Propellerheads: Drums Gone To Iceland
SATURDAY lunchtime and we climb into two cars to go and hunt for elves, find mountains, and take photographs. Spessy, a local photographer who is driving one car, believes, like most Icelanders, that the countryside is dotted by the homes of thousands of elves, who come in all sorts of different, er, breeds. Roads have apparently been re-routed so as not to disturb the elves' domestic bliss. The Props raise an eyebrow, but are prepared to go with this. Alex and I climb into the other car, driven by the Santa hat girl from last night. "I make films," she announces, "short, intense, surrealistic films."
She could make one about our journey, as we bounce along black dirt tracks through bleak, deserted, yet strangely beautiful, mountain vistas, to take photos and visit a geyser (Alex and Will whip out the portable DAT player here to grab some samples). We bounce recklessly along rocky tracks like this is a rally video game, driver giggling every time a boulder clangs her axle, Stan Getz blowing gentle, incongruous sax out the car stereo.
By 4pm it's dark and we hire costumes to swim in the Blue Lagoon, a lake-sized hot spring next to a space age power station, a truly surreal experience when it's close to zero and you're surrounded by black, black mountains. And in a place where no birds sing.
I MET Alex once before, when he was playing keyboards for The Grid and they were rehearsing in London's Kings Cross. I can remember he seemed to have too much presence for a hired keyboard player, rather than one of the band. He originally moved to Bath from the Southampton area to study electronics, dropping out of the course because it was "spod central". He became a session man playing sax for The Stranglers (who lived locally) and keyboards for jazz/blues legend Van Morrison. Playing for Van The Man he describes as close to a "spiritual experience". Van gave few instructions, though he once barked: "No sevenths! Sevenths are an abomination!" Despite The Stranglers link, he denies his youth went any more punk than "a bit of a fashion crisis in that direction", which he wisely declines to elaborate on.
Will's dad was a jazz drummer, so there was always a kit lying around the house. "He says you've got to have been through at least two divorce settlements and have a beard before you can play jazz," grins Will. "Has he had two divorce settlements?" asks Alex. "Almost. He's had one. And he's got a beard."
Will used to drum for West Country-based festival trip hop outfit Junkwaffle and met Alex on Bath's tiny music scene. Both are at great pains to point out that hip hop kid Will drums out breaks and grooves like a drum machine, not like a jazz drummer.
"When we first got together Alex came to me with a lump of tunes," he recalls, which sets them off giggling again. "A lump of tunes?" echoes Alex, incredulously. "A lump of tunes. A gaggle of tunes. A herd..." "A herd!" "A herd of tunes and basically just gave me this rocking tape."
You can't help liking the Propellerheads. Neither can the Icelanders, who keep coming up and shaking their hands. 'Decksandrumsandrock androll' is not a great album, but neither was the Chemical Brothers' first, 'Exit Planet Dust'. Alex and Will are smart and talented enough to easily surpass 'Take California' and that 'Lopez' remix, they just haven't committed it to long player yet. They will.
MANY hours later - via a mad drinking session with two lovely Icelandic mothers who take us to Reykjavik's Queen Vic to hear one of their husbands sing Oasis songs, and later, a strange soiree where a DJ for the band Gus Gus, who is wearing a marijuana tie, insists we all whisper - we end up outside a block of flats. Inside, we can see a handful of people leaping around a large living room to Ed Rush-style horror jungle. After much banging, a small, dark-haired girl ushers us into her party.
It's Bjork. I guess she was in town after all. And The Propellerheads? They're still laughing...
'Decksanddrumsandrockandroll' is out now on Wall Of Sound
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