Hi, we’re Sydney five piece Cogel. Brothers Ed and Lloyd comprise the rhythm section, while guitarist Nick offers an array of effects with his pedals and facial elasticity, Alex brings the violin and egg shaker, and Belgian frontman Nic provides the voice and overall exotic appeal!
As a completely independent band, we’ve had a pretty busy year; releasing two singles – The Bug and Felusine; gigging, recording our EP; and producing two videoclips.
Our EP, “Nowhere Near” is due for release digitally on 2 Nov and we’ll be doing some shows along the East Coast to support this.
Tell us about the concept behind the music video for ‘Felusine’
Alex: This is the brainchild of frontman Nic. One day there will be a biopsy done on his brain, and it will be revealed that he actually just has a children’s toy shop inside his head with random toys banging into each other, spawning initially inexplicable but eventually great ideas.
The toyshop was in full swing the day that Nic returned from a trip to Europe and told us he wanted to have a head cast made of his face for our next vid which we could then project images onto – an idea inspired by an advertising campaign he saw which used posters of people painted as statues. The idea constantly evolved from there, right until the last day of editing, when the originally simple concept had somehow morphed into indie music’s response to Inception – complete with a film-inside-a-film, stop-motion techniques, bugs, UV lighting, pyrotechnics and a couple of other tricks to keep you on your toes…the final product has of course been uploaded to YouTube here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Z-ehGV2-9A
You funded the new EP ‘Nowhere Near’ through Pozible, Why did you choose them as opposed to other services and what would you recommend to other bands using this service?
Nick: Initially I read about Kickstarter, but after digging around their website, I realised you had to be American-based to have your project accepted. I know there are one or two other crowd-sourcing websites around, but Pozible seemed to have a great set up. As for its success, we found it invaluable, because we had faith that our fans, friends and family would believe in our projects. If other creatives reading this believe that they’ve got a strong enough following, and potentially have a viral idea, then crowd-sourcing is a brilliant idea. Conversely, I imagine the dejection of missing the required deadline; thus ending up with nothing; would be crippling.
What’s your earliest memory of performing and who inspired you to start?
Alex: I’ve probably been performing the longest, playing my first piano concert at age 3 before switching to violin at age 6. I began playing under threat of being sent to an orphanage however these days I just play to maintain my street cred, drawing on the love of Eastern European gypsy music which came from my Romanian violin teacher.
Nick: Singing along to Billy Ray Cyrus’ “Achy Breaky Heart” on Christmas morning, after having just been given a toy Guitar and Microphone set. My parents were really into the show, and by “really into the show”, I mean “instantly regretting their purchase”.
What are the most-played tracks in your iTunes right now?
Nick: Thom Yorke – Black Swan
How do you like to find new music?
Nick: Between lastfm, blogs, reading press, writing about music, spotify, word-of-mouth, and radio, I’ve got a generous selection of discovery avenues.
Tell us about the song writing process for Cogel, does it start off with Nic or does it start in a rehearsal room with the whole band?
Alex: Mostly, someone brings in a riff that’s been playing in their head, and we just jam it out until we find a groove. Sometimes the original riff is lost; other times it becomes the chorus. It takes us a long time because the songwriting is so collaborative, but when each band member has so much to bring to the table, we’re happy to take our time to make sure all potential options were considered and we can perform something we’re proud of. We also tell a lot of monkey jokes during the process, which probably slows us down a little, too.
If you could curate your own festival, where would it be, who would be on the bill, how many people would you let in and what features would it have?
Alex: Wow, what a question!
Well, to satisfy all our varying music tastes, we would probably have to run it for at least 3 days to pay tribute all the big influential indie artists that made it big without losing their musical integrity, like Sigur Ros, Radiohead, Bat For Lashes, The National and Elbow; as well as the wealth of Australian artists coming to the foreground right now, like The Rubens, Dappled Cities, Winter People, Bearhug, Deep Sea Arcade; and of course an Aus Hip Hop lineup to placate me, with the Hilltop Hoods, Horrorshow, Chance Waters, Seth Sentry, Mind Over Matter, Joelistics, The Herd and Spit Syndicate rocking the mic.
There is only one stage so there will never be any clashes.
Alcohol would be supplied from chilled barrels and kegs located all over the grounds (BYO reusable receptacle); all the food would be locally-grown organic produce (you can get organic fried stuff, right?).
It would have to be a camping festival somewhere near the beach up in Newport…with campfires; paper lanterns (probably not too close to the campfires); free animal onesies and novelty sunglasses for everyone on entry; definitely some haystacks; a magic show with acrobats; chill out corners with beanbags, those fans which spray water flecks and guitars; a giant chessboard (and giant cheeseboard come to think of it)…and portaloos which never smell.
The weather will be perfect, the festival would probably be called “Heaven” and a lot of people should be able to come since we’d hate anyone to miss out on something so amazing – maybe 10,000?
You’ve got us all revved up now – do you know anyone who would fund this crazy idea for us?
Because it’s more fun to do things together, which living Australian artist would you most like to collaborate with? Tell us why?
Alex: Wally De Backer, because he is the master of creating quirky soundscapes, and his production skills are brilliant, especially in bringing out dynamic intensity – something we give a lot of focus to during song-writing.
What is your band’s music the best soundtrack for?
Nick: Well at this stage, it’s going to be an event or happening that isn’t much more than an hour in length. You know what takes just under an hour? Baking a cake. Much like a well-made cake, a Cogel track has a couple of different layers to it, isn’t overly saccharine and will lead to obesity upon over-consumption.
Ok, we can’t promise our music can make you fat.
Where we can see you play next, what releases do you have available and where can we get them?
To support the November 2nd launch of our EP ‘Nowhere Near’, we’ll be playing shows at Ding Dong Lounge in Melbourne on 27th October and at the Upstairs Beresford, Sydney on 2nd November.
The new EP, as well as our previous singles, can be purchased via iTunes.
