Issue 47 / August 2014

6
Bido Lito! August 2014
Words: Phil Gwyn / notmanyexperts.com
Photography: Aaron McManus / ampix.co.uk
As Bido Lito! reaches what feels like the twenty-bloodyfirst
floor of one of Liverpool’s rehearsal spaces, the constant
barrage from some of our city’s finest metal connoisseurs starts
making us wonder whether we can be in the right place to find
the spaced-out wanderings of SUNSTACK JONES. As the door to
the final corridor of the final floor is pushed open, though, the
lethargic euphoria of If I Could Only Find A Way drifts through,
transforming a space that previously felt like one of Guantánamo
Bay’s interrogation rooms into a stretch of the Mediterranean
gazed upon by a disappearing sun.
A diplomatically suggested exit and a pint later, and Sunstack
Jones (minus bassist Dan) are in a very candid mood. As Chris
(Vocals and Guitar), Lorcan
(Guitar) and Richy
(Drums) talk us
through the
making of
their
second record, Roam, a picture starts to emerge of Sunstack Jones
as a brilliant barrel of contradictions. They’re at once cloaked in
that psych-indie haze so linked to Liverpool and critical of some
bands’ small-town mentalities; both openly praising their tunes
for being “fucking good”, and self-deprecatingly observing that
their slabs of vinyl will most likely still be gazing forlornly out
from under their beds in ten years’ time; simultaneously outlining
their ambition to equal their heroes (The War On Drugs and Sharon
Van Etten are mentioned) whilst conceding that, if their talents
go unrecognised, they’ll still be plugging away in ten years’ time
simply for the selfish joy of it.
“We’re not desperate, but there’s not a lack of ambition either.
It’s working for us,” Richy says of the band’s balanced approach,
as his older brother Chris adds that “There’s just no fuss really.
Some people are like ‘we’re gonna be the next x or y.’
That’s just embarrassing... We’re just making good
music and hoping that someone hears it and likes
it.” Ambivalent it might be, but it’s a modest
plan which has slowly been winning the
band the plaudits that their welding
together of billowing soundscapes and sharp melodies deserves.
“When we sold the 250 copies of the first record [Surefire Ways To
Sweeten The Mind] we were happy because it funded the second
record, but at the same time you’re thinking, ‘well, 2,000 or 20,000
people would like that record’, but we’re not good at promoting
ourselves. We can’t even walk down the street properly...”
“We’re not good at promoting ourselves.” It’s not a sentence
that you’d have heard escape from many bands’ mouths before
the turn of the millennium, but then, as the popular cliché goes,
‘the internet changed everything’. Well, perhaps not everything,
but, as the record labels’ business model was eroded by a torrent
of free music, suddenly bands who would previously have found
themselves on the receiving end of a record company’s hefty
marketing budget found themselves locked in a perpetual online
battle-of-the-bands, fighting it out with thousands of other
hopefuls for the fleeting attention of ‘the internet’. As Chris puts it
with a definite air of exasperation, “We’re going to put our album
out on the 28th, and it feels real to us because we’ve finally got
that physical copy of it, but on that same day millions of people
will put up their latest shitty demo. There’s no sorting. That’s the
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