Fighting With Wire - Interview

  by Aaron Brown

published: 22 / 5 / 2006

intro

Formed out the ashes of the ill-fated Clearshot, Northern Irish trio Fighting with Wire have toured with the likes of Biffo Clyro and Million Dead. Aaron Brown speaks to singer Cahir O' Doherty about the band's forthcoming album

For some bands, life on the road becomes too much. Playing the same toilet venues over and over again and having no money becomes tedious and a constant struggle to survive. Sure, many bands end due to differences of opinion, that fact that fame has alluded them and the obligatory "creative differences’. Fighting With Wire however, are not one of those bands. Having toured with the likes of likes of Biffy Clyro, InME and Million Dead and having a sometime member of cult indie band, Jet Plane Landing, in your ranks does not hurt when you are looking for the old recognition. Formed out of the ashes of Clearshot after the tragic suicide of bass player Martin McCafferty in 2003, Fighting With Wire have been making a Fugazi inspired racket that is slowly beginning to pay off. I join a hung-over singer and guitarist Cahir O’Doherty in the most unlikely interview setting of his car, before their gig at the Carlisle Brickyard. We about talk Myspace, third incarnation (or is that incantation) Emo bands and inevitably our joint hometown of Derry, Northern Ireland. PB: First of all tell me about Fighting With Wire. CO : We started three years ago just after my old band Clearshot broke up. I joined Jet Plane Landing and then Craig McKean, the drummer, from Clearshot and I decided to start this other band. We did not really take it seriously to begin with, but then we said fuck it. We’ll see how it goes. So far we’ve had about five bass players so were becoming Spinal Tap. It is all good; this is the final line-up Jamie King, Craig and I. PB : What’s the story with Clearshot then? CO : After Marty died that was the end of that. We just never saw it coming. After that I just said fuck it. I moved to London and joined Jet Plane Landing and started working with them. A big tour followed with bands like Seafood, Hundred Reasons and Biffy Clyro and people like that. I got back to Derry and we have been keeping Fighting With Wire going since then, following it up, writing songs and playing shows. PB : Have you got signed yet? CO : No. We’ve got management and an agent in London, Helter Skelter. They book our shows, organise tours but as of yet we have not got signed. There is no record deal. I don’t think we are cool enough. PB : I been talking to quite a few young bands and it seems to be a running theme over here. They want the sure thing straight off. If it is not going to sell, forget about it. CO : The record industry is just so fickle. These days, with the internet and pre-downloading, a band I don’t really like, the Arctic Monkeys didn’t even need a record label to be the biggest selling band in the country. They are shit, but they were smart. That’s all. If you are smart you can go all the way. PB : So what can we expect from a Fighting with Wire show? CO : Well tonight it will involve three zombies who were in Glasgow the night before. Normally it is pretty intense. We enjoy playing so much we just go fucking nuts. I hate going to see bands that are fake that look like they don’t give a fuck. They have no passion and no presence. Some bands I have been into, when I went to see them live, I have just ended up disappointed. We always try to give a good performance. PB : My mate from Glasgow tells me you do a wicked Aztec Camera cover? C) : Yeah that was a gig we played in Derry. It was the local recording studio, The Blast Furnace’s 10th anniversary show. Cleahshot played the 5th anniversary and did a cover of Chesney Hawkes ‘One and Only’. If you play at the show you have to do aridiculous cover so that explains that. PB : Speaking of 80's music…… CO : Fucking hell, you wouldn’t believe our record collection. PB : Bit of a stupid question. If you had the choice to cover a song by a famous Derry artist and you were given the choice of either Dana’s Eurovision winner ‘All Kinds of Everything’ or Fergal Sharkey’s ‘Good Heart’, which one you choose? C0 : I would have to go for Fergal Sharkey’s ‘Good Heart’ even though he is a wanker. PB : Had to do the Derry connection, sorry about that. Change of subject, Zane Lowe has token a real interest in you guys. CO : With Jet Plane yes. He has played Fighting with Wire a few times on the radio show. He was real big help for Jet Plane. He pitched us so hard on MTV. We did a Gonzo live show on MTV2. It was great. It is weird. You always see these shows on TV and when you are actually there doing it was shit. On TV it looks great. People were freezing. We played the show in this big snow dome, and it was minus four. Whoever had the idea to do the show there was fucking simple. It was so cold I couldn’t play the fucking guitar. PB : I’m noticing some really cool CDs here. What are you listening to right now? CO : We are listening to Refused Shape of Punk to Come. Arcade Fire, Queens of the Stone Age, Nirvana and a lot of old school grunge. PB : You mentioned the internet. Are sites like My Space a good or bad thing for a young band such as you guys? CO: My Space is a great facility for bands to get their name out there and fans to discover them. They don’t need some rag to tell them what is good and what is not. They can go on My Space and just search for their bands and listen to them, or even check their friend’s sites out to see what they are listening too. We have made a lot of fans through My Space, fans that would never have heard our music otherwise. It is good thing but it is also a bad thing in a way in that, especially a band like us, makes no money from it. I am not whinging about it. That is just the way it is. At this point in our career we need all the exposure we can get. I think it is great people are getting into our band, but at the same time, I would prefer if they bought our record when it came out. PB : When is the album out then and what’s it called? CO : At the minute it is untitled and it will be out at the end of the year as we begin recording it in September. PB : Intense tour this summer then? CO : Over the summer I will be doing the next Jet Plane Landing album. There will be a few shows with them and then it is the Fighting With Wire album plus another tour. PBM: Final question. As the singer of a young up-and-coming band, what is your opinion on the state of the UK and Irish scene? C: I think… and I don’t want to generalise but Emo bands, Screamo bands and all those kids that look the fucking same I cannot stand them. Every song is the same. Just being on this tour, nearly every night the promoters put on local bands and they are always some fucking Emo band. They all sound the same. Then at the other side of the spectrum you have the Pete Doherty wannabes. Retro throwbacks dressed like sales in charity shops which again have been done to death. There doesn’t seem to be any middle-ground. It is ridiculous. Something needs to change. PB : Emo is not even new. This is the what? Third wave of Emo bands now? CO : Exactly, it is maybe even the fourth. The whole straightedge DC scene was where I first heard Emo. All of a sudden it got transformed and Jimmy Eat World were Emo. And then Glassjaw are Screamo and everything just became labels It is fashion. If you look at Kerrang TV or MTV2, it is just fashion conscious crap. No one gives a fuck about songs any more. There are very few bands out there that write good music and don’t give a fuck what they look like because at the end of the day that is what is important. PBM: Cheers.

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