Interviewed ‘Music is all the time concerning the thriller’

‘Music is all the time concerning the thriller’

Gemma Hayes interviewed 

Irish singer-songwriter Gemma Hayes has introduced three London reveals subsequent month.  Thursday 4th and Friday fifth September 2025 might be up shut and private in St Pancras Previous Church.

Saturday (6 September 2025) might be a bit extra of a raucous affair at The Lexington in Kings Cross.

Pete Harvey spoke to Gemma for Louder than Conflict concerning the current single, the final album, guitars, pedals, shoegaze and omelettes.

By the use of introduction, right here is the video for ‘Central Lodge’ the third single to be taken from ‘Blind Religion’ (2024) Gemma’s sixth studio album.

LTW: Was any of that footage shot particularly for the video? the cityscapes or something?

Gemma: That’s all outdated footage. Alfred, the director, has used pictures that he took and video from a household vacation. The remainder is from motion pictures that he liked and pictures that occurred to him whereas he was listening to the tune. He’s picked some stunning moments.

When the ocean was coming in on the backside of your chair, I used to be considering ‘it’s going to get her chair moist’, however then I realised it was a inexperienced display screen or no matter. 

Gemma: What I really like with Alfred’s visible tackle the tune is representing loneliness with the subway. There are such a lot of individuals, however it’s fairly lonely. There’s one thing actually stark about that. Everyone’s in their very own world, surrounded by strangers. 

Properly, additionally in case you’re on the tube, like late at night time, there isn’t anyone there.

Gemma: Yeah, you gained’t discover me down within the tube station at midnight.

Within the first line of Central Lodge does the man have a sore throat or is he getting excessive on cough syrup?

Gemma: I reckon there was a little bit of getting excessive on cough syrup, however on the time I used to be younger and I wasn’t certain why. “There’s no spoon, you’re simply ingesting out of the bottle”.

Properly, that may be a clue. ‘Central Lodge’ is a collage of plenty of various things.

Gemma: As a result of we had been on tour, it’s extra simply flashes of photographs of a time. It’s almost just like the video. One minute it’s Manchester after which the subsequent scene in my head is on stage in Dublin. Any individual that I cared for deeply, sadly, killed himself ultimately as he obtained older. However this was a time after we had been type of younger, he was heading, however he wasn’t totally down that street of substance abuse but. He’d undergo his spell after which he’d clear up and I used to be very a lot clear and our lives merged for some time and it was fantastic. He was a very delicate human being and I’m not shocked that generally essentially the most delicate human beings begin to self-medicate with a purpose to cope with stuff.

Let’s speak concerning the songs on Blind Religion (2024). How did you give you the form of the album? Do you continue to consider it by way of vinyl, you already know, with observe seven being essential?

Gemma: Yeah, I imply, it’s to me, I’m old style. The album is of a chunk. So there may be an arc. It begins off actually fairly form of mild after which it form of brings individuals on a journey. Whether or not individuals hearken to it that manner or not is as much as them. However for me, that was methods to do it.

What guitar do you write on?

Gemma: It relies upon, I really feel like every guitar has a particular persona. If I wish to go for a type of a tragic Nick Drake tune, I’ve a extremely, actually outdated Gibson. I picked it up in a secondhand store in America 25, 30 years in the past. It’s an unsightly guitar as a result of anyone bloody effectively varnished it with a nasty varnish.

It sounds actual honky. It’s obtained an angle, you already know, it’s not a wonderful sounding guitar.  So if I wish to do candy plucking, I exploit that honky guitar simply to offer the plucking just a little bit extra form of an angle. I have a tendency to jot down loads of the fingerpicking songs on that outdated Gibson.

After which I’ve a Dan Electro baritone guitar. Okay. Which I completely love.
If the tune is nice, I prefer to have that darkish, you already know, deeper sound on the baritone.
I even have a Thinline Tele that I’ve put a bass string on. Everyone mentioned, don’t put a bass string in your Tele, it’ll warp the neck. But it surely hasn’t. I do loads of mad tuning. I can tune that proper all the way down to an A pointy.

There have to be anyone passing you totally different guitars with totally different tunings on a regular basis while you’re enjoying?

Gemma: For years, I’d have seven guitars and I’d have a guitar tech and I’d do the set listing so I may possibly maintain onto one guitar for 2 or three songs. However now I’ve it all the way down to a high-quality artwork. I’ve a kind of Christmas tree sort guitar stands proper behind me. So for some songs, I’ve the band, as a tune ends, create a drone, a wonderful form of like Sigur Rós sort drone on the stage whereas I seize the subsequent guitar and simply have it able to go.

Which shoegaze bands influenced you?

Gemma: Massively, it will have been My Bloody Valentine, Loveless. Particularly that album. I don’t are inclined to hearken to loads of music. I’ll discover an album and I’ll simply devour that album for years and I’ll almost take up it. So Loveless has stayed with me, I’d say for 20 years. And there’s a nostalgia to it. From Loveless and to a lesser extent individuals like Sonic Youth, I don’t see them as shoegaze, to be trustworthy, however there’s a component of it.

What about Swervedriver? Did you ever dabble with them?

Gemma: Yeah, Swervedriver and there was Trip.

Swervedriver are my favourites significantly as a result of though they’re from Oxford, they sound like they’re from the Midwest.

Gemma: I discover that with Trip as effectively, they’ve such a giant sound. As in, it doesn’t sound from a particular place on the planet.

I suppose that’s the shoegaze factor, isn’t it? It’s epic partitions of fuzz and nice for driving. It’s simply driving music.

Gemma: Oh my God. Yeah. Yeah, completely. However I additionally discover that music transferring. It strikes me after I hear it. I ended up doing a couple of reveals with My Bloody Valentine as their assist act. It simply blew my thoughts to be a part of their ensemble on the street. To face there and hearken to the music, it overwhelms you a lot. It’s stunning. And with My Bloody Valentine, the chord progressions are gorgeous, you already know, and it’s very courageous. They may maintain on one chord for 5 minutes.

I really like folks music as effectively, you already know, however I get just a little bit uninterested in form of simply an acoustic guitar within the folks world, you already know. I don’t play solo for that motive. For me, it’s all about texture. After I go to see, let’s say anyone enjoying solo, I discover myself simply getting just a little bored as a result of I feel songwriting is essential, however for me, the manufacturing on stage is essential. Even in case you simply add a double observe vocal or add a drone underneath just a little acoustic tune, hastily it’s in a totally totally different cinematic place. So for me, it’s essential to have individuals on stage creating sounds.

Who’s going to be with you in London?

Gemma: My full band. Drums, keys, fiddle. I’ve obtained two multi-instrumentalists. I’m actually excited concerning the UK reveals as a result of the band are simply killer.

Being again in Baltimore (County Cork, Eire) and away from London and Los Angeles you’ve needed to discover a complete bunch of latest guys?

Gemma: New-ish, one in all them I’ve been enjoying with for 3 years and the others would have been a couple of yr and a half, so comparatively new.

You’re large in Eire, you’re large internationally, there are individuals coming to the London reveals from everywhere in the world however you’re lesser identified within the UK?

Gemma: It is sensible as a result of I didn’t do something for 10 years. There was a buzz within the UK with my first album (Night time on my Facet, 2002) as a result of it was nominated for a Mercury Prize. However then I ended touring. I’m not a touring artist, so I’ll disappear for a couple of years.

Do you have interaction with social media?

Gemma: You must be very pc savvy and social media savvy and importing continuously and promoting a life-style, promoting your self by way of, you already know, continuously speaking, continuously pushing. And I’m simply not gonna do this. For me, music was all the time concerning the thriller. I’m not attention-grabbing, personally.

Couldn’t you simply type of prepare dinner one thing for TikTok? Just like the footballers do? ‘Right here’s Gemma Hayes making an omelette’.

Gemma: Properly, there’s one thing actually pathetic, as a result of while you don’t have loads of followers and also you’re simply making an omelette, it’s not as superb as making an omelette and getting, like, 100,000 likes. There’s one thing actually unhappy about having one or two likes to your omelette.

Do you may have a pedal board? What’s on it?

Gemma: I’ve obtained a Tube Screamer and a Blue Sky delay with stunning, attractive woozy sounds. I’ve obtained a Vox vocal harmoniser, an equaliser pedal, a Boss loop station, an AB field and two DIs. That’s it.

So that you simply put that via a clear sounding Fender or one thing?

Gemma: I’ve obtained a Vox VT40. It’s a small little amp. I used to have the massive AC, what had been they known as?

AC30? However it’s important to play them actually, actually bloody loud, don’t you?

Gemma: Actually loud and the valves on the again can warmth up and trigger points. This new Vox is basically sturdy. It packs a punch on stage. The BlueSky pedal has modified how I write. It’s a Strymon. They do superb pedals. If you would like that shoegaze sound, simply woozy delays. It’s actually modified how I sound dwell now. I can actually add extra texture.

I suppose you will get the Strymon going, put it via the loop station after which swap away to a different sound.

Gemma: That’s what I do. So that you simply create a mattress of a drone, you already know, of simply wooziness. After which you’ll be able to have just a little plucky guitar over it and immediately, it’s far more cinematic.

Go and see Gemma Hayes in London this September. The reveals might be filled with absorbing and intimate storytelling from one in all Eire’s most quietly sensible musical voices.

Central Lodge

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All phrases Pete Harvey. {Photograph} by Gemma Hayes. Extra writing by Pete on Louder Than Conflict will be discovered at his creator’s archive.