Midlands-born fast rising important punk duo Big Special have shared the deluxe edition of their acclaimed debut album ‘POSTINDUSTRIAL HOMETOWN BLUES’. Successful collaborations, sold out shows and the two supporting The Pixies gave us more than enough reason for an interview!
Big Special bellow their words, and those words matter, the Midlands duo write about desperation and struggle, about a Britain in decline, about finding pride in your darkest moments and about how the real class war in the UK is always punching downwards. Theirs are words of hope, despair, and more hope, because we simply have to believe that in the end the good people win. We sat down with Joe and Cal to talk about the deluxe edition of their debut album which was just released and includes collaborations with Sleaford Mods and Public Service Broadcasting, as well as early demos and acoustic versions of their songs. They’re doing things differently and they’re doing it passionately, and that’s palpable in all they do and say.
What drives Big Special?
Joe: “We don’t want a normal job anymore”
Cal: “We’re two lads from the midlands and met when we were teenagers. Over lockdown we spent the entire time indoors writing twenty, thirty odd tunes. We wanted to make sure we were giving a complete honest representation of ourselves and our perspectives of the world and our lives. Two years later we started gigging and we released our first album last year and it’s been one mad adventure. Since we’ve put the album out it’s been non-stop. It’s been a bit intense, we’ve just been cracking on. We tried so long to be musicians and it didn’t happen until we were in our thirties. I ain’t giving this lifestyle up for anything, we’re very keen.”
What is your approach to writing songs?
Joe: “We don’t really have a method. We’ve got our ways, we jam and improvise and build a song structure around that. Lyrics can come from anywhere. I make a lot of notes and revise them and keep them in separate piles. We just put the work in and we then get songs out of it. We like to work pretty quick, and then we like to think everything through a million times.”
How did you approach those that you worked with on the new album?
Joe: “It’s been a bit of both between ourselves and the label. It was brilliant to have artists that we respect on the album, Sleaford Mods are our faves, so it was a dream come true.”
Cal: “Through gigging we’ve made a lot of mates along the way, it’s been lovely. We also know the album better now, going back over it and putting out the acoustic versions and the demos from the early days. It was a nice little reflection.”
What is it like being in the studio?
Joe: “We have fun in the studio, music isn’t a means to an end, we make a racket and see where that goes. We don’t take the making of it too seriously. It gets a bit hard sometimes trying to explain things to each other, “don’t you think things should be more squishy? The bit back here when it went “bah”…”. We all try to make the best things we can make. It’s great, I love being in the studio.”
What is your background in music?
Cal: “We met at a BTEC music course. The way we started writing music together was at seventeen years old our college tutor was like “you play guitar, you play drums”, you go in that room together then. And we ended up liking writing tunes together.”
Joe: “And we’re still writing tunes together now!”
How do you keep the mental balance when life gets tough?
Cal: “All of our music is sort of based on that fight against depression. We’re both very understanding people when it comes to that. When you’ve been on the road, everyone is unwashed, knackered and broken in different ways, we’ve just always had the gift of the gab of staying afloat and understanding. Also knowing that now we are doing our dream job and it’s happening together, we navigate and understand each other quite well.”
How do you protect the peace when on tour?
Joe: “We smoke weed.”
Cal: “Haha, we have holistic calming techniques, like rolling a fat one and having some space. There is no personal space on the road, when you finally have a day off it is important to take time for yourself. When someone’s sleeping, let them sleep, no one gets enough sleep on the road! Learning where people’s lines are and respecting that.”
Who else would you like to work with within the next few years?
Joe: “CMAT. I’d love to do a duet covers EP with CMAT, where we do synthy punk covers.”
Cal: “I’m a huge The Streets fan, so I’d love to work with Mike Skinner, he’s a midlands lads like us, so if we could convince the man… Anyone who’s willing to deal with us though.”
What does success mean to you?
Joe: “I feel successful in the sense that I’m living off music, it was the main goal. I feel successful but there’s still loads I want to do and achieve. I look back at the kid of my past and want to say “yeah man, we did it”.”
Cal: “I used to have to get up at 5am and hated it every single time, so the fact that we’re here by choice and that we’re doing it on our own is the best bit about the whole thing.”
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