Immediately after forming, Fuck Buttons started to play live whenever possible. Soon they were picked up by post-rock-masters Mogwai, and signed on All Tommorow Parties’ own record label. There were many music hearts blown away by the English two-piece, Benjamin John Power & Andrew Hung’s debut album last year. “Adrenaline pumping, ear purging slab of towering, pristine noise” were the praising words from Time Out Magazine short after their very first release. Experimental electronic noise has never felt so catchy. Fuck Buttons are now ready to let their second noisy baby into our ears. Curious as we always are, one half of the band, Andrew, answered some of the things Form to follow were wondering.

The new album is called ‘Tarot Sport’ — where’s the name from?

We’ve been delving into the psychic world and the more we researched we learnt about this gathering between people who play each other off and we thought it was quite a resonant activity.

What did you do differently on this album to the first LP ‘Street Horrrsing’?

I think there are a lot more complex sounds on the new record. I’m not saying in any way the first one lacked anything, but I think it could be perceived that there are more than two people in the band now just because of the nature of the sound — we’re triggering a lot more stuff than we did with the first record, a lot more live instrumentation as well.

‘Tarot Sports’ seems a lot more driven than the first album ‘Street Horrsing’, which seemed more contemplative — why is that?

The first record took us a long while to gather all the pieces. During that time we weren’t fully concentrating on the music — we had full time jobs and it was a hobby. It was something we were very passionate about, but it wasn’t something that dominated our lives, whereas it is now; it’s definitely something that’s on our minds all the time, that’s the reason for its directness.

How would you characterize the last year? Have you changed in your personal lives?

I’ve seen more than I ever could have imagined in this last year; I feel like I’ve changed. I didn’t really expect I’d see this much of the world, and there’s more to come. I guess it changes you somehow, I’d have to speak to myself a few years ago to find out how; I don’t feel that I’ve changed but I’m sure those around me would say that I have — hopefully it’s positive.

What does each of you bring to Fuck Buttons that the other one lacks?

Charisma is my weakness. Haha. One of the most interesting things I thought which came to light in the studio was the lack of roles we have in the band and what comes with that. What’s necessary for that to work is there needs to be a lot of communication. We don’t know what each person’s gonna do, and we’re presumably working towards the same goal, so we’re having to communicate with each other and be malleable at the same time and being able to go to different places. We cover each other’s backs but not in a specific area.

How do radio presenters refer to you on air?

‘F Buttons’ usually.

Did you ever think the name might be a hindrance?

It was never a consideration! Haha.

You speak of wanting your music to “allow the listener to create their own narrative” — is that why you make your music so epic?

I think you should be able to visualize a piece of music any way you’d want to. We don’t have lyrics not necessarily because we’ve decided not to have them for that reason so that people can make their own mind up about what’s going on — we hope that surely the listener will throw up some kind of mental picture. And with that Clash are off, as we fly at red walls of towering clouds with an army of honeyed bees at our side whispering urgent malevolence into our buffeted ears.

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Fuck Buttons — Surf Solar

(via Pitchfork)

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