Charles Haddon (Ou Est Le Swimming Pool) interview 2010

News of Charles's death at the Pukkelpop Festival in Belgium has just broken as I write this. I was lucky enough to interview him for the band's first Australian tour due to take place in October. Despite much of the interview's irrelevance in terms of future activity - I wanted to share the results of one of Charles's last promo engagements for fans who would obviously be shocked, as I am, by the loss of a such a young talent who had so much potential.

Charles Haddon

If you like your electro-pop big and brassy with '80s-centric instant hooks, Ou Est Le Swimming Pool (translated as: Where Is The Swimming Pool?) won't have escaped your radar. Although emerging from the same area of London that produced Pet Shop Boys, this is a mere coincidence for the band, who despite sharing a musical kinship with the Pets', claim no formal knowledge of them. Ou Est Le Swimming Pool's massively popular debut single Dance The Way I Feel, along with a tour opening for La Roux, has earned them a spot on this years Parklife festival alongside dance heavy weights Dan Black, Bag Raiders, Groove Armada and Missy Elliott to name a few.

The band's mouthpiece, Charles Haddon along with his splendid bouffant of hair, is in a talkative mood on the eve of his band's first visit. What are we in for though, I wonder after a trawl through group's online video diary, which shows a group of lads fully in touch with their mischievous sides? "You've gotta do it haven't you" Charles laughs, "There's so many bands around who take it all very seriously, but we've already got up to a fair bit of trouble." Now that Oasis have split the position of 'showing off and being arrogant' is vacant, so perhaps they're the ones fill it? "There are a lot of record companies who won't touch a band who have any kind of reputation for bad behaviour, they just want somebody who's going to turn up and stand on stage and play and then go back to their hotel room and eat fruit." Charles jokes, "But we're actually very proud that we can at least enjoy ourselves as well as get the work done."

It's been just over a year since Ou Est Le Swimming Pool formed in Camden, (North London). Charles recalls the early days of the band and how it could've been a totally different sound that launched them. "Me and Joe (Hutchinson) were doing completely different music in the start. Joe was right into hip hop for example". Charles explains, "He and I were sharing a flat and had all these music projects happening – one of those became Ou Est Le Swimming Pool – so when that started to take off, we dropped all the other stuff we were doing and focused on this." Not a bad move either, the bands debut single, Dance The Way I Feel enjoyed a thorough remixing by Armand Van Helden and instantly put it's creators on the map. Charles says of the bands overnight success on the back of the debut single; "I get that it can be hard to follow up a first rush like that one, but I believe we have plenty of great music." He says, "I mean Dance The Way I Feel was chosen by the record label to be released in Australia ahead of our tour, but I think we have a pretty solid bunch of songs easily as good as that. I'm pretty confident we can that follow up for sure."



Charles claims he knew very early on he wanted to pursue music as a career. He continues, "At the age of about 13 I realised that I wanted to do music, and unfortunately my school work was crippled by that decision." He laughs, "I was actually a scholar when I was younger, but then I ended up getting expelled because I was bunking off all the time. It was good in a way though because I immediately moved to London and started making things happen, wasting no time really." Last year the band embarked on their first tour as opening act for La Roux. It allowed them, as Charles points out, a chance to sharpen up their sound for the inevitable headline shows. "Yeah, La Roux gave us that important live exposure, and allowed us to work out a strong set list of what to actually play in our shows - because we've got about 40 songs written for the first album - and it's hard to pick just seven or eight. I'd leave home thinking we had a perfect set list, but after the first night we ended up changing, like three, so it was a great learning curve for us."

 

Similar to La Roux, Ou Est Le Swimming Pool have been saddled with the typical '80s revival tag, but Charles reckons working with vintage equipment, "It's all we could afford", has much more to do with their sound than revivalism. "I'm not much of an '80s fan, the only reason we sound the way we do is because our synths are old 808s and our drum machine which we were using, initially came from the '80s. The hip hop stuff that Joe and I were into didn't work at with the equipment we were using so we altered our sound to fit with what we had to work with." On the subject of comparisons, he continues. "When we started we were compared to Depeche Mode and Pet Shop Boys but the only Pet Shop Boys song I knew was Go West because it had been on an advert in England for custard, so I had a pretty skewed idea about what people were hearing in our music." He laughs.



Like so many people of his generation, Charles' earliest musical love was the pop star's pop star; take a bow, the king. "Michael Jackson's History, was the first album I had as a kid," Charles says proudly."I remember my family were moving house and we didn't have anywhere to live for a couple of weeks so we just drove around England, going to sea side towns and stuff, and I can't remember how old I was but I think I cried if we didn't listen to Michael Jackson and my poor parents must have hated him by the end of that trip, because it was two solid weeks of the best of Michael Jackson." They've been wrongly tagged '80s revival, had a false start as a hip hop band and one of them has Jacko fixation, but what do Ou Est Le Swimming Pool all agree can go on the all important tour bus stereo?

"We all have one major love which is a '70s reggae band called Culture – they are absolutely ridiculous, I mean it's just really chilled out songs about smoking pot." Charles exclaims "After seven hours in our van on the road, we need something to calm us down otherwise everyone tends to get a bit agitated." Would Michael Jackson's History revisited cause a few tempers to rise, I wonder? "I think that album was thrown out by my parents actually, or maybe even driven over a few times." Charles smiles, "Thanks for reminding me, now I'm gonna have to get a new one."



As a draw card at this year's Parklife festival, I ask who Charles and his band are most keen on whooping it up with. "I'm quite looking forward to Dan Black. We've played several gigs with him before, but we haven't seen him for a while and he's going really well now. He's such a nice guy too, he even let us get up on stage and dance with him a couple of times." Charles continues, "And, now I've said this before, but I'm definitely going to be best friends with Missy Elliott… She doesn't know it yet but by the time that festival finishes, no by day two, she's going to love us and I reckon we're going to be riding in her limo and her private jet." He reasons, "Plus she's going to pay for everything so we can just go nuts." Charles laughs adding, "If there's one thing we've got as a band its enough confidence and cockiness to pull this off!"



lEIGh5

I think this interview shows clearly that Charles had a fun loving, boisterous side to him. It's  so sad that his darker side was the stronger. A lovely guy who leaves a short-lived but exciting legacy in the dance music scene.

Click to watch:

OU EST LE SWIMMING POOL - Dance The Way I Feel (video)

Jason Kingshott (Glide) interview (2010)

FLYING TOO HIGH

When Sydney band Glide called it a day in 2000, it was in the most sombre of situations. Their last concert together was at a wake for the friends and family of their singer, William Arthur, who died suddenly and mysteriously towards the end of '99. His death at 34 spelled Glide's end after a ten year run as one of Australia's most endearing shoe-gaze acts but now another decade has passed, the band are on a timely mission to remind us what we lost in Arthur - a songwriter of great stead. Glide's complete and much sort after catalogue is to be reissued through iTunes, coinciding with a two date live performance, which will see Youth Group's Toby Martin – a long time fan – step into Arthur's shoes. He will be joined by the surviving Glide line-up, bassist Marc Lynch, guitarists Andy Kelly and Tim Scott and drummer Jason Kingshott in celebration of William's work at the East Brunswick Club. I catch up with Jason Kingshott today as preparations mount and the buzz builds for what promises to be a very memorable night.

 

"I think the early to mid '90s was a pretty exciting time for music, especially in Australia." Jason begins, "That said, I always though Glide had a very international sound. We had a lot of fans in New Zealand and England and the overseas influences were strong in our music, and in a way I think our potential wasn't really picked up on at the time because we weren't really 'typically Australian'. I think we were up there with our contemporaries though." Many agreed, and Glide, although never reaching mainstream success, bashed out a solid underground niche for themselves alongside the likes of Clouds and Smudge. Their breakthrough came when two overseas contemporaries at their peak, Blur and Ride, requested Glide as a support on their respective Aussie tours. A chance to meet their musical idols and even match them in concert was too good to pass up, Jason recalls. "You don't get cocky about it, but we thought it makes sense that those bands would want our band to open for them. It wasn't intimidating because we felt we had a kinship with them and when it came to performing, we also had that wall of noise thing going on and were just as able to fill those big venues with our own sound too."

After stumbling upon internet forums discussing Glide, many fans up til now have seemingly been swapping the bands rarities in mp3 format. Actual CD reissues were never really discussed, Jason explains, as Glide's complete recordings are finally available in digital glory. "I just think iTunes is a more immediate way for people to get hold of the music, and a lot of our older fans will already have the CDs so there wouldn't be any need for physical releases. Also doing it this way means people can fill the gaps in their collection and get songs that were previously only out on B-sides or EPs."  With just two reunion shows and Glide's reissues on iTunes only, it all seems a little understated. Perhaps as Jason pointed out their appeal was quite marginal  in Australia and a full fledge re-emergence would create confusion. A small backlash has inevitably occurred, but it's difficult to fault Glide's reasoning. Jason responds, "When the press release first came out there were some people saying, it's wrong and this sends the wrong message or whatever but I honestly don't care about that." He ensures, "It (Glide) was a big part of our lives and also why not celebrate William's skill as an artist. Further more we have the full support of his family for these shows so I am completely at peace with our decision to go through with this because we're doing it for the right reasons."

I recall The Triffids reunion/tribute shows back in early '09 as Jason speaks, and the addition of Toby Martin as one of the late David McComb's stand-ins. As a long time fan of Glide, Martin once again is set to re-visit his from-fan-to-conduit role. Kingshott says on how Toby came to be involved. "We were already acquainted through friends in the music community, but the turning point came after I had a conversation with Andy a few months ago along the lines of wouldn't it be great to play together again and get Toby to front it." He exclaims, "Being that its 20 years since we started the band, and ten since we performed William's tribute, something just clicked and Andy actually told me he'd been thinking about the exact same thing." He adds, "The fact that we both had been thinking it suddenly meant it could be tangible and before we knew it the whole thing started to come together. Plus it turned out Toby was a big fan of William's music."

Kingshott on his Glide band mates, believes making music was the glue in their friendships. He further describes. "Andy and I still would get together for drinks and so forth but there was always that other side to our friendship not really being indulged - making music – and it was pretty hard to ignore, so when things started coming together with Toby we already knew we could see it through properly." Jason continues, "Toby has been so committed too, and he can even get those bizarre chords that William came up with. Everyone's been playing so well in rehearsals but even though it's harder for Toby because he's following an existing blueprint in a way, he really gets it."

The man whose untimely death all this is in response to, William Arthur must have had quite an impact on his band mates. To revisit all of his work and relive music they made together would surely carry with it a painful twinge for a lost mate. Jason contemplates. "It is very bizarre looking back at some songs I had shivers down my spine to be honest, particularly because they evoke so many memories for me. It definitely affects the senses." He adds, "You have to step back from yourself sometimes, which is kind of how I remember William in a way. In the early days we all loved a drink and many an after party would go on into the wee hours in these indie clubs in Sydney and Melbourne and William would always be there just taking it all in." Rumoured to be somewhat anti-social, Arthur was instead all about moderation. Jason continues, "Contrary to the belief that he would retire to his hotel room after shows, don his smoking jacket and take in a little Norman Mailer," Laughs, "William was human and needed to blow off steam as much as any of us, but he was a very creative and intellectual guy, you know, he just didn't like to dance." 

Seeing as Glide are now a full band again, the question of future projects with Toby staying on as the singer seems relevant. Jason concludes, "I gotta be honest with you that did cross my mind. I haven't spoken to the guys about it yet, but I doubt we could release anything new as Glide because that was William's band. But talking about it now makes me think that maybe the idea I had in the back of my mind wasn't so crazy after all."



lEIGh5