Munch Munch Interview: SXSW 2010

Posted on Mar 11th 2010 11:15AM by Farah Ishaq
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Playing a phenomenal eight showcase gigs at SXSW 2010, Bristol's Munch Munch look determined to work hard since three of the four members have now graduated from college. "We haven't played in the US before, there's so much stuff we've just realised we have to sort out at the last moment: like power adapters, car hire, visas." New single 'Cyclorama' is out this month on Fear and Records. Spinner caught up with Carrell in between car journeys to sort out all the details ahead of Munch Munch's neon-pop assault on Austin.

Could you please describe your sound in your own words.

Explosive. Some people describe us as ADD as we kind of change stuff a lot. Colourful, energetic.

How did your band form?

We all came together at university. Everyone's graduated apart from me -- I'm in my final year. I was playing a Eurythmics song at an open mic night and Rich [Manber] talked to me afterwards and we realised we were into the same stuff. We made some stuff on a laptop and then we decided we didn't want to be one of those bands with backing tracks on stage. Because we had complicated drum beats at that stage, we thought we needed two drummers to do it. That's when we got Jack [O'Connor] and Sarah [Renwick] on board.

What are your musical influences?

When we started out four years ago it was contemporary stuff like Animal Collective. I listen to mainly older stuff now. Fleetwood Mac is a big one at the moment and Burt Bacharach is someone I constantly listen to. Sparks are quite a big influence. Really pop, actually. We approach making music in quite a naive way, because I'm not trained in music. We just want to chuck stuff together.

How did you come up with your band name?

We had loads of stupid ideas. At one point we wanted to use 'Jesus Sex Party'.

A name like that wouldn't have helped your American visa chances...

Exactly! Rich likes a band called the Plot to Blow Up the Eiffel Tower. At their visa interview they had to lie about their name.

We just wanted something really dynamic, and someone said 'munch munch banana' and we just cut the banana off. We didn't realise that we would keep doing stuff. It was just stuff me and Rich were doing on our laptop, we just had to give it a name when we made the MySpace page. I guess lots of bands have names that don't really mean anything because they didn't realise they were going to keep going, and then get stuck with these names!

What's your biggest vice?

Fast food. Any really bad stuff -- I eat it! I feel really bad about it and everyone in the band has a go at me for it, which is fair enough as some of it is just really rough.

What's in your festival survival kit?

You know those tents that say they are two man when actually they can only fit one? I say always get a tent which is two sizes above than you need. I went to Green Man festival last summer and bought a tent from Argos. It said two man, but it wasn't! The person I was sharing with wasn't a small person either.

Who was your first celebrity crush?

I had a really weird one. When I was seven I kind of had a weird crush on Joanna Lumley. Not her when she was younger, her when she was older.

What's your musical guilty pleasure?

A lot of the stuff I like nowadays is stuff I never used to like. Kitsch stuff like Abba. I'm really into Abba now, when I used to hate them. Guilty? Maybe Lady Gaga? I just like her stuff generally -- maybe that's not even a guilty pleasure.

Beatles or Stones?

Definitely the Beatles. I'm not that familiar with a lot of the Stones stuff so that probably helps sway my vote. The experimentation, the range of stuff they were doing. I don't know much Stones stuff but everything I have heard just ploughs off the same blues influence that I'm not really into. Maybe if the Stones had stopped at the same time as the Beatles and didn't continue they would be better? I don't know. All the albums that they do are just excuses to tour.

What's the craziest thing you've seen or experienced while on tour?

We came out of a gig in Liverpool and were loading stuff into my car -- which we were using for that tour -- and there was this guy who was wiping his penis all down my car! I tried to pull him off and then he opened the back door and was about to p--- fully into my car! It was so horrible.