The Edge interviews Eoin and Rory Loveless from Drenge just minutes before their first gig in Southampton’s most famous venue. We proceed to talk about how being in a band with your brother is like primary school half-term, when to watch Game of Thrones and dreaming of keeping a good garden.
How has the current tour been?
Eoin: Really fun!
Rory: Weird that we get to do this and people come and see us, it’s just a massive compliment.
Any highlights?
Eoin: Waking up this morning without a hangover, the weather has also been really good.
Rory: Even though we haven’t played any outside venues.
Eoin: But it just helps you get through the day. Lowlights, Wytches’s gear getting stolen.
Rory: Yeah they got some guitars stolen, had to borrow some from a mate’s band, which is good but not good, cause they shouldn’t have to.
Eoin: Birmingham was fun, cause Birmingham is always a really nice place and they look after us very well there, and it’s our first time in Southampton.
Rory: It should be really good because it’s the Joiners; a legendary venue.
Eoin: Bristol has a pretty decent burrito bar we haven’t visited yet, so that should be good.
The Joiners was recently awarded the best small venue in Britain by NME, do you think there any that could contest that?
Rory: The Hundred Club in London is great, and I’m looking forward to the Joiners, because I’ve heard so much about it.
Eoin: I’d say my favourite small venue that we’ve played is the Deaf Institute in Manchester, I think they have really thought about how it is to play a sweaty gig in horrible, dark places that have been there since the 70’s.
What’s it like being in a band of just two brothers?
Rory: It’s like when you have half term during primary school, you’re just at home all the time and you might go out to the park now and then, but kinda for a living cause kids don’t make a lot of money.
Eoin: There’s quite a few years when the only the times we’d see each other would be meal times, so it’s like an eternal meal time.
Rory: It’s a bit like those mornings when your mum would cut up an apple for us and put it in a bowl and we’d watch the telly.
Eoin: yeah, like Skippy the Kangaroo.
Where do you think punk is at the moment?
Eoin: Now punk’s been done and you can’t really do anything like punk that’s hasn’t already been done and it lasted for a year and sort of burned out. But politically it has a strong relevance now, but musically I don’t think it has stopped, or will ever stop.
Looking at your website, you get the impression that you guys like to collect vinyls and records, where in particular does that stem from?
Eoin: It helps you to appreciate music more, when you have a physical thing to look after, almost like a child.
Rory: When you’re listening to music on the internet you can just move onto something else straight away, but with a record you have to get the turntable out and put it away again.
Eoin: As a musician you learn the rules of what an album is.
Rory: Yeah, with how the current business is like: ‘you can’t put that track on itunes there, it doesn’t look right’. Also the more you spend on a record the more you have to enjoy it, cause you’ve just bankrupt yourself.
I recently watched the music video for your track Backwaters, how fun was it to smash up a car?
Rory: We told them what we wanted in the video and they came back with: ‘the boys smash up a car’, and we were like ignore everything else and go for it.
Eoin: I was like, you’re just going give us a car to smash up and drive around, and I hadn’t driven a car in a while, in fact the best bit was driving the car actually.
Rory: Smashing the car was a little bit stressful, because we had to look like we were having fun, I don’t normally smash things up, it’s not a hobby.
Do you guys watch Game of Thrones?
Boys: Yep!
Have you watched-
Boys: Nope! Don’t talk about it!
Rory: When this season is finished I’m tempted to just get it all done in one big hit. (To Eoin) You up for that? We always watch them together.
Eoin: And Breaking Bad as well! T.V series are a good thing to do on the road because you’ve got so much free time but we never do, we just do it when we’re at home.
Rory: We just sit in the van and do nothing.
You’ve got several festivals coming up, like Reading and Latitude, excited?
Rory: Yeah, we’re going to hang in the VIP area!
Any plans for the future?
Rory: (To Eoin) What was I saying today? About if I ever had kids? I probably thought it was quite funny then but it was quite boring.
Eoin: I’d like to get better at cooking!
Rory: I need to start brushing my teeth three times a day, got a dentist appointment soon. I’d like to keep a good garden when I’m older, get into that, and listen to more Radio 4. As a band, you can’t really tell with these things, just do it one day at a time.
Drenge have just released single ‘Backwaters’ and will play sets at Reading and Leeds and Latitude festivals this summer.
