The Hysterical Injury are a noise-pop duo hailing from the historic city of Bath, formed in 2007, 'Our Lives Are A Futuristic Nightmare' is the first available recordings of The Hysterical Injury as a duo
1. Hi Annie, how are you?
Hi Andy, I'm fine, although a bit of a sore throat coming on - i hope it doesn't linger...
2. Can you give us a brief history on the band?
Yes, I had a load of songs and went looking for a drummer. I found Lee on a forum after a long search. We had alot in common and we worked really well together - we didn't really speak, just played which I thought was fantastic! We had alot of other members thinking that's what we should do and it didn't work out. Even with our guitarist, who was fab and was with us for 18 months, he had to move away.
3. Hysterical Injury was originally a three piece until quite recently, can you tell us the reason you decided to carry on as a duo?
We've been a duo for about 18months now. We didn't want to stop! Quite simply we were enjoying ourselves too much! We kind of went full circle and took the challenge to make as big a sound as possible - which we are still making bigger and bigger- with as little as possible. I was interested in giving the intsruments, drums, bass, voice, their space inside their own fequency range and using that to make the full sound.
4. On your myspace you cite Sonic Youth and Lightning Bolt as influences, what kind of music background do you guys have?
Yeah they are amongst my favourites and the influences on our myspace page are where Lee and I cross over. I come from a musical background and have been playing different instruments for a long time. I started with Violin age 9 ish, went on to clarinet, played in orchestras, sounds fancy but it was pretty general. I picked it up easily but I didn't really get excited till I found bass guitar and Nirvana, Sonic Youth. I had a massive dance music phase where i'd go and see Grooverider Dj and catch free parties with dark dark hard house, then just listening to experimantal electronic stuff, ambient stuff, then back to punk rock - PAtti Smith, Television, No-Wave - Teenage Jesus and the Jerks - all these things muddle in to my background.I have always been ossbsessed with unlikely sounds, drones, textures and melodies and all of them working in harmony and conflict.
5. I love your bass sound, what gear are you currently using?
Currently I am using a SansAmp bass overdrive pedal, Zvex Fuzz Factory (meant for guitar), Electro-Harmonix Micro POG, ocassionaly joined by other bits. I run these through two amps in a loop - one is an Ashdown Bass combo and the other is an Ampeg gemini twin valve guitar amp. For 'Our Lives Are A Futuristic Nightmare' I used just the SansAmp and the Fuzz FActory pedals through the amps.
6. The title for your latest EP, 'Our Lives Are A Futuristic Nightmare' comes from a photoshoot, can you explain the meaning of this?
hah! Our friend and artist Ben Garrod at the time was making alot of work with text projections. We got chatting about stuff and we needed non-playing photos of ourselves and we're not very camera friendly and kind of wanted to steer clear of the /moody band shot/ thing. So Ben sent through some ideas that he could use us as subjects for a 'text piece' where he projected text onto us, would then write it on us with permanent marker and photograph it and it would double up as the band photo. His art is about pointless acts! He called one of his exhibitions 'Postefficient Anticlimacticism' and it was just the invite! We are massive fans of his work. Anyway, he came up with 'Our Lives...', he said it was kind of a tounge in cheek witty text evaluation of Hysterical Injury. We loved it so we used it.
7. Do you have any plans to record in the near future?
Yes we do. We are looking to record very soon, just sorting dates. We're hoping to make an album this year but it may come out as two EP's, we'll see. The trouble is keeping up with ourselves. We have a high output but things get discarded very quickly unless they are recorded...if songs fall out of the set they are sometimes never heard again.
8. Finally, what do you predict for the future of The Hysterical Injury?
More!
9. Thanks Annie!
Thanks!
[The Hysterical Injury's Debut EP 'Our Lives Are A Futuristic Nightmare' is available direct from the band, hand-screenprinted by themselves @ www.myspace.com/thehystericalinjury]
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