ARTIST : Clocks
TITLE : Untitled
LABEL : Island
GENRE : Indie
BITRATE : 224 kbps avg
SOURCE : CD (LP)
PLAYTIME : 00:32:35
SIZE : 55.1MB
STORE DATE : 2008-09-00
Track List
----------
1. All I Can 2:57
2. She Wants Something Else 3:09
3. Old Valve Radio 3:19
4. That Much Better 3:14
5. Call On Me 2:54
6. Indigo 3:26
7. Do You Really Know? 3:49
8. Happening To You 3:08
9. In My Arms 3:23
10. It's Good To See You 3:16
Clocks are a band who specialise in short and
bittersweet, powerful and punchy pop-rock nuggets
concerning new love and old valve radios, delivered using
the tried and tested guitar, bass and drums method but
rendered with sufficient vigour to make it all sound
fresh, original, brand new.
Straight out of Epsom & Ewell come the four Clocks boys û
and they are boys, aged 20-22 at the time of writing,
making them a sort of hard-edged boy band, only a boy
band who can play their instruments, write their own
songs and have a hand in the production and presentation
of their material. Nothing like a boy band at all, then.
Some of the things that have made Clocks what they are
and sound the way they sound include the music of Bob
Dylan, Simon & Garfunkel, The Hollies, Buddy Holly and
The Beach Boys. And a bunch called The Beatles. ôMy
writing influences were basically Lennon & McCartney
because those songs got me into music,ö says Tom Hewitt,
ClocksÆ singer and main songwriter, who points out that
heÆs more of a Lennon fan than he is a McCartney man.
ôThatÆs what IÆm looking back to and aspiring to. I donÆt
have too many modern influences.ö
But weÆre getting ahead of ourselves. The members of
Clocks first met on the cusp of teenage, when Tom and
guitarist Ed Hilliam, bassist John Ricketts and drummer
Rich Farris all attended Scouts. Ed, John and Rich went
on to Epsom & Ewell High School, while Tom attended
Sutton Grammar School, a veritable hothouse of future
celebrities whose famous alumni include gay police
commissioner and aspirant London mayor Brian Paddick, one
of the co-founders of Mensa, David Bellamy, Dane Bowers
and several Wimbledon football stars of the Æ90s. We
trust youÆre getting this down.
It was when they were 11-12 that the four Clocks really
gelled as a unit. Ed and John were both into
rollerblading and tried to get Tom to join in û ôbut he
shunned us,ö says Ed. ôBecause I thought you were weird,ö
replies Tom. Touche. It was during a Scouts summer camp
that the band took shape. JohnÆs dad had a varispeed tape
recorder that they soon put to inventive use. ôWe thought
it was hilarious,ö recalls Tom. ôWeÆd write stories and
make up odd things and have great fun recording them too
fast or too slow. During that summer camp we progressed
to making up songs. At first we were going to do a
cookery show, even a sketch show at one point because we
liked Harry Enfield. But we decided to write songs
instead.ö
Now all they had to do was learn to play them. After
dabbling with the flute, Ed decided to be a guitarist.
RichÆs future as a sticksman was assured ever since he
visited his mumÆs friendÆs percussion group as a two year
old, where kids could bash tambourines and cymbals till
their hands dropped off. After taking Grade 1 percussion
aged 10, he was given a drum kit for his birthday. Tom
started out playing keyboards. ôI taught myself from
buying reams and reams of sheet music of songs I was
into,ö he says. ôI never bought CDs û I always bought the
manuscripts. This developed an unusual writing style
whereby IÆd write songs as scores rather than on a guitar
or piano. One example of this approach was That Much
Better. I gave up on guitar the first time I tried it as
it seemed very unnatural to me. It was only after I
bought my own one after my GCSEs that I started to pick
it up properly. Then I bought a guitar book from a
second-hand music shop in London.ö As for John, after
stints on the recorder and ocarina, he played a bit of
classical guitar before picking the four-stringed
variety, whereupon his dad drove him to Kingston to buy
his first bass.
But first there was the little matter of further
education to negotiate. John is the only member of Clocks
to actually graduate, earning a 2:1 in Biology û he left
Sheffield University in 2006 before he could start his
Masters in Biology so he could concentrate on the band.
The others deferred their places - Ed was reading German
and Spanish at Nottingham Uni, Rich did a computer
animation course at Portsmouth and Tom studied
engineering at Cambridge. ôWe could technically go back
this autumn, but this is my last chance to be in a band,ö
says Tom, "so I donÆt think I will." Tom is unique in
being given a two-year deferral. "There is only one other
non-medical ædegradationÆ - as itÆs known in Cambridge -
that IÆm aware of in recent years," he explains, "where
somebody got a year off to train for the Commonwealth
Games. IÆm very grateful to my tutor for her help!ö TomÆs
career path thus far bears an uncanny similarity to Nick
DrakeÆs - left CambridgeÆs Fitzwilliam College after two
years, signed to Island Records aged 20. People even
comment on how much Tom physically resembles the
legendarily tormented singer-songwriter. ôHe haunted me
at Uni. Am I as haunted as him? IÆm disturbed,ö he jokes,
adding: ôWeÆve got everything in common so far, spookily
soàö ôJust donÆt let him near drugs,ö warns Ed.
It was during Uni holidays that they played their first
gigs. Their very first one was at Christmas, which they
dubbed The Xmas Bash, in their dilapidated scout hut with
its weedy PA, playing cover versions of Christmas tunes:
Stop The Cavalry, Lonely This Christmas, Step Into
Christmas, Merry Xmas Everybody, Last Christmas,
Fairytale Of New York, I Wish It Could Be Christmas
Everyday featuring guest vocals from a bloke called Robin
Willes who in 1957 played in a skiffle group with one
Jimmy Page. Using the money raised from these local
shows, the four decided to splash out on a demo. So they
headed to Kent, to a ramshackle converted outbuilding
owned by someone they found online. Over two days, and at
a cost of ú500, they recorded three tracks with Paul
Midcalf, two of which, All I Can and Call On Me, were so
strong they will be on ClocksÆ forthcoming debut album,
albeit in rewritten form.
With a new manager, Clocks couldnÆt fail. In 2006 came
their first exuberant burst of power pop rock on indie
imprint Hungry Kid called That Much Better before Island
Records made an offer. They produced some demos with Liam
Watson, who formed Toe Rag Studios in the early æ90s and
has since used his collection of vintage musical
instruments and recording equipment to create ôretro
edgeö rock for The White Stripes, The Kills and The
Zutons. In January 2008 they released their released
first major label single, All I Can, a paean to a wannabe
princess, with a poignant yet rousing verse of,
ôdazzlingly pretty, sparkle in the city, I'm doing all I
can.ö
Meanwhile, the band have been doing what young bands have
û and fortunately love û to do: tour. TheyÆve done four
UK tours in the last 18 months, either alone or as
support to the likes of The Departure, The Fray and The
Feeling. A gig with the latter in front of 1700 people at
Loughborough University proved a turning point. ôIt was
amazing,ö enthuses Tom. ôA hundred people cheered when I
asked, æWhoÆs come to see us?Æ It made me want to play
that kind of venue.ö
Next on the agenda for this potential-packed four-piece
is the single Old Valve Radio, a stompalong, fist-waving,
airwave-friendly anthem so upbeat and infectious it makes
Oasis sound like Radiohead, a further single in early
summer, and then the album. As yet untitled, ClocksÆ
debut LP, produced by Eliot (Bloc Party) James in
Eastcote Studios in Ladbroke Grove where Arctic Monkeys
recorded their last LP, will be a tune-stuffed, melody
rich affair, full of three-minute pop marvels bursting at
the seams with hooks, nagging guitar lines and boyishly
pretty harmonies. ôA lot of them are boy/girl songs with
bittersweet lyrics,ö explains Tom. ôWeÆve all had
relationships that have gone horribly wrong and a lot of
the songs deal with that. But then thereÆs a song like
That Much Better [which, incidentally, Orange recently
picked up on and made a video for to aid their online
campaign], about night culture, which is quite poetic.
ôNot all my lyrics are based on my own personal
experiences,ö he adds, ôbut I do like to put myself in
other peopleÆs shoes or imagine myself in different
situations. Some of them are collections of images û I
suppose I just think a lot.ö