Those Damn Crows are back in a big bad way. With a UK tour currently underway and a new album God Shaped Hole dropping on April 11th, we thought it was about time we caught up with them again. After a stonking show at Bournemouth we caught up with Frontman Shane Greenhall to chat all things crow.
How the devil are you boys? It’s been five years since Rocksins last spoke to you and it’s fair to say quite a bit has happened in the world, but how has it been in the Those Damn Crows camp?
Very busy leading up to the album release for God Shaped Hole. Currently on tour around the UK at these smaller venues. Getting up close and personal is what the Crowfamily wanted, so that’s what we’re doing!
You’ve been beavering away at new album God Shaped Hole and we’re a month away from release. What is the month before release like for you?
As I say…. busier than ever! Currently on tour, followed by a record store tour with acoustic set at some venues, two a day! As we get closer to album release day April 11th.
Has your process evolved at all? It seemed for Point Of No Return you were doing a bulk of writing remotely in your own studios, so now that the threat of COVID has finally dissipated are you writing more in the same room now?
I’m / we… are always writing, I’m on a train right now and before this interview I’ve sang into my phone a melody line that came to me as I thought of a lyric based on a conversation I had yesterday. I’m never bound to a room because there’s no spark there, ideas and conversations come from human interaction, emotion, and people’s stories/lives. The room is the place I put those sparks into a cohesive (hopefully) formula or structure, then we jam, then the crow magic happens.
How much of all those sessions actually makes it onto an album? Is there anything on God Shaped Hole that was actually birthed during those previous sessions?
The whole recording/writing process is a very organic thing. Take ‘The Night Train’ for example, I’ve had that song for sometime, though I feel our album Inhale/Exhale needed to be released first for the song to become what it’s become now, timing is soooooo important you can’t rush these things just because it’s a good tune, it only goes on the record when it feels right, a good song needs time, the song means so much more now than it would’ve on the last album because of it fitting perfectly now in this period of our personal lives and professional careers.
Same with ‘Fake’, it nearly went on Inhale/Exhale but didn’t feel right for the album.
At which point do you have to stop listening to new recordings because you start picking things apart and wishing you could go back? Perhaps a personal feeling that you didn’t perform something as well as you could or want added an additional track over the top?
Personally… I hear it on every track, on every album we’ve ever done haha!
There’s no such thing as perfection but man… I try! That’s all we can really do. I will never change, and probably put too much pressure on myself but if I don’t push it to the limit then I’ll never know what’s possible. All I know is to trust the process.
Let’s talk about the resurgence of vinyl – How has this impacted artists? Are you guys seeing a bigger return in your bank accounts (I notice most of your pre-orders have sold out) or is the cost of producing vinyl offsetting it a little and/or is it still a niche market that is buying them?
It’s good to see the vinyls back as they’re amazing pieces of art which I feel go hand in hand with the art of music, there’s something so cool about an actual physical copy you can look at and read whilst listening to the music, there’s lots of good things about digital music but this is one thing that digital music can’t compete with and that’s the physical touch, feel, sound and visual stimulation that I feel is really important but sadly so overlooked.
We’re only a couple of dates into this tour – last time you spoke to us we talked about constructing the setlist, so how easy or difficult has that been this time around with more to choose from?
It’s getting more difficult for sure. But… It makes it easier in some ways promoting a new album as we have to play the new songs that have been recently released. It’s exciting for us to play new songs in front of people/fans for the first time too! People still wanna hear the Crow Classics!
How easy or difficult was it to select tracks from God Shaped Hole – particularly pre-release? Will we hear more of them on stage after the album comes out?
When the album’s out is when it gets difficult as we have to choose which songs we get to play, the right balance of old and new is critical, plus the balance of tempo and vibe of set list is paramount. It should be segments and moments of highs and lows musically. Taking the audience on an emotional crow journey.
I don’t want to go down any sort of negative road so are there any songs you THOUGHT you might get sick of playing but actually still thoroughly enjoy?
Well there are songs that have been crowd favourites for years, and are very difficult to leave out of a set, I love all our songs so it just comes down to how many times we’ve played them which can become ‘a same old’ scenario, this is why playing new songs becomes the remedy for that.
What prompted the smaller venues this time around, especially with this run and some of the venues you are playing?
Crowfamily wanted it, we’re very close to our fan base, so we listen and we try to make things work when we can, and we also know what our calendar looks like so we also know what’s coming up in the year.
When this tour has finished you’re pretty much jumping straight into another one of record stores around the country – do you ever take a break and what’s next when you’ve finished that?
We pride ourselves on being one of the hardest working bands out there, so whatever it takes to see as many of our fans as possible. We play The Lamex Stadium in Stevenage with Skindred in May. Then we head to Europe, Germany, Austria and Switzerland supporting Takida. Lots more planned later on in the year too.
For more information on Those Damn Crows including tour dates & album pre orders head here
