After two years in their current line up, after tireless touring including several large UK festivals still to come this year, and just weeks before their new single Read And Write is released, Turbowolf got the Necromag treatment.

We had the great  pleasure of interviewing singer Chris Georgiadis a few days ago, fresh from a performance at The Great Escape Festival, Brighton, about how it feels to be playing one of the biggest rock festivals of the year; DOWNLOAD 2009.

How long have TURBOWOLF been together?
been together for about, well this incarnation, for almost two years

You say this incarnation, which form did you take before?
We kind of wrote, me and Andy in the band wrote a few songs three years ago and we got a few people we know from other bands to play until we finally settle on what we are now, a four piece.

Have you been touring a lot as a headliner or doing any big support slots?
we just came back from the states, we’ve just done SXSW in Austin, Texas and um, we’re down in Brighton the moment doing the great escape festival, we just played a set this morning and we’re going to do a support slot for Juliette Lewis tomorrow night in Brighton and we’re doing Download next month, so really we’re just doing festivals this summer otherwise we tend to do headline slots back in our home town of Bristol. Other wise when we’re going off to other places like London or around the country we usually play support.

Which Support slot has meant the most to you?
A band called Monotonix from Israel, they’re an awesome band and they’re a great band to play with played with them twice now and seen  them countless times. absolutely incredible if you get a chance to you should check them out.

Theres been so many, I guess our friends Invasion from London, they’re an awesome band, The Computers, which are wicked, we’re really good mates with them. Just bands that we like on that sort of level, you know, definitely, but at Download we’re looking forward to cause we get to see Faith No More and we’re all big fans, it’ll be awesome.

You say you’ve got Download coming up and i’ve got noticed that you’ve got a few other festivals lined up too like Middlesbrough Music Live and the Relentless festival…

Relentless? Yeah, we’re doing a gig in Milton Keynes Arena, like a snowboard event, we also did a show for Relentless this morning in Brighton as part of the Great Escape like a secret show on the beach, its pretty wild. Yeah, we’re doing a snowboard event for them and Vans next month I think, or the end of this month. And We’re doing The Stag and Dagger Festival in London next week, Don’t know if you’ve heard of that. Its like around Shoreditch and Hoxton, Its been going for a few years and its abit like Dot to Dot and The Great Escape like a sort of festival in venues around the city.

Turbowolf's beachside performance at The Great Escape festival

Were you approached to do a lot of festivals this year, or did you persue these gigs?

We’ve just been kind of doing it all our selves and anything we’ve had genereated has come of our own work and come from playing a lot live and stuff, so I think its just come that point where people s0rt of prick their ears up, and email us and say “how about this?”
So yeah, Its all kinda working out well.

So, is Download pretty much the icing on the cake?

Yeah, Absolulely, but I wish it was still called Donnington Monsters Of Rock festival.
Its kind of a scene that you have to do if you’re a metal band and we’re sort of a rock/metal band I guess so its absolutely great, and just to be able to go for free as well, thats great.

You Just described yourself as a rock/metal band; What would you
Say is the best way to describe Turbowolf?

We sound a bit like napalm being dropped on you and all your skins tearing off your naked body being poured with salt and writhing on the floor.
Thats how we like to do things realy.. Heh.

I can’t really argue with that one… I’ve heard a lot of talk about electronic elements in the music

Yeah, yeah…. We’ve got a keyboard. I think at the moment, or a least  a while ago it was quite a sort of popular thing  to have keyboards in bands, and a lot of bands do have them, but we are always up for using a variety of different sounds, instruments and weird noises, and its really just a tool. We like to use various tools to make the sounds that we do. I guess electronic is a part of our sound. We cross over a lot of different things.

With this electronic element, has it affected the kind of bands you’ve toured with?

Yeah, Its just meant we’ve been able to get on the bill of things like the Loop festival, Which is an electronic music festival in brighton over a weekend and we played that last year. Its kind of weird because we were the only rock band playing it, and if you listen to our music its not really electronica, its pretty heavy rock. I guess having a keyboard has really helped us get in to play these sort of shows and yeah, Its great. It means that we can play to a lot of different audiences.
Our live shows have got so much energy and we’re so passionate when we’re out there and we love it so much when we’re playing live.
I think, no matter if you’re an indie kid or a hard core kid or what ever you listen to you’re going to get in to it and I think people realise that we can play club night shows and the crowd gets into it.

The other members of Turbowolf; are they all from the same area?

We’re all from Bristol.  At first it was just me and Andy in the band, writing a bunch of songs and then we went into how to make it how to happen live and after that I guess wherever you are you kind of stumble into people that you think might fit in the band
The people that we’ve got at the moment; That is the band, have been with us for 2 years now. Thats the band now. I don’t think theres going to be any changes.

Are there any people like artists or other bands that are friends of the group that help you, like part of the Turbowolf Family?

I mentioned a few of those bands earlier on, Invasion, The Computers, Monotonix. who we hopefully wanna tour with in the autumn. The City, from Brighton, they’re good mates of ours, theres a whole bunch of bands we like playing with but they’re pretty much the core I guess.

When is the single out?

We’ve got a single coming out, Its called Read and Write. Its out the 15th of June, the day after our Download performance. Its out then and you can obviously buy it, download it or what ever. Buy it at one of our gigs. It’ll be distributed through a few record shops as well.

Do you have an album out as well?

No, No album. We’re writing the album and that should hopefully be coming out, well when ever we want really. Its good not having a label because you can just do things at your own pace. We’re just enjoying what we’re doing at the moment a nd doing festivals and writing quite  alot. we want to make sure the album is totally awesome. We’re not going to rush it at all just take our time and do it when it feels right.

Is the album just a collection of songs or is there an idea behind any of it?

not as yet theres a few ideas floating around. i don’t know if its gonna be a concept album or not. its definitely going to have more than just songs on there. its not going to be just tracks. were gonna have fun with it and basically make it into a bit of a journey for the listener. So you’re getting something more than if you were coming to see us, in a different way.

Have you had any other singles out other than Read and Write?

We had a single come out end of last year. we put out a single called bite. thats still around, you can get it on the internet. We made some records; 7 inch vinyls and we sold all of those pretty quickly.  We got 5,000 records done, distributed and stuff, so I think we might have a few left that we take around to sell with us at gigs, but theres not that many left. We’re down to our last 30 or 40 and thats good.

Being without a label, do you find there is any trouble with distribution?

The industry’s changing at the moment and everythings up in the air and noone knows what to do and how to make money out of it, but as as a band, we’re just getting by. We’re just enjoying it, making music and we just sort of blag whatever we can really. thats what its all about really; you’ve got to meet people, get in with the right people, scratch peoples backs to get them to scratch yours and thts the way it works. Its like the whole business side of it coexsists with being in the band. You’ve gotta do that if you wanna play alot of shows and you want to get by, thats what you gotta do.  So yeah, we’ve just been kinda fortunate to have people around us who we can rely on to help us with recording and distribution. Its all DIY really and thats ok, it works out for us.

Whats actually been the best way to distribute?

The internet’s great for selling stuff like that but I guess we’ve liked selling at our gigs the most. Theres an instant connection with who’s buying it. Theres something nice about that rather than someone just sitting there clicking at home they’re there and they’ve experienced a show that they’ve really liked and they want to take something away and they get to meet this person.  Its kinda cool.  I like that about it.

How would you describe the live experience of Turbowolf?

I’d say it was like a terrifying noise party, its like we’re basically making the music of our dreams. we’re combining all these things that we’ve heard and we like and trying to make something thats a bit fresh and different that we’d like to listen to. Live, Its about energy and getting the crowd involved and just blowing the place apart really.

Turbowolf are constantly on tour.  current tour dates, including festivals can be found on our gig gide [here].
Turbowolf  will also be featured in the 5th Necromag Podcast; our Download festival special, due around Tuesday.

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