Pack Your Bags,  By the Rakettes

Vocals, Rhythm Guitar: Rob Wright
Lead Guitar: David Cocking
Bass: Rob Foster

Pack - Your - Bags

Cheap Talk

Call it dance, call it rock, call it what you want. Talk is cheap. This is The Rakettes -This is Scandalous [unmastered]

Scandalous

At school we would seek refuge from the normality and monotony of  lessons and lunch-time mischief in  rehearsal rooms, tucked away in the corner of the department we discovered a passion for creating sounds and songs that would entertain us and any passing onlookers. In many ways, nothing has changed;  We spend our nights honing and developing our sound in a garage, hidden amongst the urban sprawl in which we live.  


We met Vocalist and garage MC Rob Wright in 2010 and were unquestionably relieved to find someone that shared our vision and enthusiasm for the music we were making. Rob burns hot; like a lot of creative minds he has an energy that is not always explainable or definable but it works. We wrote songs and played them in small clubs to anyone that would listen, constantly assessing what people responded to and then we'd adapt it for the next week's experiment. Sometimes we got it right, sometimes we didn't but the process allows the music to evolve into something that is focussed around the audience. 

At this time the only percussive element of the band was an 808 drum loop that we would take with us to shows and set at different tempos depending on the song.  This was partly out of necessity and partly to move the audience. People need that regular kick drum keeping everything else tied together and it allows the instruments to explore more jumpy and unconventional rhythms. When we write, it's to a 4-on-the-floor  808 loop, this probably injects the motion and sway right into the foundation of the track, everything else is built up around that.  As our writing progressed it became evident that we would have to further explore the role of the drums in our music and this has added a new dimension to the sound. With that dance element in mind we met with a musician we'd heard about town, Toby Dawkins. He brought a rare musicality to the drums and to the band. 

 

Cheap talk – is the name of the E.P and is the title track. It's an 'Indie Banger'! We been writing pretty intensely at the moment to make this E.P the best it can be and it's exciting what we're putting together. There's definitely a lot of those dance elements that are directing the music but the songs evolve in all sorts of ways. We have kept the instrumentation basic and have avoided incorporating a lot of synthesized sounds.  we are now trying to synthesize - the sound of synthesizer on guitars – GET IT?. And we've gone full circle now, how fucking post modern are we!.  That's the concept anyway but what this creates, or allows us, is some solid ground that we can introduce other complimenting elements to. Certain styles seam to mix well with this technique, repetition of chanted lyrical hooks are obviously a strong component of club tracks and good to listen to. Similarly, aspects of Soul or R&B really fit the mood of some of the songs and add some sentiment and feeling into sections. Not getting ahead of ourselves, we are still a garage Indie group but we're trying to broaden that genre, just a little bit more. 


theRakettes