Torquil Campbell of the Canadian band Stars practises for media interviews in his bedroom, so this article should be a great read. He talks to Tony Clayton-Lea
ANOTHER month, another band from Canada. If you must blame anyone, blame the Canadian government and its forward-thinking arts grants policies. It is, says, Torquil Campbell, the singer with Stars, the main reason for the recent avalanche of Canuck musical activity.
"If anyone is making an argument for the funding of art, they should take a look at what has happened in music in Canada over the past few years. The whole thing started about 20 years ago as a funding mechanism for bands, and you can really trace a lot of what is happening now to the ability of just getting out to tour, getting records distributed. Once you have that incentive and a sense of being able to do something, rather than being stuck at square one for years, then the sky's the limit.
"It isn't that hard to play rock'n'roll; anyone can do it. It's just a case of being so difficult to get anywhere with it, and the head start we had in Canada accounts for a lot of the success we are having now."
Isn't too much being written about these Canadian bands, though? If it isn't Arcade Fire, then it's Metric, and if it isn't Patrick Watson then it's Broken Social Scene. Campbell is pragmatic about the level of media coverage.
"Oh, look, there's too much being written about practically everything in the world except for the things that really matter. I guess Stars are just another distraction, but we're a little bit more sincere. The whole thing of publicising records and talking about them is something that I dreamed about in my bedroom - I had all my answers ready. That was amazing for a while, but now I find it interesting in another way because it's such an arbitrary choice to talk to one person about their experience, and to create a sense of occasion about it.
"With Stars, we want to make kitchen-sink music for people; music that you can do the dishes to, drive home to from your mother's funeral, and get drunk and shag to - all the things you can use music for. We want you to use us and sort of disappear into what your life is. Ultimately, we're just a soundtrack band for people's lives."
According to Campbell, that was the ethos from the start; it's all they had ever hoped and planned for. "Simply put, what we do is storytelling." The obvious corollary here is that the art of effective storytelling mixes collective influences with an original voice. Are Stars there yet? Their previous album (Set Yourself on Fire) and their new one (In Our Bedroom After the War) would certainly indicate they are.
"We're doing alright, we got a bit of a thing going, but it's not like we're reinventing the wheel," says Campbell, ever the realist. "I love storytelling bands, and I always thought that would be a way to make things interesting. I was a big fan of The Beautiful South, and the idea of having two points of view in the songs gives you a lot room to create stories. If you like that, then fine, if you don't, then it's because you hate me."
Er, sorry? That's a strange thing to say, even if your name is possibly something that got you picked on at school. But Torquil Campbell is unrepentant.
"As we get a bit of notoriety you can see an element of vitriolic hatred directed towards me. On the face of it this is not good, but I actually think it's fantastic . . . as an artist I'm quite happy about it."
In a way, clarifies Campbell, it's something he has always wanted. "Getting into rock'n'roll, for me, was about picking a fight with all the people who said that what I listened to and what I was as a kid was nothing. To annoy these kinds of people is my revenge!"
