Music / Psychedelia
Interview: Raptor Live Release
You may recall that Bristol based purveyors of psychedelic riffs Raptor launched their debut LP at Rough Trade back in May (read about said LP’s gestation here). Rather than just launching the LP they decided to preserve the event for posterity but not quite in the normal way… The Brothers Fletcher (aka Kurt, guitar and Adam, drums) gave us the skinny as well as an exclusive link to the end results.
So, you launched the Escapism LP back in May, how did the launch party go?
KURT: The launch show was amazing! The best thing for us was getting to hear people reactions to the new songs and the physical LP itself. We put a lot of thought into the whole release, it was so great to see so many people and friends come out to see us!
How have the critics reacted to the release?
Adam: We’ve had some great responses and reviews including one of our favourites It’s Psychedelic Baby magazine from Slovenia and Brave Words News USA. The response overall from Europe has been overwhelming! People have been mentioning how good the studio production sounds as well as how different the songs are from each other. Things like that are really nice to hear because those are the things we really pushed ourselves with whilst writing and recording the album.
And how about the fans?
BOTH: The same! The fan response to the new material has been ace. Everyone has been super supportive, and things are getting busier for us each and every day.
Dare we enquire how the sales are going, and what’s the split between real, solid product and airy-fairy downloading and streaming?
KURT: We’ve sold more vinyl that any CD release or digital download and have been sending out our hand painted, psychedelic mail packages to the UK, Ireland, America, Germany, Holland. We’ve always loved LPs because of the size of the artwork and the way it forces you to listen to an album sequentially. It gives us hope that vinyl and record shops are here to stay. We have everything available to stream/YouTube as well though, we want it out there for people to hear!
How about getting the LP out there, getting any radio plays?
ADAM: Yeah, it’s been getting a lot of radio play all over the world. Nick Giles from Rock Radio UK has been a massive pioneer as well as Andrew Marston from BBC Introducing, Radio Brooklyn NY, Global Psychedelia USA, California and airplays/articles in France, Greece, Russia, Turkey and Hungary. The whole band have been really surprised by it all! We’ve been really inspired by bands who have a fully independent/do it yourself kinda vibe, it’s pushed us to get ourselves out there instead of waiting for something to happen.
is needed now More than ever
And what about live dates?
BOTH: August is a free month that we are going to dedicate to music video filming and recording. In September we have a few shows coming up, here they are!1 4/09/19 – Worcester Music Festival, 19/09/19 – The Crofters Rights – Bristol w/ The Velveteers (USA) and 26/09/19 – The Prince Albert – Brighton.
Meanwhile, you’ve taken unusual methods to get yourselves a live document of the event, tell us what you’ve come up with for the footage?
ADAM: It was a real nerve-wracking night – the fact that we were going to film and record the night. Kurt had to pick his amp up on the same day which meant battling with Bristol 5pm traffic. Think we played a better show because of it!
KURT: Adam has been getting into a lot of production work and has been dying to record a live gig for ages! We asked our friends Harry Randall & Josh McColl to help record the album launch and that’s where the idea started really. About 2 days before the gig late one night we thought “wouldn’t it be cool if we got the audience to film the gig?” – and that would be the way people see it, from the audience perspective.
And who was the mastermind behind the concept?
ADAM: We both heavily contributed to the result. I came up with idea to film the gig and took care of mixing the sound. Kurt had the idea to take the video and audio editing further and to do something different with it. So instead of having crisp HD or grainy footage… we had both and more. To make it even more different, Kurt added lots of colours and wild effects to make the video interesting to watch.
How much of the footage was usable and how much was just the back of someone’s head?
KURT: To be honest we used every single piece of footage people took from the audience. Nothing was wasted (apart from certain individuals from the night…haha). All the different phone camera qualities and perspectives of each person was interesting to see, we saw things that we missed on the night! It was a real experiment – we found that if people were filming one thing, others would instinctively film something different or film another member of the band.
Did you take the precaution of having some professional footage too?
ADAM: No, we didn’t take any precautions, there was a main camera that filmed the band the whole time, but that was just Kurt’s camera and a £20 fisheye lens. In the past we had toyed with the idea of getting a company involved to film a show for us, but honestly, we felt like a lot of them charged extortionate amounts for something we could do ourselves.
What’s next for the band: writing the next album, touring this one or both?
KURT: We’ve already got a few new songs together, the next record is going to have a more experimental, heavier vibe. More music videos are in the works and we’re looking forward to the shows in September! For next year we want to put on more of our own shows and promote them ourselves.
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