Alex Holland and Olivia Sang
BCR: You said on stage earlier that music at the moment is very vibrant and that there's shit loads going on; I really do believe that. We were talking earlier about the idea of this cross-hybrid musicianship, of these fantastic amalgams of genre and musical discipline where you can be a be a beat-boxer in a string quartet, or you can also be a classical trained opera singer in rap band.
JG: There's a lady here tonight, Olivia Sang, who's gonna perform at the awards and she's working with Enigma, Cafe Del Mar and she's a trained opera singer that sings over dance tracks, and it's an amazing mix. These wonderful things are there, but the traditional industry needs to see it. Because they want to go to mass markets, they have to pension the role and therefore it becomes diluted.
BCR: but this is why we’ve got festivals like All Tomorrow’s Parties that are curated by people who actually give a shit about music and are involved in it. The last one was curated by The Dirty Three and then coming up is Vs The Fans. I believe that when things start to die away, the people around it will try and pull it up because they're passionate about it…
JG: When things fragment the individuals can't survive unless it's brought together under some kind of umbrella.
BCR: That’s what I mean, with the amount of festivals we have in the UK now devoted to music and put on by people who love music, do you not see that as some kind of shining light?
JG: Yeah, sure. I think it's amazing because that's bringing together lots of fragmented tastes and styles and if there's no rules on it, you don't have to be processed through this thing we call the music industry to hit a mass market. You can have these individual things. And just because you don't get signed by a major label doesn't mean it doesn't have value, and what these awards are trying to say is: Look, you're good, whether you get signed or not. You’re good and you have a value
The Light Years
BCR: What I see you doing now is a very independent endeavour, by that I mean supporting something that has little to no support from the mainstream. Does that mean that there's very little out there in terms of mainstream media that you can see?
JG: Let's think what this means. Mainstream media is attached to mainstream corporate cultures.
BCR: But at the same times it's also attached to popular choice, and you see that in downloads and you see that in MySpace...
JG: I think a lot of it's about gatekeepers as well… And when the markets become too fragmented, it becomes too complicated for people to get a handle on what's going on. Saatchi, he was a gatekeeper. He was saying these are the people who are cool. He established himself as a journalist, as a gatekeeper. A radio DJ as a gatekeeper. NME as a gatekeeper.
One of the reasons it's called the Indy music awards with a 'y' is, if it was an 'ie' everyone would think it's that one particular type of music. So Indy with a 'y' is trying to take that back because you can be urban, hip-hop, you can be rap. Whatever... you’re an independent artist. So there's a bit of resentment all of a sudden... The gatekeepers of NME have taken that market and yes, it's good for the gatekeepers to pick a genre of music, but there's a lot of other stuff happening in the world.
BCR: What would you say to those who are just starting out now?
JG: Be honest. If there’s nothing else you do be honest with your music and what you’re trying to do with it.
There are still limited tickets for the awards ceremony available from the website here: Indy Music Awards official site
