Field Music
The Brewis Brothers let Prog in the trade secrets behind Flat White Moon.
“I feel terrible about the political situation. There’s a new paradigm of political action where essentially it doesn’t matter what you do as long as you don’t take responsibility for it. People say that’s a terrible immoral thing that you did, then you say, ‘Well, I didn’t do that. And if I did, it doesn’t matter, let’s talk about something else.’”
David Brewis
For their eighth album Flat White Moon, multi-instrumentalist Sunderland siblings Field Music have found much needed comfort, joy and inspiration in the sounds they grew up with, and their favourite ever records. They’ve also been spreading the love with community projects all over their city – sorry, “town”.
“I’m gonna go home and listen to Broadsword And The Beast. That was one of the big albums in our house when we were little,” laughs David Brewis, sat in the Field Music studio as Prog wraps up a Zoom session with him and his brother Peter, who’s at home in his kitchen. In an enjoyable 90-minute chat, today has mostly been an amble down memory lane, reminiscing about favourite music and the inspiration for their latest, and eighth, album, Flat White Moon.
It’s been just over a year since their last record, Making A New World, was released. A project commissioned by the Imperial War Museum, it was a weighty 19-track concept album that explored life in the 100 years after the First World War – culturally, technologically, politically. Making A New World and its fabulous 2018 predecessor
Open Here were “really difficult to play live,” says David. Field Music had found themselves in complex musical foxholes, reliant on click tracks, locked to continuous visuals and grappling some heavy themes. With Flat White Moon
they’ve loosened the stays a little; the intention being for the sound to “have some swing,” says Peter, and “to capture me and Dave and the other members of the band playing together, a lot.”
If you already know Field Music – alongside David and Peter on vocals, guitars and drums, there’s Andrew Lowther (bass), Kevin Dosdale (guitar) and Liz Corney (keys) – you’d be familiar with their consummate musicianship and eclectic take on indie art rock. You’ll hear Prince, 10cc, Steely Dan and Status Quo often all in one song. Flat White Moon was inspired by the brothers’ all-time favourite records, and when Peter mentions that they said, “We’re gonna be free!” when making the LP, he actually meant: “We’re gonna be Free!”
“We were just thinking about all the rock stuff we liked – Free, Cream, Fleetwood Mac – and soul music, funk,” Peter says. “But the one big inspiration was Odelay by Beck. You forget how progressive that is as a pop and hip hop record. I realised that I’d been listening to it for years and had never figured out how it was put together. It was the producers, the Dust Brothers, bringing their record collections into it. It got me thinking: ‘How do you do that?’ and ‘How would you use the sound of classic British drummers?’ I wanted to create a collage.”
If readers are thinking, “Well, that doesn’t sound very prog,” then a) go and listen to the ingenuity of Odelay and b) never forget the inventiveness of Field Music. Reckon they’ll play something straight? No chance. Example: “We’ll say, ‘What if we make a song that’s like Under Pressure, but it’s the opposite of Under Pressure?’” That’s how they make a pop tune.
Flat White Moon was mostly written before the pandemic, and does have a loose theme. “We want to make people feel good about things we feel terrible about,” they said in their press statement. So what do they mean?
“Shall we do the silly things first?” Peter asks of his brother. “You can start, that’s your forte… [chuckles]”
“I feel terrible about the political situation,” says David. “This is what [recent single] No Pressure is about. There’s a new paradigm of political action where essentially it doesn’t matter what you do as long as you don’t take responsibility for it. People say that’s a terrible immoral thing that you did, then you say, ‘Well, I didn’t do that. And if I did, it doesn’t matter, let’s talk about something else.’”
“We’re both feeling bad about the pandemic and being stuck in the house and being denied the chance to see people,” David continues. “I really want to sit and have a coffee with me dad. He’s not much of a hugger but I’m going to hug him when I can, and he’s gonna be really embarrassed.”
Prog wonders what Flat White Moon’s silly things will be; so far it’s quite serious.
“Those were the silly things,” says David. “Our mam passed away just before Open
Here came out, she’d been ill for a long time, it was third primary cancer.” Looking at Peter, he’s attentive but understandably quiet as David speaks. “When it happened it took me a long time to figure out how to think about it, and I’m still figuring it out, because when it happened, we had things to do,” David nods. “Making A New World came along and that meant we weren’t directly trying to deal with the mess of thoughts about our mam not being there. This record is a bit more about the mess of thoughts about our mam not being there.”
In their effort to process their emotions, the siblings have created another gorgeous slice of innovative and intelligent progressive pop with the “off-the-cuff”, demo style that they were seeking. Lead-off track Orion From The Street takes a spacey, twinkly turn around on Tomorrow Never Knows, Not When You’re In Love has touches of Rotary Connection’s
I Am The Black Gold Of The Sun mixed with Joni Mitchell, and Out Of The Frame and In
This City nudge at XTC territory. There’s a bit of Spirit there, Neu! and Os Mutantes in The Curtained Room and a metric ton of Beatles, George Harrison and Led Zeppelin all the way through (and some Kool And The Gang, apparently). But for all the spontaneity, it sounds as tidy as ever, and will appeal to fans of their fêted 2012 album, Plumb. “There’s more mistakes in Field Music records than anyone realises,” smiles David, as his brother nods, knowingly.
If readers have ever wondered how to compose their own Field Music song, the duo just gave all the secrets away in a YouTube tutorial video. Kinda. Realising a full-band performance video would be out of the question for a while, No Pressure is a tongue-in-cheek version of t’internet how-tos with David hosting from his ‘guitar shop’ (the studio, with all the amps and a curtain behind him), cut with parts played by Tim, Kevin and Liz. Oh, and Peter, who truly looks the part in cargo shorts, backwards baseball cap and sleeveless The Thing tee. “The video to Orion From The Street was a bit sad and introspective,” says Peter. “We thought, ‘Let’s do something sillier’, and the next thing I knew Dave was Sharpie-ing a John Bonham tattoo on my arm.”
“Peter came up with the original idea, though, and I misunderstood it,” says David. Peter: “Isn’t that always the case?”
“Yep, that’s how it goes,” says David. “I half-listened to what you said and what I half-listened to became this great idea. That video really represents the Field Music sense of humour in the van.”
With touring off the agenda for now, the Brewis brothers have been far from idle. If you follow them on Twitter you’ll have noticed their involvement in Sunderland Museum and
Winter Gardens’ event, Paint The Town In Sound. “We were approached to curate an exhibition,” says David. “We decided to do something on the links between music and art and how that informs your sense of identity, your sense of place.”
Researching record sleeves, bands and local artists – “we scoured Discogs for slightly knackered copies of a Shadows album or Pipedream by Alan Hull” – the duo had a labour-intensive few months up to the end of 2020, also recording a short series of accompanying podcasts. The exhibition is open to the public until July 6.
And that’s not all; David and Peter have been putting time aside to work with Northumbrian poet Paul Summers on a project called Poems Of Town, making music with young people in isolated communities, helping to develop their music and lyrics. Was this related to Paint The Town?
“Only in that we keep using the word ‘town’ in things that we do – and that’s a bit of an in-joke as Sunderland is proud of being a city,” laughs David.
It seems like the city will be keeping them busy for a bit.
“We’ve got all sorts on,” says Peter. “We just keep saying yes.”
Flat White Moon is out now via Memphis Industries. See www.field-music.co.uk for more.
“The video to Orion From The Street was a bit sad and introspective. We thought, ‘Let’s do something sillier’, and the next thing I knew Dave was Sharpie-ing a John Bonham tattoo on my arm.”
Peter Brewis