Satellite

You may wonder why there is such a large article on some five piece called Satellite who blatantly are nearly totally unheard of. Well, firstly they are going to be playing at our very own union tonight as part of the ‘Common People’ indie night and secondly they are one of a few number of up and coming bands who actually have something to say and aren’t scared to do so. They boast a diverse cultural line up with three of them from the North of Britain and the other two from Japan and write about why we’re here on some blue planet surrounded by stars, basic human emotions and why life is not just a ‘Supermarket Sweep’.

The interview was planned to take place at the recording studios currently being occupied by Satellite where they were mixing a few tracks for their forthcoming album. I entered the building and discovered a tiny mixing studio filled with a huge desk cluttered with a worrying array of buttons and three slouched members of the band. The initial greetings were soon out of the way and it was agreed that a trip to the pub would be a good move.

I posed the burning question of, ‘Why play a gig at IC?’, considering it hasn’t exactly got a reputation for quality gigs although admittedly there were one or two outstanding ones last year.

Andy the guitarist maestro of the band replied, ‘Well it was either them or the Albert Hall and we thought nah, it can’t be the Albert Hall, IC definitely!’

Mark, the lead singer and writer of the band added in his Merseyside drawl, ‘I mean to us the only significance is that I believe they get about 600 people on the night which means we’ve got 600 chances. They chose us from a tape, and the songs have got a bit of a delayed action which kicks in a bit later which we’re really glad about. She, (meaning Midori, the bassist), calls the production like stringy squid, the more you chew the more juice you get out, while some of them are like rich cakes that you eat once and never want to eat again.’

Satellite originally started as Mark and Midori but soon grew to its present size after a number of successful ads in the back pages of the melody maker and a recommendation from a friend, which brought Andy to reminisce about his first encounter with the band. ‘I got a call from Mark and it was really weird ‘cos when I first heard him , he sounded really Scouse.’

Mark replied, ‘Well I am. You expected to see curly hair and a ‘tash and funnily enough I knew one of the Harry Enfield cast’, while Andy maniacally shouted, ‘Calm down, calm down!’.

Talk moved on to how the songs are all gelled together, with Mark generously saying, ‘I can’t play guitar like him or bass like her and I don’t want to teach them to suck eggs basically. I can write and I can stumble about on the guitar to make it sound like I know what I’m doing.’ Their influences range from Beck and The Velvet Underground to Andy’s love of TV themes?! though they don’t rate the new crop of indie bands very highly. This topic caused Midori to announce that in fact she actually likes the new Blur single, resulting in a massive debate about Blur’s career and attitude which decided that Damon is a fairly intelligent bloke who seems a lot more honest nowadays. Satellite feel that they have an affinity towards Kula Shaker of all people because of their commitment to spirituality, further reinforced by Mark’s hope that he and Midori will have a chance to take a year out to just meditate.

Mark final words were , ‘Stringy squid is always better than a quick fix of McDonalds and it would be worth it if you made it to the gig.’

Jason