Innocent Smoothies

Mark McCambridge and Eamonn McNamee may have grown up together, may have shared formative experiences in bands while still at school, may have discovered songs and musicians (Pixies, Dylan, Orbison, Otis) and cultivated a common sensibility; may even have kept in touch and maintained a creative relationship despite moving to different countries. But crikey – you couldn't say they're alike

Take Mark – Nottingham Forest supporter, quietly spoken, thoughtful, careful with his opinions.
Then there's Eamonn – sparky, incapable of sitting still, a fan of the verbal fifty-fifty tackle.
It's a duality that can even be seen at play throughout the repertoire of their band The Holy Innocents. Each time Eamonn throws in a gad-fly anthem to late-night, big city living, Mark matches it with a warm, low-lit paean to old pals and home comforts. And the effect, it has to be said, is fairly magical.
"Every song is different," says Eamonn. "Mark has had different experiences than me – he is currently living with a girl and a child, that possibly promotes more reflection. I am living very much as a single man. Also, when I write about a particular person it ends up being about three or four different people because sometimes you want to veil the identity and sometimes the person in question just isn't interesting enough to devote a whole song to. Sometimes you sit down and begin a song and an avalanche happens and it's important to let it all come out and then review it later. I think Mark is probably more measured than this."
"Undoubtedly, the songs are reflective of our lifestyles," Mark jumps in. "I write about what I know. Not to play it safe, but because I think it produces the best songs. A lot has happened since our days grating ears around various small Ballymena venues. Now, my pace of life is certainly slower than Eamonn's, and the songs can often follow suit. But this is the main characteristic of the band. Every song is different. The rest of the band members, and subtleties such as backing vocals and the occasional clunked piano, provide the cohesion."
Which is bang on the money.
For all the lyrical and thematic variety, The Holy Innocents' material all shares a similar genetic code. Lush, plaintive and militantly classicist: keeping company with their tunes is like spending an evening catching up with old friends – shaking your head at their antics, empathising with their troubles, anticipating their punchlines. The fact that the ace production comes courtesy of another old classmate, Ben McAuley ("He's seen now as this mysterious doyen of the Belfast music scene," says Eamonn, "but I still give him dead arms...") only adds to the air of intimacy.
Since forming three years ago, the band have been slowly developing their sound with little fanfare or fuss. A recent slot at the Isle Of Wight Festival, however, has boosted confidence within the camp, and while Eamonn has no intention of "playing pishy little gigs forever", for the moment the pair are happy to continue with their low-key, old-school approach.
"Gigs seem to be a discredited concept at the moment," says Mark. "Bands seem to have forgotten to play them, and punters only seem to want to go to festivals. With Facebook and MySpace and all that, the emphasis seems to have changed. Bands emerge, write one song, there's a huge feeding frenzy and they break up."
"I don't have the patience for all this online friends bollocks," Eamonn vents. "Do you play five-a-side with me every week? No. Then you're not my friend. There's a lot of people who are better managers than they are songwriters at the moment."
"I think bands these days feel that unless they're in your face, they won't get noticed," adds Mark, "but there are different ways of approaching things. Look at Will Oldham. I don't think I've ever seen him interviewed. He doesn't siphon off his energy appearing on CD:UK. We're trying to do this in a certain way. It's fairly idealistic and may not even work, but we're building something with foundations."
Eamonn nods in agreement.