New Politics Interview: SXSW 2010

After a fairy-tale beginning, and a whirlwind tour of Europe, New Politics is kicking off their US tour with two performances at the SXSW festival. We got a chance to meet with singer David Boyd, in a rare moment of downtime, to get his take on sudden fame, the origin of the name New Politics and why he loves music festivals so much.

How did your band form?

We didn't really have a band. Soren and I were just writing music as a hobby. We'd been working together for about four years we had about 300 ideas and songs. There were a couple of songs that just sounded awesome that were basically what we're doing now.

Basically what happened was I came with this newspaper and told Soren, "Let's enter this competition." There was nothing to lose. If we didn't win or if we didn't go to the next round we would still meet up and do music. This way we could also get a response and see if we had anything that worked.

We sent in some songs and about a week later we got a phone call saying we were in the competition. They'd been looking at over 900 bands and solo artists and we were among the 48 that were chosen. We were all hyped up and we had to play our first concert three weeks after that. We were trying to figure out how we were going to do it. We decided to call up Poul who was like "Let's do it." We met up for practice and from the first practice we knew that this was it. It was pretty wild.

Had any of you ever played together before?

I'd never been on stage performing music like that. I'd been working a lot in the studio. Soren had a band that never really took off, but he had performed on stage. Our drummer, Poul, comes from a very musical family, so he plays a lot of instruments. He's really technical. That's what I would consider him. And he's also a monster on the drums. He has done a ton of shows. He's probably the most experienced out of all of us.

Describe your sound in your own words.

I think it's actually best to leave it open, to let people decide for themselves. We also don't expect everyone to like it.

If I speak on behalf of all the people we've played for in the past year, the four names that continuously come up are The Pixies, Beastie Boys, Rage Against the Machine and Nirvana.

What are your musical influences?

I don't really know. Everyone always asks us who we're inspired by which is kind of cliche because we're inspired by all the artists that others are inspired by. By all the great icons and artists that went before us and also unconsciously inspired by so many other artists and music. It's really just what we read, what we see and what we go through every day. It's the time line that we live in at the moment. That's what we write about.

How did you come up with the name New Politics?

That's actually a funny thing. We are probably the only band in the world that's been around for a year and we've already had three names. Originally, when we entered the competition, we didn't have a band we just had music. We were originally called the Rubber Head Bandage, because we needed a name. We had the name for the first three months and one of the things we continually heard was that a lot of people didn't know how to pronounce it or didn't understand it. It didn't have that impact. We wanted a new name and we came up with the name The Politics. There were a bunch of small bands around the world that had politics with different spellings, so we had to find a new name. We decided on New Politics with the help of A&R. Now it's set, this is it. The name isn't changing. We're the only ones called New Politics and it's registered.

You've just finished a tour of the UK and are gearing up for a tour of the US; in between you have the SXSW festival. Do you have any downtime in there?

We haven't really had a break to be honest. It really took off like a rocket. There was so much buzz and hype, just in Denmark alone. The response we were getting was just incredible. Whatever time we have free, we're writing songs. We're working on an album and we're hoping to have it done by the end of summer. And, if it all goes according to plan, hopefully a single by mid spring.

Of all the songs in your show, are there any that you get a big kick out of performing?

I think the whole performance is a kick. It's something we want to express and share with the crowd in front of us. We kind of unplug ourselves from everything around us and just perform for the crowd. What makes the show special, fun and memorable is the interaction with the crowd. The minute we go on stage we unplug. It's like going into a trance.

What is the craziest thing seen or experienced on tour?

When we performed this one concert, it was a mess. It was probably, technically, our worst concert but it didn't matter. It was so special, there was something about the energy of the whole performance and the crowd. I was up on a two-meter speaker, Soren was bleeding and hitting the guitar wrong, Poul had hit himself and was bleeding--there was a puddle under the drums -- and we just made a mess.

What do you like most about festivals?

The thing I love about festivals, especially for a band like us is that nobody knows the band, all we are now is a bit of hype. But one thing that I realize about festivals is that every individual there doesn't care who is playing or performing. You go to a festival; it's kind of like taking a break from life. People are there to listen to music and try new stuff. They're there to have fun. It's not a picky crowd, and that's what I love about festivals.


Jill Jackson is a contributor from Seed.com. Learn how you can contribute here.