On a cold October night in Belfast, Echoes and Dust have been invited to swap words with Johnny McGinley, guitarist and vocalist of Northern Ireland’s newest rising stars in the alt-metal scene, Droids. The Derry quartet have been together for just over a year, and it’s astounding to see how far they have come so quickly:
“It feels like absolutely ages ago we sort of started it. Basically, I was living in Manchester and my girlfriend and I decided we were coming home, like, for work purposes. I’d been sitting, just sort of like, messing around on the guitar and got to the point where I couldn’t get anyone to jam with cos, I just couldn’t find anyone that fitted and I’d sort of turned, as a frustrated guitarist, to be a bassist.
We came home but about a month before, I’d spoken to my good friend Mick (McCallion), who’s our drummer, whom I’d previously played guitar alongside in like a stoner rock kinda set-up, and previous to that we’d played in a sorta folk band. I asked him to drum ‘cos he’d done it a few times before. I think Stephen (Butler) was the main guitarist I wanted to jam with cos I’d jammed with him before and we just clicked. It took about a week and a half to organize, and I was dying to do something ‘cos my mates over there didn’t play and I was getting real itchy about the whole thing. I don’t know, being away, when I left the country I just got this real urge to listen to just Northern Irish and Irish music, just real hardcore. I went crazy for nothing but Lafaro, Mojo Fury and Adebesi Shank.
We got a few songs structured and after about 3 or 4 practices we put a advert on FastFude (Northern Ireland’s premier music forum) for a bassist and Adam (Vaughn) got back to me and we sent him some rough demos with no vocals, because as far as I was concerned we’d be getting a singer in. Adam came down and had already made up bass-lines for the songs we sent and they were good basslines, they bridged the gap in the tunes. So within about a month, we were a band”
Their first, self titled EP was released at the end of the Summer (and previously reviewed on this site), around 11 months after their initial inception:
“Our aim for our first year was to try our best to get on a bill at Glasgowbury (Northern Ireland’s biggest and best small festival), it was a high bar to set, but we did it. We just sort of thought, lets go hell for leather and get on it in our first year. So it was partly out of urgency that we went into the studio, ‘cos we had to have something recorded for submission for January.
We entered a battle of the bands and won it, then we got to play with Gascan Rucus and Lafaro so our fourth show was pretty fuckin’ good. At that Lafaro gig we had spoken to the guys from Smalltown America studios about calling in to record a few weekends and Chris Cassidy an engineer there, came to a few more shows and had a chat about what we wanted to sound like and we didn’t’ really know, we just like “fast and heavy, or big and heavy”. We got into the studio as soon as we could and were in for quite a while from start to finish over a long period due to our day jobs, we did it at weekends when it suited us and when it suited Chris, who was very accommodating. It’s been a massive learning experience, where I think, as a brand new band we just went with it.“
Exposure, especially locally, is essential, and Droids have found it in spades through Derry’s finest local radio DJ:
“We gave an unmastered mix of Astromech to Stephen MaCauley (host of BBC Radio Foyle’s ‘Electric Mainline’) and he played it straight off. He was so enthusiastic about us, as he gets with loads of local music and I’m guessing he fired it up to Across the Line (Radio Ulster) and it got played up there too. He takes a huge interest in local music and it’s class to have someone who’s as highly thought of in the local music scene digging your stuff.”
Listening to the album, it’s almost impossible to classify exactly what genre Droids are, even Johnny has trouble deciding:
“I don’t think we need to classify ourselves. It’s difficult for us to pinpoint a sound considering we all listen to such different things. We all have a hugely diverse set of influences each, which is a blessing as sometimes you can be stuck and someone will pull something from a totally random place and it will work and you’ll be like “holy fuck I never thought of that”. Alternative rock is the closest we can say, there’s heavy parts and there’s not so heavy parts. Bands that write songs that have a lot of dynamics and have more to them than just like fast and heavy, like the whole quiet loud thing, but build on it, throw some crazy riffs into it.”
With Ireland being such a melting pot of bands right now, Droids are just one of countless acts making names for themselves both here and further afield, and like all the others, Droids are well aware of where they come from:
“From Derry you’ve got bands like Making Monsters and Intermission and Wyldling and it’s exploding with music at the moment. In the last two years it’s gone nuts like, I mean a few years ago it was just cover bands and nothing against cover bands but if you’re into original music, you should be able to find it locally. HumanShield are another amazing band, from Letterkenny, who are in the middle of recording more material at the moment. I can’t fucking wait to hear it!
We also love playing with Stillpoint just ‘cos they’re so good, and so tight and just like, lads. Triggerman too, although they’re not part of the new breed. We’ve played a few shows with them recently and every time we do it’s like “holy fuck”. No matter where they play they just command the room, even if it’s not even like, a music-orientated bar, everyone is totally mesmirised by them. They’re total pro’s and every time they play they always give it 110%.”
When writing, the band seem to take a very organic approach to their material, with every member throwing in ideas, although like most things, it all has to start somewhere:
“The vast majority of the songs at least begin with Stephen, and I try and put the bit more rhythmic guitar over the main riffs and the vocals go in last, they always go in last. We all, to varying extents, are big fans of instrumental bands. We write instrumentally and then throw in the vocals at the end. Some people wouldn’t agree with that process but I think the instrumentation, the music is by far the most important part of it.
There’s a few songs that I have written, a few songs that Adam has written, but a lot of the time there’ll be a riff and we’ll work from there. With Recognizer, the last track on the EP, Adam came in with a bass-line for that whole tune and we added it all in and it’s probably the most organically written song we have to date. As a singer, I don’t wanna fuckin’ sing, I want to play guitar. I try to do as little singing as possible and just fuckin’ scream. We’re really proud of the songs we have written so far, but we want to build on it.”
So after such a hectic year, you’d think it would be time for a break, but not for these lads, it seems bigger and brighter is the only direction for 2013 and beyond:
“The plan is to build upon what we’ve done this year. The most important thing is recording again. As I said before, our experience in the studio first time round was a massive learning curve. Plenty of do’s and plenty of don’ts, the don’ts possibly more important than the do’s. About ourselves as a band, mostly about our limitations of what we are capable of. We’ve sorta looked at a few studios, one or two have got in touch with us. Clarity and tone are the two most important things looking forward to the new record. It’ll be another EP, I think albums are dying.
We’d like to go on the road too. It’s in it’s embryonic stage now, but we’re hoping to sort some Scotland dates and then get through England and come down to London, organically build up a fan-base of people who actually want to see you instead of someone on Facebook just clicking ‘like’.”
Interview by Eóin Boylan.
