Money interview: We owe a lot to Manchester really

Image: Money

Just a like a secretive, back-street drinking hole, it's quite easy to consider Money as a Mancunian whisper. The city is where the band formed and has undoubtedly had a profound influence on their music, which is why their forthcoming gig in Manchester has an air of celebration about it. 

One thing's for sure is that Money are more than a band: whether you hinge that on the literary capabilities of lead Jamie Lee, exhilarating live shows held in unique locations, slightly barbaric album artwork, or the glinting melodies that run through their songs - they exhibit much more than the average band. 

They convey themes, concepts and sensations that affect you - even more so in recent album Suicide Songs (listen to a track below), written during a self-destructive point of Jamie's life.  

After relocating to London and responding to producer Charlie Andrew, they were eventually able to pull the album together. The result was a record that manages euphoria amongst bleakness, assisted by pristine string and brass sections.

Central to its allure is Jamie's yearning passages of poetry and story-telling, a skill and hobby which he tells us extends beyond the band - to ten unfinished novels for perspective.

In anticipation of Money closing their tour at the Ritz in Manchester on Friday 22nd April, Ben Smith spoke with him about his song-writing, the band's affinity with Manchester and what separates their upcoming show from the rest. 

Hey Jamie, how's things? 

We've just finished a European tour and we played with Frightened Rabbit last night and the night before in London and up in Scotland. We're just kind of resting now. 

How was that experience? 

It was fun actually. It is a bit of a challenge playing in-front of a crowd that isn't yours. You've got to try and win them over really. 

Do you feel as if the crowd you'll experience in Manchester is yours? 

Well yeah more than last night. I assume they kind of want to see us and I also assume that people are there to make up their mind as to whether they like us or not.

We'll just have to do what we do and try and enjoy it really because otherwise we'd just have a string of miserable experiences. But I don't want to turn up to gig and be like, "hey we're here to wow the crowd". We're just there to produce something honest and hopefully authentic really.

If things do fuck up then so be it, that's part and parcel of the whole thing. We're not there to wow people, we just want to put on a good show really and live up to some of the shows that we've seen.

You mention with your shows that people are there to make up their  own mind, but when you head into a more familiar crowd which is Manchester, how do you think they're approaching it? 

Well I think most people will be there to support us, which is a celebration of the record really. I hope so anyway, you know there's that saying: "You can always find an Irishman in a bar" - the same thing seems to be about Mancunians all over the world.

Whenever we go and play in like America or France, there are always Mancunians who turn up. So the record is kind of be a celebration and the gig will be a celebration of the record. 

Would you say that although the record is largely built on self-reflection, it was also tailored towards the people of Manchester?

It wasn't tailored towards them, but you know it was written there. So inevitable it does have a certain quality of the city in it.  

Because when I listened to you recite your poem "Paradise is hell" (A poem he wrote that expands on the quote 'Manchester is paradise'), the themes in that seemed to reflect in Suicide Songs. 

I think in a way you do have kind of the right audience in your head. I don't know what mine is, but it's at least our peers and i'd say our peers are all Manchester musicians.

So that's where we have lived and made music so we need to please them. That is a way of saying Manchester is a certain way and the people who live there are a certain way and the art is made there in a certain way and that's all because of the city really.

Since the record you've moved back to London. Have you proceeded to write anything else in this time? 

We're always writing new music. I don't know how thing's will change, whether the next record will be a Manchester record or not I don't know. It depends how we record it, how we do it, but I'm not really thinking about that right now and it's important to make the best music that we can.

Manchester has been formative and inspired a lot of the music we have made, as well as ruining my life at the same time. We owe a lot to that city really.

Have you been writing anything on a personal level, because I get the impression so see yourself as a writer rather than a musician. 

I'm always writing. I've tried to start about ten novels which haven't really gone any further; I'm always writing poetry and stories but I think it takes a long time to get a handle on that and I'm just trying to be as patient as possible. I put out bits of writing on the Money social networks and I have a couple of pieces published online.

I also run a small publishers as well so I'm trying to keep busy on that level. I don't know, I see it as a sacred thing, it's not about showing anyone, it's about being good at it. It's not important about what other people think.

When I've read about you in interviews speaking about yourself as a writer, you mention heights you aspire to reach. What are those heights and for what reason would you like to reach them? 

The reason I want to reach them is the thrill you get when you read a piece of writing that is original, brave and exciting. That's a thrill that I want to give myself. There are certain books and certain writers that give me that feeling and that's what I have looked for throughout my love of writing.

So when you write is it for self-satisfaction or to eventually influence others? 

It's a bit of everything really isn't it. It'd be ridiculous to say I want to do it only for myself because part of the art form is communication. You know, you have to communicate in writing on some level and I mean that in a very open way.

I'm not talking in a very literal sense, I'm saying you just have to convey something through the words or the way they are displayed - it doesn't have to be literal.  

Why do I want do it? It's because I want to be able to capture a sensation and the ability to be able to do that in people is remarkable.

When I'm sat with someone and they come up with something even in a humorous way that I feel is so succinct and correct I'm kind of in admiration of them. I love words and always have and think that's as simple as I can put it. 

So is there more satisfaction when you read about a reviewer speak of your words and lyrics rather than defining the music as a whole?

Yeah definitely. You know Tom Waits said, "I like to think my first instrument is vocabulary". He is a real good example of someone who's love of words comes before the music and the music is the way for his poetry to be accessed. I'm not comparing myself to Tom Waits [laughs]. 

And is this why in your shows you deliver these accapella, recitations of poems? 

Yeah definitely. It's just the words laid bare without any kind of distraction.  

Have you got anything like this planned for the Manchester show? 

Not really, I've kind of stopped doing that because I felt like it became a bit of a gimmick. But maybe we'll see.

I read in an interview you describe your showmanship as "drunk Jamie", how have things changed on stage since you've been sober?

[Laughs] Not much. I had a period of time when I wasn't drinking for a while just because I needed to slow down, but now I'm back to my normal self. On stage I wanted to say before you get a thrill from performing the songs and with my kind of personality, you want to hide from that thrill for as long as you can.

And yeah, that turned into three years of thrill seeking.  It's just going to be however the night is really. We want Manchester to be a big and important show, we want to mark that moment and give people who have supported us since the beginning the best show that we can. But that's just because it's Manchester really. 

I feel like you're spoken about a lot more in Manchester circles, and outside [Jamie interrupts "not so much"] 

I like that, I don't want us to be ubiquitous. I just don't like that, I like bands who are kind of secretive and not peddling their wares to entertain us. I want to do whatever we want to do and for that to be the only mark of our reputation really. 

Pleasure Jamie. 

Money play at Manchester's Ritz on Friday 22nd April - tickets available via the box below.

Read our review of Money - Suicide Songs

Tickets are no longer available for this event