Christina Dun: CMW: Alex the Great

Thursday, March 29, 2012

CMW: Alex the Great

Left to right: Hamid, Juan, Vlad, Steven and Liam

During Canadian Music Week, my schedule was full of interviews with new artists that I was excited to meet and chat with. One of the most interesting and funniest interviews was with Alex the Great, a band from Brighton, UK.

Made up of Steven, Juan, Hamid, Liam, and Vlad, the five of them have such great chemistry and their personalities really shone through during the interview -- they had so much to say it was hard to keep up at times!

These guys have literally come together with backgrounds from around the globe -- Tokyo, The Netherlands, Hong Kong, Columbia, Nigeria...you name it, they’ve lived there at some point in time. After being high school friends in Spain, they each went their separate ways, but eventually found their way back together in London, where journey really got started.

Here's a clip of Vlad explaining where he is from (it's pretty impressive!)

So for someone who has never heard of Alex the Great, how would you describe your sound to them?

Juan: We’re mainly considered a folk-rock band but we also include a lot of different elements - cellos, organs, things like that - basically we’re a folk rock band but trying to reach other genres as well.

Steven: We’re trying to get an orchestra essentially, bit by bit. We started with cellos, flutes, organs, pianos, everything in the background. We love layering instruments over everything. I would describe the band as an old rock band on the folk-y side of things, but when we perform live we really pump up the volume.

This is their second year participating in CMW, so I asked them how this year was different. Here is a funny audio clip from the interview:

I also checked out their show at the Dakota Tavern on March 21st, the same day of the interview. They were great! Check out some of my photos: