Quiet Rock Stars - The Brian Jacket Letdown

Sometimes in life you’ve just got to seize the opportunity, grab the bull by the horns and roll the dice of chance in order to get to where you want to be. Although that might mean making sacrifices, ultimately, where do you really want to spend the rest of your life? If, like Gigwise, you feel enlightened by that little moral boosting speech, then welcome to the club, or rather, welcome to a club that’s chaired by The Brian Jacket Letdown – a club where if you take the first step, good things really can, and do happen.

It’s a late morning at the beginning of April when Gigwise catches up with 28-year old Will Harper, front man and co-founder of The Brian Jacket Letdown, and the reason why our self-belief is on an all time high. It’s clear as well that, after spending half an hour in his company – talking about everything from music to puppets –he’s feeling the same way. And his reason? Well, his band - who have spawned from a schoolboy friendship with the groups keyboardist Tom Philips - are on the verge of the most important month in their history. A month, which will see them record their complete debut album. How things can change if you decide to take the plunge, eh?

“It’s all we’ve ever worked to do for so long, for years and years, to record our first album. It’s great that we’re getting it together, it’s really cool. We’re going to be in there for ten days in a mad studio in Manor House and we’re going to be recording in the lovely people’s kitchen because apparently that’s where the best sound is,” barely containing his excitement, he continues. “We’re filling the drum room with fridges and tables and stuff and we’re going to move the drums in the kitchen area and record in there. It’s really nice of the people that run the studio. We’re really excited about it – I think it’s going to be a lot of fun.”

The career direction of TBJL, although it’s always been fun, hasn’t always been as obvious for its members as it has become of late. Initially it was just Will and Tom. Then, just two twelve-year old school mates from Islington who had a passion for music, and who just happened to have a dusty old four track recorder in their self-constructed home ‘studio’ (Tom’s Mum’s basement) onto which they recorded, as Will puts it, “tunes and stuff.” Music, therefore, was more of a pastime than a viable career prospect. It’s only when 26-year old Dan Radclyffe, a dab hand on the drums and bass (they’re a very multi-tasking bunch), joined them in 2004 that things became more forward thinking, and started to feel like a genuine band. “We met Dan, who is half Brazilian and he plays things like bass guitar and drums which opened it out and turned it more into a band scenario kind of thing.”

Since the “core” trio of the band found each other (live, depending on who’s available, TBJL do also feature other multi-instrumentalists) and, since their first gig at The Enterprise in Camden where they took that first step, the momentum behind TDJL has been brooding nicely and, although they don’t want to lose the “natural connection” through which their music is created, Will admits there’s suddenly an audience to ‘work’ for. “Now we’re quite into promoting it and making people hear it and stuff which is something that is quite a new idea for me and Tom who have been playing together for so long. Suddenly thinking about an audience listening to it does change what you write; it makes it grow a bit.”