SPLIT FESTIVAL SPOTLIGHT: HYDE & BEAST

Hyde & Beast are Futureheads drummer Dave Hyde and ex-Golden Virgins drummer Neil Bassett. They released their debut album Slow Down in 2011, and a follow-up, Keep Moving, will be unleashed on 4 August. We caught up with Neil and Dave to hear about sharing a private jet with the Foo Fighters and their desire to resurrect Otis Redding…

 

GIGSLUTZ: Where are you and what have you been up to this week?

NEIL: I’m sitting in our bijou studio, drinking a warm beer and waiting for the rest of our live band to turn up, so we can begin rehearsals for our festival shows.

 

GIGSLUTZ: A super-group fronted by two Mackem drummers sounds like a concept for a TV sitcom conceived on acid. How did this unlikely union come about?

NEIL: We have always been mates, really. Dave once approached me at a gig years ago, wearing a burgundy velvet smoking jacket, wanting to bum a cigarette. I thought “I like the cut of this man’s jib”. Years and years later, we started recording bits of music in my studio just for a giggle really. Before we knew it these songs were somehow being played on the radio. It was all an accident guv, honest.

 

GIGSLUTZ: You’re playing Split Festival this year. Who are you looking forward to seeing?

NEIL: I’m really looking forward to seeing School of Language and also Super Furry Animals frontman Gruff Rhys.

 

GIGSLUTZ: Dave, as one of the people responsible for curating Split, what’s the weirdest request you’ve received from any of the artists who’ve played at the festival?

DAVE: There was a well-known punk icon who requested a hard to find cheese on his rider. He then seemingly proceeded to just mould all of it with his hands into animal sculptures. Giraffes, etc.

NEIL: Thankfully, I’m not involved in curating Split, because if I was, the bill would be full of Ethiopian soul & psychedelic blues! 

 

 

GIGSLUTZ: Let’s pretend that money is no object and you could book anyone to play Split – who would you choose?

DAVE: I’d have Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. Easy. And Cat Power, too.

NEIL: If money was no object, I would plough it all into research in DNA, cryogenics and the dark arts so that I would be somehow be able to raise Otis Redding from the grave and have him perform at Split. Now there is a performer.

 

GIGSLUTZ: You’ve played at various festivals with your respective bands – what are your most memorable festival experiences?

DAVE: Playing a festival with The Futureheads somewhere in Scandinavia and being asked to accompany Dave Grohl and the Foo Fighters on their private jet to T in The Park in Scotland where we were both playing the next day.

NEIL: So many to choose from. Hyde & Beast once played on a moored cargo ship in Bristol Docks for part of the Dot to Dot fest. Then there was someone (obviously from Sunderland) shouting “Ivy House” in between songs in a packed tent in the middle of Somerset at a Glastonbury gig. That made me chuckle. I also once had lunch with the Pixies in the catering tent backstage at T in the Park (that’s the band Pixies by the way, not the mischievous mythical creatures of folklore).

 

GIGSLUTZ: What can we expect from Hyde & Beast at Split this year and what’s next for the band?

DAVE: A second rate E-Street Band.

NEIL: We will have our full eight-piece band playing some new songs from our second album (out August 4th, the week of Split Festival, by the way) and also some old favourites. Expect glam rock guitars, 70’s harmonies, wonky tunes and some odd dancing. Come on down and shake a tail feather.

 

Hyde & Beast play Split Festival, Mowbray Park, Sunderland on Saturday 9th August. Tickets are available here: http://www.split-music.co.uk/

 

Paul Sng

sng_paul

 

Paul Sng

Paul Sng

Editor-at-large, Brighton. Likes: Lee Hazlewood, Lee Hazlewood songs and Lee Hazlewood's moustache Dislikes: Celery, crap nostalgia and people who raise their voice when speaking as if they're asking a question?