Viva Brighton April 2015 Issue #26

music
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Polar Bear
Hard-to-classify jazzers
Photo Kristy Campbell
Noted for his drumming talents and his Sideshow
Bob hairdo, Seb Rochford was a key member of
the Hendrix-covering jazz/punk band Acoustic
Ladyland. They’re no longer active, but he’s coming
to Brighton this month with Polar Bear, which has
three of the same members, two Mercury nominations,
and a jazz-like sound that no-one seems quite
sure how to describe.
You’ve said you wanted to play drums ‘ever since
I was four years old or so’. Was that a typical
four-year-old’s enthusiasm for anything you can
hit and make a noise with, or were you really
into music at that point? Yeah, I’ve been very, very,
very into music for as long as I can remember.
In your teens, according to Time Out, you
‘played with indie, metal and hardcore outfits’.
How did you start moving from that towards
jazz? My mum played me jazz from when I was a
baby, so I was always hearing it, although I couldn’t
connect to it for a long time. Seeing it live really
changed things for me; she took me to see [saxophonist]
Andy Sheppard, which I really enjoyed a
lot. That started me listening to it at home. For any
style of music, for me it’s just about finding the door
in. Thelonious Monk and Duke Ellington were also
very important doors for me into jazz.
What were your early years in London like,
when you were carrying your whole drumkit on
the Tube to gigs, and trying to get established?
I was really broke when I first came to London and
did anything I could to play and get inspiration,
finding out where the free gigs were and walking to
them if I didn’t have any money. I carried my drums
on the Tube, stands in a rucksack, drums packed
inside each other in my arms and cymbals on my
shoulder. I did this for three or four years.
Did you do any non-musical jobs to get by? Or
any unrewarding jobs as a drummer-for-hire?
When I first came, once a week I would sing nursery
rhymes with children in Ealing, and also play piano
with a man who had Down’s Syndrome. After the
positive effect the music was having on him, they
increased it to twice a week. I learnt a lot from
spending time with him. These two things enabled
me to survive very basically, but still gave me plenty
of time to practise. When I saw the standard in
London I thought I really had to practise a huge
amount if people were going to want to play with
me. Because I didn’t study in London, I felt like it
took me a bit longer to meet people, but was lucky
that, at the first jam session I went to, I met an amazing
musician called Rachel Musson, who took my
number and asked me to have a jam with her. This is
who I started Polar Bear with. Steve Ramsey
Polar Bear + Leafcutter John, Wed 15 April, Komedia,
7.30pm, £15
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