Christmas wrapping paper available from www.wearethephysics.com
Originally christened "We Are The Physics Club And Therefore Everything We Say Is Fact", now they are just "We Are The Physics". Simple enough? Nah... never! They are made up of Michael, Michael, Michael and Chris. How do you know which Michael? Let's call them Michael M (frontman strapped to a power bass), Michaelguitar (that would be the one with guitar...), Michaeldrum (need we say more?), and Chris (obviously, the other guitar man), shall we? They all sing and they all dance, and sometimes Michaeldrum likes to pop a party popper during the live set. Let's hear it from these exciting four boys from Glasgow we have come to love...
FACT #1: WE ARE THE PHYSICS DO THE STYLISTICS
We Are The Physics are a product of an accident and they continue to be so. The first gig they ever played happened because the band that were supposed to play pulled out, "We haven’t really tried that hard with our previous bands, so this is the only band that we’ve tried to do something with it," says Michael M. "We have never sent a demo or anything or have been actively pursuing to get gigs but things seem to be working out which is nice for us. We’re not very frustrated with promoting ourselves that way, we’re kind of shy about putting music to people, it’s better that way."
He continues in regards to his band's simple but highly effective uniforms, "One of the first things we talked about was that we definitely wanted to wear shirts and ties, so that went wrong," he laughs. "The thing is we all worked during the day so we were all in shirts and ties during the day. So we just ended up wearing them onstage too," Michaeldrum chips in.
"Stylistically we just listen to the same sort of bands, we were influenced by the same sort of bands at that time when we came together." Many will carelessly tick Devo off as their main inspiration, but the M quickly clarifies, "a lot of [Devo music] we hadn’t heard of when we started the band. It’s kind of late influence and we’d already written most of the songs we play now and a lot of people say we’re like Devo or we’re influenced heavily by which we are... but not to the extent that people think." Nods Michaeldrum, "It’s more of a coincidence that it turned out like that."
"Our influences are bands like The Skids and Polysics who have Devo influence, it’s more bands that are influenced by them and then influence us."
FACT #2: THEY EMBRACE POPULAR CULTURE
If you happen to be part of some sort of pop culture success, watch out! We Are The Physics are waiting to rip it off you and make them their own... in the most fantastic and humorous way, of course. Once at the Buffalo Bar, they played with Art Goblins (the one-off supergroup consisted mainly of members from Art Brut) at which Manic Street Preachers' bassist Nicky Wire was verbally abused with the line Nicky Wire can suck my cock. Half an hour later the Physics have completely stolen it and sampled in one of their songs! The latest on their wonderful pop sampling? The B-A-N-A-N-A-S line from Gwen Stefani's 'Hollaback Girl'!
"We have a song called 'This is Vanity' and as it finishes we usually bust out a part of another song - we did Stefani in England because we were sure people would know it, in Scotland we usually do themes from adverts. There's not really any connection with the Stefani at all, she spells out 'bananas' in the song and we quite liked that." Michael M recaps, "once we sang the theme from 'Blind Date' at that part, next will be 'You've Been Framed'. Occasionally, we'll misjudge the audience and sing something and nobody will recognise it and assume it was part of the song. It's our only attempt at audience participation and it fails about 90% of the time."
FACT #3: GLASWEGIAN BANDS ARE ARTY, OR NOT?
"Not really sure about how artsy Glasgow is," he disagrees when asked about the Glasgow's love affairs with such arty bands as Franz Ferdinand, Orange Juice, Mogwai and Sons And Daughters. In fact, WATP's website is rather arty itself, all pages are laced through the 1950s sci-fi comic strip. "It's quite a trade-orientated city. We're not a particularly arty band and we don't really know anybody from art school, or even from the music scene in Glasgow - there are a lot of bands in Glasgow that are made up of people who were already in the music scene, whereas none of us were part of that when we formed. It's not necessarily a bad thing though, and there are some great bands in Glasgow at the moment, but it was different for us in that respect, we knew NOBODY within the music scene.
"I think with regards to arty bands in Glasgow, it's mostly a case of people not trying to be arty, there's quite a lack of pretension in Glasgow and most people will generally encourage what you want to do with regards to art or music or whatever. It's more a case of people not being afraid to be themselves rather than adhere to a particular style, because the criticism is generally constructive."
FACT #4: THE TOTALLY OWN THE ROBOTIC MANEUVERS™
We Are The Physics are always extremely fun to watch, it's not just the music that makes them interesting and different from others. Their super jerky dance choreography is equally entertaining, the audience will never get bored when there are as many movements as theirs happening on the stage, all at once. This is something they are very proud of and name it the Robotic Maneuvers. How long did it take them to rehearse though?
Micheal M: We never rehearse them, we practice in Michaelguitar's bedroom which is about the size of a bed, so we never actually got a chance to dance until we played our first gig, but it just came with the music really - the music's stunted and jittery and fast so the movements just come with it, once you know the songs the stops and starts become the movements, which is why it probably looks mechanical. We don't actually indulge in THE official robot dance™. We quite enjoy the fact that the music can be beneficial to people who know the songs. Once you know the structure, you can dance to it. We're like the Magnum PI of music, which was a TV series that didn't require you to have seen previous episodes to enjoy it, but rewarded the viewers who had with in-jokes and references. We're like that, minus Hawaii!
FACT #5: WE ARE THE PHYSICS ARE (ACTUALLY) OK AT MUSIC TOO!
It's true they specialise in computer science. As a group WATP work hard at writing together, "Usually somebody gets a wee of a song for the rest of us to use as an idea, so it goes from a tiny and obscure piece of noise to a huge and obscure piece of noise!" The M laughs and adds, "To a huge noise beast."
But he writes all of the lyrics all by himself, "I don’t think I could sing if it was someone else's. I think because they’re all my lines I’d feel more comfortable changing them or emphasising a certain part. If it was someone else’s, I’d feel quite guilty about reading them a certain way. I won’t be able to sing freely. I know what’s important in that sentence because I’ve written them. If you sing one of the ones that I wrote, I’d be like… 'No, you don’t sing it like that!'" he laughs.
"Sometimes we don’t know what the words mean, like you haven’t explained it to us," complains Michaeldrum, backed up by Michaelguitar who also admits that he has no idea what the songs are about.
"Most of the stuff that I’ve written about is a range of things, some are quite computer-based," he starts musing the answer out for SUPERSWEET as well as his bandmates, "But it’s usually got a sort of post-humanist’s slant! I’m making this up by the way, it’s just come into my head. It’s about technology and the effects on people. It’s like the democutisation of technology! That’s what our songs are all about!" And then he makes the whole table laugh so hard they nearly choke.
"What about that 'WOO!'?" Asks Michaelguitar about the M's signature NRG 'WOO' that can be heard at least ten times in every single song. "I copyrighted that word, the word is all me!" He smiles rather proudly.
What's next for WATP then, Michael M?
"Our first single is out now on One Records! Less Than Three, CD and 7", it's really ok! You might like us if you enjoy wee blasts of big noises and tight jitters like epileptic militants. We have no idea when we'll do an album yet, but it'll be so good that you'll have to buy it and not download it."
You want our opinion? We think We Are The Physics are now doing more than OK at music!
Words and photography: SUPERSWEET