
You also plan to take some vacation after that… Take a break?
Joe Langridge-Brown: Yes, we'd like to ask ourselves a little bit in early 2019. Rest and write a new album. We have to make songs, even if we do great covers (laughs). We haven't stopped touring since 2014, so it's been a long time since we settled.
Philip Blake: It must have been more than a year since we took time for ourselves, to reflect and realize what happened. We went from the first album to the second very quickly. But that's always been our plan.
Joe Langridge-Brown: It's essential to do such a huge tour, which took us from a gig with 100 people in London…
Philip Blake: 10 people in London (laughs)
Joe Langridge-Brown: I'm really waiting for this moment to rest. To write an album, you need time to take things into consideration and find inspiration.
I have the impression that your second album was really to confirm the success of the first…
Joe Langridge-Brown: Yes, that was what we've always seen for the band. There are a lot of other bands that we follow that have done the same and I think it's a really good idea. We were just having a blast and we didn't want it to stop.
So this time we will have to wait a little longer to hear a third album?
Joe Langridge-Brown: Yes, a little more!
I have a crazy question, which anticipates a lot, but… Do you think you could win an award this year? Brit's or Grammy?
Joe Langridge-Brown: No! For us that's not really what interests us. I never really thought about it anyway…
Philip Blake: The most important thing for us is that the fans come to see us in concert and allow us to realize our wildest dream. It's not the Awards that keep us going, it's the people who love our music. We write the music we love and if you like it too then that's what matters most. An award could be a nice thing, but it's not really essential for us. So we don't really care! (laughs)
A last word for your fans?
Joe Langridge-Brown: This last album, I feel like we've made it a 'land of love' for our audience outside of Britain. Sometimes it's difficult to transcribe your music for another country. I feel that the French fans really understood what we wanted to do. We were able to play it in many places in front of a growing audience. Like today, it was very beautiful: it brings us a sense of humility to be able to go to other countries and do this! I can't wait for us to be even more fans in France because it's a great audience!
Relaxed, smiling and super welcoming, the guys of Nothing But Thieves remain totally accessible even with their growing success. We are already looking forward to seeing them again and they will indeed be in France on November 2 at the Bataclan and November 3 at the Avion de Lille. For the third album, we will have to wait a little longer, but we have no doubt that the band is here to stay!
Find the concert of Nothing But Thieves at Eurockéennes 2018
Photo : Fabien Matthieux
