Six Nation State's musicalconquest

Tue 13th Nov, 2007 in Features

Gerry lead singer of Six Nation State is from all appearances living the rock and roll lifestyle- after a hectic year touring worldwide he finally has a little time off and is making the most of it by conducting all his interviews today while still in bed, and by taking his grandmother to the physiotherapist this afternoon. ‘She can’t speak much English and I can speak Italian so I go along and translate for her, it’s how I like to spend my days off!’

The band came together after meeting at Southampton University at a time when there was a lull in the live music scene so they decided to orchestrate their own live music nights, – œAfter we’d organized and played at a few of these shows, we realizsd we were actually a really good band, and it became more important to us than the live music nights. We were all working 9-5 jobs, playing four gigs a week and rehearsing, and working that hard marked out a blueprint for us early on; we want this band to be a career’. Rock and roll band and long term career are not two thoughts you usually hear in the same sentence, but Six Nation State are determined to break the mold of ‘get hyped by music press, release one album, possibly win some NME awards and then disappear into obscurity’. Gerry says they draw inspiration from musicians like Damon Albarn. – œA band like Blur have been around for years, and they didn’t really hit it big till their 3rd album, and that’s how we want to be. You see bands that have one big album and then are selling out the Astoria, but when you rise that quickly you fall that quickly. I know we’ve got at least another 15 albums in us, whether it be as Six Nation State or something else, we’re all about career and progression’.

Six Nation State already have an intense fan base that has been built up by word of mouth, a lot of which is due to their intense live gigs. ‘Our fans would kill for us you know? And all our fans have come from people coming to see our shows, telling their friends and it’s just built up from there. We play every show like it’s our last, and we never know how our shows are going to finish, sometimes we’re all in the crowd, sometimes we’re on stage, as a band we have an air of unexpectedness and we’re all insanely passionate about music, and we try to get that feeling across in all our shows’.

Their debut self titled album was recorded in Latvia and it was an intense experience for the band, – œWe were recording for 14 hours a day, going out to bars, then coming back and sleeping for whatever was left of the day before getting up and recording again.’ The result was an album that reflects Six Nation State’s diverse influences as well as the experience of recording in a country that most bands wouldn’t think to visit, – œWe like lots of varied music so we wanted to try lots of different things on this album, we all like ska, Bob Marley, punk as well as newer bands like The Coral and The Zutons so it’s a melting pot of everything we’re into as well as being influenced by the eastern craziness of our drinking and recording holiday.’

Six Nation State were fortunate enough to play at this year’s South By Southwest and made the most of this once in a lifetime experience for aspiring bands as clearly evidenced by Gerry’s description of a typical day during the festival- – œIt’s 10am, you’re watching Lily Allen and drinking margaritas, then it’s 11am and you’re wearing a ridiculous fluffy pink hat and seeing another band and drinking more margaritas, and then repeat this process till the early hours of the morning’. In-between wearing fluffy hats and drinking cocktails Six Nation State played an impressive set, ‘A lot of the hyped up bands from the UK only have English journalists at their shows but just through going round and talking to people, inviting them to our show we were one of the few bands to have American journalists at our show, and we won over the crowd, if you can impress people from the deep south, the bible belt, you know you’re alright’.

It’s very obvious after our conversation that Six Nation State are in it for the long haul; and you’ve got to respect a rock and roll band that genuinely cares about the important things in life- making music and looking after your grandma.