Articles - Features

Monday Mixtape: Silverbacks

81949209_2677605429002797_5506599453059973120_o

From Broadcast to Sonic Youth, Kilian and Daniel from Dublin indie rock five-piece Silverbacks take us on a guided tour of the acts and tracks that made an imprint on their recent singles ‘Drool’ and ‘Sirens’.

Stones by Sonic Youth

At the time we wrote Drool I have been listening to Sonic Nurse a lot. Similar enough drumbeat to Stones too ey? – K

Lazy Eye by Silversun Pickups

I’ll be honest, I don’t know any other songs by this band but this song used to be in an old iTunes library on Daniel’s laptop years ago. The noodly guitar riff that happens between 2:16 and 2:24 in this track is on a similar buzz to the verse riff in Drool. – K

Broadcast

Once we brought Drool to the studio certain parts of how we played it as a band reminded me of Broadcast’s sound. Using Broadcast as a reference point, we started tinkering with reverb and delay on Emma’s harmonies. It also helped us find the right synth sound for the outro. – D

LCD Soundsystem – Losing My Edge

When we initially started recording the demo the aim was to write an LCD rip-off. Something like Losing My Edge but with way more guitars. The more the song developed the less it ended up sounding like LCD. Anyway, I think we failed, but in a good way. – D

Super Furry Animals – Northern Lites

When recording the demo, I weirdly started weirdly singing like Gruff Rhys in the second part of the chorus. It didn’t make the final studio version but I always think of the Super Furries and a welsh accent when I hear ‘the middle minorities will never understand’. Oh, and Northern Lites is one of the best songs ever written. – D

Deerhunter – Nothing Ever Happened

The outro kraut-rock groove in Sirens is heavily inspired by Deerhunter’s anthem. It would be nice to eventually extend our imitation to 10 minutes like Deerhunter do here. We’re working on it. – D

Larry Wallis – Police Car

Sirens, police cars etc. Beep beep, this is a jam. – D

Secret bonus song:

Thin Lizzy – The Boys Are Back In Town

is the editor of The Thin Air. Talk to him about Philip Glass and/or follow him on Twitter @brianconey.