Her Name is Calla Interview

These are exciting times for Her Name is Calla. Having spent six or so years making music together, they have reached a stage precious few bands attain, where their music is so utterly unique and so magically enriching that you marvel at the fact that mere human beings should be capable of creating such a thing. It’s a very good time for the band to be releasing their debut album then, and we recently caught up with Tom from the band for a bit of a natter about it.

For the benefit of those of us who enjoy being able to neatly categorise their record collection, the first thing we want clearing up is the thorny issue of whether forthcoming record The Quiet Lamb is their debut, or whether that would be 2008’s The Heritage? “I consider The Quiet Lamb our second album but some of the other guys don't and acknowledge it as our first. We're an unnecessarily complicated bunch of people, sorry. The difference for me would be how the record works as a cohesive whole, which I feel both albums do. That said, you could also consider that we intended The Quiet Lamb to be a full album, and so may have approached it differently from the start. That might not be true of The Heritage”.

So clearly, the band’s opinions differ on the semantics. They do, however, show an entirely united front on the much more important issues surrounding the creation of the music. The thoughtful sound of The Quiet Lamb was borne out of a determination not to hurry things, but although this approach has yielded an astonishing piece of music, it wasn’t without the odd wobble: “I always knew the album would be finished and released as it's a hugely important piece of work for us. We wouldn't have just let it fall by the wayside. But our promise to ourselves was that we wouldn't rush it and that we'd get it as close to perfect as we could. Obviously, the moment we sent it to Denovali for pressing we totally shit ourselves and found there were things that we wanted to change, but sometimes it's important to just let go. We recognised that we'd completed the album to the best of our abilities in quite difficult circumstances. For sure there were a few moments along the way where things seemed really bleak and unending. We scrapped the entire album recordings about four or five times, I think.”

To make life even trickier, the current economic climate means that a harsh reality of life for any musicians who aren’t selling out arenas is the ongoing problem of earning enough money to simply keep going, something Tom has recently highlighted in the band’s blog. Something that can’t help matters is the emergence of a culture in which people view it as their right to help themselves to music for free: “I think it's a disappointment. I don't have much money at all, but when I'm able to buy a record it makes it all that more special. I don't download music illegally. What's the point? I'd be a contradiction. It affects us hugely. Some folks think that it is only an issue for big bands but if anything it's the other way around. It's harder for the smaller bands or the bands that are just breaking out to a bigger audience. We give plenty of music away for free and there are plenty of tracks from the new album that are available to stream. Ultimately, downloading the album via illegal means does directly damage us as well as our label. I think it should be our choice to make it available for free download or not. That's something we chose for our first album and and EP we released earlier in the year.”

Given Tom’s feelings towards the pleasures of the physical specimen of a record, it’s no surprise that the presentation of their music is important to the band, resulting in the wooden box special edition of The Quiet Lamb: “We didn't put all this effort into making an album so that iTunes and MySpace could compress the living fuck out of it. I buy my music and there are people out there who do the same, so this album is for them, the folks who like to feel a record in their hands, smell it and leaf their way through a beautiful booklet of artwork whilst the record plays.”

From an entirely musical standpoint, although The Heritage was an extremely impressive piece of work, The Quiet Lamb feels like a big step up for the band, not just in terms of running time, but in terms of its scale, and an all-pervading sense of grandeur about the thing. With regard to how the two records sit together, Tom recognises more differences than similarities: “Both albums are fairly autobiographical. There are parts which are total creation, but those parts are far and few between. Mostly it documents the relationship with my ex-wife, the shit I put her through. There are certain punishments that I expect. If the album sounds personal it's because it is. The Heritage was more about the past and the future and what we'll leave behind. The Quiet Lamb is very much present tense. I'm happier with The Quiet Lamb. It's the first album where we worked together as a full band. It feels more complete and I'm happier with the arrangements and production. Even though both albums were just recorded in our houses, with the new album we were just a bit more experienced and found a better way of working.”

Although they are now freed from the recording environment, Tom expects the band to be no less busy over the next twelve months: “We'll do a few tours, and we are already in the initial stages of a new record that we'd like to release next year if all works out. We've also recorded a collaborative album with our friends The Monroe Transfer. That should come out early next year; it's just being mixed at the moment. There are all sorts of side projects and things going on as well.” So if for any reason the seventy-five minute masterpiece of The Quiet Lamb doesn’t slake your thirst for all things Calla, there’s plenty more music on the horizon. Can’t wait...