Interviewed ‘Music is all the time in regards to the thriller’

‘Music is all the time in regards to the thriller’

Gemma Hayes interviewed 

Irish singer-songwriter Gemma Hayes has introduced three London reveals subsequent month.  Thursday 4th and Friday fifth September 2025 can be up shut and private in St Pancras Outdated Church.

Saturday (6 September 2025) can be a bit extra of a raucous affair at The Lexington in Kings Cross.

Pete Harvey spoke to Gemma for Louder than Battle in regards to the latest single, the final album, guitars, pedals, shoegaze and omelettes.

By the use of introduction, right here is the video for ‘Central Lodge’ the third single to be taken from ‘Blind Religion’ (2024) Gemma’s sixth studio album.

LTW: Was any of that footage shot particularly for the video? the cityscapes or something?

Gemma: That’s all outdated footage. Alfred, the director, has used pictures that he took and video from a household vacation. The remainder is from motion pictures that he cherished and pictures that occurred to him whereas he was listening to the track. He’s picked some stunning moments.

When the ocean was coming in on the backside of your chair, I used to be considering ‘it’s going to get her chair moist’, however then I realised it was a inexperienced display screen or no matter. 

Gemma: What I really like with Alfred’s visible tackle the track is representing loneliness with the subway. There are such a lot of individuals, nevertheless it’s fairly lonely. There’s one thing actually stark about that. All people’s in their very own world, surrounded by strangers. 

Effectively, additionally should you’re on the tube, like late at night time, there isn’t anyone there.

Gemma: Yeah, you received’t discover me down within the tube station at midnight.

Within the first line of Central Lodge does the man have a sore throat or is he getting excessive on cough syrup?

Gemma: I reckon there was a little bit of getting excessive on cough syrup, however on the time I used to be younger and I wasn’t positive why. “There’s no spoon, you’re simply consuming out of the bottle”.

Effectively, that might be a clue. ‘Central Lodge’ is a collage of numerous various things.

Gemma: As a result of we have been on tour, it’s extra simply flashes of photos of a time. It’s almost just like the video. One minute it’s Manchester after which the subsequent scene in my head is on stage in Dublin. Any person that I cared for deeply, sadly, killed himself ultimately as he bought older. However this was a time after we have been type of younger, he was heading, however he wasn’t absolutely down that highway of substance abuse but. He’d undergo his spell after which he’d clear up and I used to be very a lot clear and our lives merged for some time and it was fantastic. He was a really delicate human being and I’m not stunned that generally essentially the most delicate human beings begin to self-medicate with the intention to cope with stuff.

Let’s discuss in regards to the songs on Blind Religion (2024). How did you give you the form of the album? Do you continue to consider it by way of vinyl, , with observe seven being vital?

Gemma: Yeah, I imply, it’s to me, I’m old style. The album is of a chunk. So there may be an arc. It begins off actually fairly type of light after which it type of brings individuals on a journey. Whether or not individuals take heed to it that method or not is as much as them. However for me, that was easy methods to do it.

What guitar do you write on?

Gemma: It relies upon, I really feel like every guitar has a particular character. If I need to go for a type of a tragic Nick Drake track, I’ve a extremely, actually outdated Gibson. I picked it up in a secondhand store in America 25, 30 years in the past. It’s an unsightly guitar as a result of any person bloody properly varnished it with a nasty varnish.

It sounds actual honky. It’s bought an angle, , it’s not a stupendous sounding guitar.  So if I need to do candy plucking, I take advantage of that honky guitar simply to present the plucking a little bit bit extra type of an angle. I have a tendency to put in writing loads of the fingerpicking songs on that outdated Gibson.

After which I’ve a Dan Electro baritone guitar. Okay. Which I completely love.
If the track is nice, I prefer to have that darkish, , deeper sound on the baritone.
I even have a Thinline Tele that I’ve put a bass string on. All people mentioned, don’t put a bass string in your Tele, it’ll warp the neck. But it surely hasn’t. I do loads of mad tuning. I can tune that proper all the way down to an A pointy.

There have to be any person passing you completely different guitars with completely different tunings on a regular basis once you’re enjoying?

Gemma: For years, I’d have seven guitars and I’d have a guitar tech and I’d do the set listing so I might possibly maintain onto one guitar for 2 or three songs. However now I’ve it all the way down to a high-quality artwork. I’ve a kind of Christmas tree kind guitar stands proper behind me. So for some songs, I’ve the band, as a track ends, create a drone, a stupendous type of like Sigur Rós kind drone on the stage whereas I seize the subsequent guitar and simply have it able to go.

Which shoegaze bands influenced you?

Gemma: Massively, it could have been My Bloody Valentine, Loveless. Particularly that album. I don’t are likely to take heed to loads of music. I’ll discover an album and I’ll simply devour that album for years and I’ll almost soak up it. So Loveless has stayed with me, I’d say for 20 years. And there’s a nostalgia to it. From Loveless and to a lesser extent individuals like Sonic Youth, I don’t see them as shoegaze, to be sincere, however there’s a component of it.

What about Swervedriver? Did you ever dabble with them?

Gemma: Yeah, Swervedriver and there was Experience.

Swervedriver are my favourites notably as a result of although they’re from Oxford, they sound like they’re from the Midwest.

Gemma: I discover that with Experience as properly, they’ve such a giant sound. As in, it doesn’t sound from a selected place on this planet.

I suppose that’s the shoegaze factor, isn’t it? It’s epic partitions of fuzz and nice for driving. It’s simply driving music.

Gemma: Oh my God. Yeah. Yeah, completely. However I additionally discover that music transferring. It strikes me after I hear it. I ended up doing just a few reveals with My Bloody Valentine as their assist act. It simply blew my thoughts to be a part of their ensemble on the highway. To face there and take heed to the music, it overwhelms you a lot. It’s stunning. And with My Bloody Valentine, the chord progressions are beautiful, , and it’s very courageous. They may maintain on one chord for 5 minutes.

I really like folks music as properly, , however I get a little bit bit bored with type of simply an acoustic guitar within the folks world, . I don’t play solo for that purpose. For me, it’s all about texture. After I go to see, let’s say any person enjoying solo, I discover myself simply getting a little bit bored as a result of I believe songwriting is essential, however for me, the manufacturing on stage is essential. Even should you simply add a double observe vocal or add a drone beneath a little bit acoustic track, hastily it’s in a very completely different cinematic place. So for me, it’s vital to have individuals on stage creating sounds.

Who’s going to be with you in London?

Gemma: My full band. Drums, keys, fiddle. I’ve bought two multi-instrumentalists. I’m actually excited in regards to the UK reveals as a result of the band are simply killer.

Being again in Baltimore (County Cork, Eire) and away from London and Los Angeles you’ve needed to discover a entire bunch of recent guys?

Gemma: New-ish, one in all them I’ve been enjoying with for 3 years and the others would have been a couple of 12 months and a half, so comparatively new.

You’re large in Eire, you’re large internationally, there are individuals coming to the London reveals from everywhere in the world however you’re lesser recognized within the UK?

Gemma: It is sensible as a result of I didn’t do something for 10 years. There was a buzz within the UK with my first album (Night time on my Facet, 2002) as a result of it was nominated for a Mercury Prize. However then I finished touring. I’m not a touring artist, so I’ll disappear for just a few years.

Do you have interaction with social media?

Gemma: It’s a must to be very laptop savvy and social media savvy and importing continuously and promoting a life-style, promoting your self by way of, , continuously speaking, continuously pushing. And I’m simply not gonna do this. For me, music was all the time in regards to the thriller. I’m not fascinating, personally.

Couldn’t you simply type of cook dinner one thing for TikTok? Just like the footballers do? ‘Right here’s Gemma Hayes making an omelette’.

Gemma: Effectively, there’s one thing actually pathetic, as a result of once you don’t have loads of followers and also you’re simply making an omelette, it’s not as superb as making an omelette and getting, like, 100,000 likes. There’s one thing actually unhappy about having one or two likes in your omelette.

Do you might have a pedal board? What’s on it?

Gemma: I’ve bought a Tube Screamer and a Blue Sky delay with stunning, attractive woozy sounds. I’ve bought a Vox vocal harmoniser, an equaliser pedal, a Boss loop station, an AB field and two DIs. That’s it.

So that you simply put that by way of a clear sounding Fender or one thing?

Gemma: I’ve bought a Vox VT40. It’s a small little amp. I used to have the large AC, what have been they known as?

AC30? However it’s important to play them actually, actually bloody loud, don’t you?

Gemma: Actually loud and the valves on the again can warmth up and trigger points. This new Vox is de facto sturdy. It packs a punch on stage. The BlueSky pedal has modified how I write. It’s a Strymon. They do superb pedals. If you would like that shoegaze sound, simply woozy delays. It’s actually modified how I sound stay now. I can actually add extra texture.

I suppose you will get the Strymon going, put it by way of the loop station after which swap away to a different sound.

Gemma: That’s what I do. So that you simply create a mattress of a drone, , of simply wooziness. After which you’ll be able to have a little bit plucky guitar over it and right away, it’s far more cinematic.

Go and see Gemma Hayes in London this September. The reveals can be filled with absorbing and intimate storytelling from one in all Eire’s most quietly good musical voices.

Central Lodge

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All phrases Pete Harvey. {Photograph} by Gemma Hayes. Extra writing by Pete on Louder Than Battle might be discovered at his writer’s archive.