Your name:
My name is Daniel Bateman and I’m lead singer/songwriter.
Where are you from?
I’m from the south of England, currently living in a
small village near Portsmouth.
Name of band:
Pistolhead.
Who else is in your band?
My partner in Pistolhead is Paul Brighton. He is a DJ and technical musician who apart from many other things is
the key creator of the music. It’s his job to
send me musical ideas with which I create songs that we then
build upon and record. The final creation of the song is a
joint effort in the studio.
How would you describe yourselves and your music?
Our music is a blend of rock, pop and electronica. The
music we create in the studio and as a live unit skips from one genre to another as if it had itchy feet. Being labelled
is a thing we want to avoid but our influences make that
easy being as diverse as David Bowie, Nine Inch Nails and
Tricky to Ryuchi Sakamto, Aphex Twin, Sex Pistols and Squarepusher.
With a bunch of squeeks, beeps and weird instruments
in between.
Who are your main influences musically?
Well as the aforementioned my main influences run through music, film and art. You see music is really a visual
medium. The listener creates images instantly when they hear
music and it’s a band's job to control (as best they can) those images and suggestions. So from David Bowie, Nick Cave,
PJ Harvey, Depeche Mode, David Sylvain, Bauhaus, Nine Inch
Nails, Radiohead and Pink Floyd to movies like The Road, 2001
Space Odyssey, Repulsion, The Hunger, Seven, to art by Salvador Dali, Picasso, Carravagio, Rembrandt, Andy Warhol and
Banksy it’s all in there in one way or another. Influences come
from the world around you some obvious some less so.
What do you hope to achieve in music?
Isn’t creating the music itself enough? Well like any
piece of art that required a lot of passion and hard work you
naturally want an audience to respond to it. The logic is if we
like it then there must be others out there that will too so the
task is to ‘get it out there’. But these days it’s hard to be
heard over the noise of vacuous empty superficial trash that
clogs up the airwaves and the internet. It’s a challenge but
you hope the good will out somehow.
What has been the highlight of your career so far, and why?
A highlight for any musician or artist is the completion
of a song or an album, or a film or a painting followed by a positive reaction from other people. I’ve been fortunate
with this band and countless others to have experienced that
many times. However my greatest highlight as a memory really
was the first time I ever sang on stage with a band. I was 17
and nervous as hell as the venue was huge and packed out
(over 200 people). But the gig went brilliantly and got a
really positive review in the local paper the next day. I was
bitten by the bug that night and never looked back.
And what’s the moment you want to forget?
In terms of music? Wanting to sing like Bruce Willis when
I was 13.......Jeez!!
If you had to pick just one of your songs to represent your music, what would it be and why?
At this point, currently my favourite song is Moon. It’s the song that starts up when you go onto our website (www.wearepistolhead.com). I love the mood and tone of that tune and the funky hooky guitar riff towards the end just rocks. It's got a bit of everything in it so is a
good representation but like the weather my faves change a
lot.
Where can we listen to it?
Where can we find out more about your music?
We are out there on Facebook, Twitter and on our official
site of course. You need to be these days.
Anything else you’d like to say about your music that I forgot to ask?
Just that if your tastes are broad and you want to
discover something new and fresh that hasn’t been served up to you
via Simon Cowell and other such killers of popular culture
then give Pistolhead a fair hearing....you might like them.
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