Erland & The Carnival came onto the scene at the start of 2010 with the release of their self titled debut album, which was preceded by the ever so catchy ‘Trouble In Mind’ single. Erland & The Carnival are Erland Cooper (Guitar, Vocals), Simon Tong (Guitar, Harmonium, Zither,Vocals), David Nock (Drums, Percussion, Vocals, Keyboards), Andy Bruce (Synthesizers) and Danny Wheeler (Bass guitar).
Erland explained how the band first got together.
‘Simon and David worked together, doing a few project including releasing a folk music compilation, and I was introduced to them at one of the folk nights they were running. We kinda hit it off and then starting writing together. We spent a year demoing songs and it developed from there. Once we made the record last year, we decided we would take it live.’
‘We have many influences but for me it’s traditional music, folk music in general.’
‘We recorded lots of stuff in Simons attic and Davids studio and my shed, but then went into a studio for a couple of weekends and put it all together. We are excited to put the songs together in a live format and see how it worked, which kept us busy after finishing the album.’
Guitarist Simon Tong has previously played in several other bands including The Verve, Blur and The Good, The Bad and The Queen. Simon explained how he was finding being in an up and coming band again.
‘I’ve always tended to join bands when they are quite big, or at least established, whilst this was starting from scratch. The recording process was similar to other things I’ve done. It’s nice to be in a band that’s up and coming again, although sometimes it’s not nice playing in some shithole to 5 people, but we are starting to play bigger venues now, it’s nice to see fans coming along to gigs to see us.’
While most bands would be focused on just promoting their brand new album, Erland is keen to work on the next album whether they get the chance.
‘We are already putting together songs for the next album, and once we have a few weeks off, we’ll work on new songs and start the next album. We are also working on a project to put the Carnival sound behind other vocalists, kinda remixing lots of people.’
Erland And The Carnival is out now.
