Clint Boon brings his new band to these shores later this winter, and judging from his new album, it promises to be an un-missable experience. Pop Music ... Space Travel is an album that wears it's influences on it's sleeve, but the sum is greater than it's parts. Vainglorious pop music with echoes of the Buzzcocks and John Cooper Clarke, imagine The Divine Comedy fronted by Julian Cope and you're getting close.
"I know what you mean", explains the genial Mancunian, "but I think that the influences are older, Scott Walker, definitely, and The Velvet Underground; you hear these things later, but it's quite unconscious at the time. The best thing about playing pop music is that it's fun, we've been involving the audience a lot at the live gigs, getting people up to play, it's a lot of fun."
The Inspiral Carpets are still seen as the poor relations of the Madchester 'baggy' scene that exploded in the mid-eighties, enjoying moderate chart success but always overshadowed by contemporaries like The Stone Roses and The Happy Mondays. Despite this, the band released four albums in ten years, and toured extensively worldwide, accompanied by a guitar roadie called Noel Gallagher.
"The Inspirals achieved far more than we'd expected. Initially we thought we might make one single, and then we found ourselves working solidly for ten years. We were one of the few bands of that scene who toured a lot, so in some ways we were apart from that whole baggy thing. Ultimately it ran it's course and I realised that people didn't want the Inspirals, so you leave it and go do something else. It was a big shock to lose the deal, but it encourages you to try something else."
The new album is a lot more upbeat than anything the singer has produced before, from it's mock epic Apocalypse Now type intro, on which the voluptuous vocals of boon's wife Meaghan feature, to the almost prophetically defiant 'You Can't Keep A Good Man Down', the album is one of that rare breed that you can play right the way through. Tongue-in-cheek sleeve notes include a guide to making it in the pop business, including such gems as "Wear White All The Time", "Use E-Mail", and "If Your Wife's Got A Cool Voice, Use It".
"Well, it's pop music, it's supposed to be about fun. This is music for everybody with a radio. I remember years ago seeing Elvis Presley on television and thinking 'that's what I wanna do!' and I still love it. I can't categorise the music, it's just stuff I'm proud to play. It's like, I do a bit of deejay work and the tunes range from the Beach Boys 'California Dreaming' to 'There She Goes' by the La's, it's whatever I like, really. We're playing in Dublin and Cork in December, but I also want to gig Belfast while we're there. I did a deejay gig in Belfast a while ago and I loved the place".
Before I take my leave of Clint I have to ask about that guitar roadie. What was the young Noel Gallagher like?
"As a roadie he was alright, but as a friend he was brilliant. He wasn't what you'd call a grafter, and sometimes he'd give it a bit of attitude I have to say, but he's a sound bloke. We don't keep in touch because our lives have just gone on totally different tracks. I've been busting my bollocks getting this band together, and he's been hanging out in London with supermodels, but I consider him a mate, yeah. Hopefully, if this all goes according to plan I'll buy him a pint in The Groucho Club in about six months!" n
* Pop Music ... Space Travel is out now on Artful.