Hiya PALEJOY, thanks for joining us in the virtual RGM lounge today, grab a brew and take a seat.
What made you decide that music is a thing for you?
Dale: I started playing drums at the age of 14 before moving onto guitar and bass. I started a band called Purple Divide at 16 and I’ve been caught up in this love affair with being in bands ever since.
Jamie: My mum pushed me to Learn guitar and after a year or so of not liking it something clicked, and I became obsessed with music. It was all I wanted to do and that feelings been reinforced through the years with the strong community’s I’ve found in DIY music.
Kieran: With music-fanatic parents, it never really felt like a choice as it’s something that I’ve always been surrounded by and prominent through my whole life.
Introduce us to you all and your musical history.
Dale: I’m a guitarist, vocalist, songwriter and social media/PR man for the band. As I said, I started my first band at 16 and we did some cool things in our local scene in Inverness. We supported Fatherson and General Fiasco, which as a teenager was just wild. Fast forward to my college and uni days, I started a band called Alkanes which was my baby for 10 years. We had the pleasure of playing with bands like Vukovi and Holding Absence. We also toured up and down the country with Broadsea, Jamie and Kieran’s other band. That’s how we became good friends. I’ve also put out solo music under the pseudonym Justboy. When I moved to Aberdeen again after being away for a few years, Jamie decided we should try put something new together and her we are around 18 months later!
Jamie: Palejoy is the newest project that I’ve been part of. I’ve played music as a solo artist (Poür Me) for 13 years. Along with this I play rhythm in Aberdeen based bands Ceramics, Audiokicks and Broadsea alongside my Palejoy bandmate Kieran. I also performed in a weird spoken word band called Before Stories which has been active for 9 years. I like to play.
Kieran: Drummer, I’ve been playing for around 15 years. Playing in bands around the local scene & touring up and down the country for the last 10 years with Broadsea.
What’s the live music scene like in Aberdeen right now? Anyone we should be looking out for (Bar you of course)
Dale: I think there’s something for everyone up here and it feels very inclusive and supportive. There are some cracking bands. I’m loving Times New Romance and Vibrator at the moment. What kind of mate would I be if I didn’t plug Broadsea as well?
Jamie: I feel like with tour schedules getting tighter for medium sized bands Aberdeen gets missed out a lot more than it used to which is a shame as supporting the bigger artists does wonders for the local scene. Otherwise, the scene has got plenty going on and a diverse sound throughout. Bands like The Trauma, Times New Romance and Depeche Choad are good friends and great bands to watch!
Kieran: Aberdeen can be quite difficult but we have a lot of good bands on the scene, it’s been good to us all throughout the years & continues to be – we sold out a headline show earlier in the year with Empty Maps, Magician and Vibrator.
I’ve seen a lot of people struggling for support recently online. Whats your view on the industry?
Jamie: It’s hard to say but it feels like a mess, maybe it always has been but it’s definitely smaller (at least on the ground level) than it used to be though there’s glimmers of hope that it will recover, Inverness is set to get a new venue which is huge news after only hearing of venues closing down for years.
Dale: It feels like the industry is still trying to find its feet again after the pandemic. It feels like big bands have been touring relentlessly since then and artists and venues at a grassroots level have fallen by the wayside. I understand it, as a punter it’s great to be able to see all the bands you love and grew up with. However, with all the time and money going into seeing them, it has definitely had an impact on the underground music scene and less folk seem to be going out to their local venues.
Where do you feel you currently sit within the music industry?
Dale: I think it’s hard to say for us at this moment in time. I think following the release of our next two singles we’ll have a clearer picture of where we are at and where we are heading.
Kieran: I feel like we are in a good position with “our sound” as we seem to slot in well with the mid-west emo movement happening right now but also offer that grungier aspect too so it pulls in a lot of the alternative crowd; offering something for everyone.
Jamie: The music industry’s gone to the bookies. I’m the wee dug that’s tied up outside.
Tell us Two truths and a lie about you.
Dale: I play drums left-handed but guitar right-handed.
Rag ‘n’ Bone man added my girlfriend and I to his guestlist for one of his shows, but we were too hungover to attend.
As a teenager, I had a trial for Ross County, despite the fact I’m a big Inverness CT fan.
Jamie: My stone skimming record is 9
I have three nipples
I have a distant cousin who played bass for The Cult
Kieran: I went on stage with 30 Seconds to Mars
I once had lunch with Tom Jones
I met Josh Homme & asked him for a kiss
Do you ever worry about people taking things the wrong way or cancel culture? Discuss….
Dale: Hah! This was a hot topic for us on the road recently. I can be quite outspoken on things at times but I don’t think it’s ever anything to be “cancelled” for. It’s not something I ever worry about because I like to think I carry myself with integrity. I do think we all jump to conclusions rather quickly these days. However, if you are genuinely a piece of s**t then you will get what’s coming to you.
Jamie: I try not to. The herd mentality of cancel culture doesn’t sit right with me and thankfully I’ve never been close to a level of fame that makes complete strangers online want to express negative views about me. Pray for my anxious wee soul if it ever did happen.
Do you sign up to any conspiracy theories? If not why not?
Jamie: In the sense that conspiracy theories are mostly just people trying to brighten up their mundane lives I can be a bit partial to the odd ghost story.
Dale: I love a ghost story until I spook myself too much and can’t sleep! I’m a big believer in Aliens and the idea we have been visited too. There’s no way we’re alone in this universe. Being an Inverness boy, I’ve got to get behind the Loch Ness Monster too.
Kieran: There are a species of lizard people living amongst us…
What was your best experience on stage?
Dale: A sold-out hometown show with my old band Alkanes. It was 2 weeks before we went into lockdown. The energy was insane. People screaming the words back to us and just going nuts. It felt special, like we were finally making an impact in the scene.
Kieran: Monsterfest at the Ironworks in Inverness. Playing in front of 1000 music lovers on a big ol’ stage. It felt like one of those moments you dream about as a kid – still makes me smile when I think about it.
Jamie: Same as Kieran, Monsterfest in 2019.
What was your worst experience on stage?
Kieran: There’s quite a few. The shows when the engineer doesn’t understand what a drum kit is.
Jamie: I won’t name venues or anything but one time a sound engineer kept playing with sound levels the entire way through our set. Vocals would jump in volume out of nowhere guitars would suddenly be cut then put back up way too loud. Half way a bandmate had to shout at the engineer through the mic to stop messing around. By that time the atmosphere was well and truly spoiled.
Dale: There’s been a few. The one that sticks out the most is a charity event which was the most unorganised thing I’ve ever been a part of. We got stopped half way through our set for a pipe band to play. We weren’t informed of this at any point. I just remember someone waving at us to stop but I thought they were just being friendly and waving so I waved back! This was after Broadsea were stopped for a parade of motorcycles too. It was so bizarre.
Tell us something about each member that you think people would be surprised about.
Jamie: None of us are from Aberdeen, we’re all immigrants from various places in the North.
Kieran: I’m a huge mental health and fitness advocate but just look like a wee sad emo boy.
Dale: I’ve never seen an episode of Game of Thrones.
What are the next steps you plan to take as a band to reach the next level?
Jamie: Just to do what we can. Continue pushing our music, take the opportunities and do the work.
Dale: We’ve got more new music on the way and already have plans to hit the studio again early next year. We’ve now also got our own we studio/rehearsal space which will allow us to really step it up for writing, recording and even creating content for our socials. We also now have an eye on planning shows for next year and eager to hit the road.
I hear you have a new music, what can you tell us about it.
Dale: Yes, our brand-new single I Bet Heaven Isn’t Real At All. It’s one quite personal to me. My Grandfather, better known as Papa, passed away in March last year. The song explores everything I’ve felt following that. There’s a lot of raw emotions in there. I find writing very healing in these situations. It’s great to be able to be open, be vulnerable and get it all out in music.
Jamie: This is our first “proper” single following us releasing a couple demos last year. Since we got this song down it felt like an exciting track and we normally open live sets with it so feels right to “open” our music catalogue properly with it too.
What was the recording process like?
Dale: It was very quick but the standard was excellent too. We really worked hard on having all our parts down before heading into the studio and I felt that it just flowed out of us and the process was smooth. For me, what we came out of the sessions with was some of the best stuff I’ve ever had the pleasure of working on.
Jamie: Very sweet, Ewan at MM Audio knows his way around a rock band. We stayed in Burntisland during recording and I can fully recommend Burger Island if you’re ever passing through.
What was the biggest learning curve in writing the new tunes?
Dale: For me I guess just working with new people and allowing for the process to be a lot more collaborative. With previous projects, it’s always been my vision and I’ve never really allowed for much input from anyone else. We’ve always said we wanted this project to feel like a real collaborative effort from all of us and it’s been a refreshing approach.
Jamie: I think we learnt more about the sound we were honing in on with the tracks we’ve got down now. It was a bit “pick a riff” to begin with which I think is pretty normal for a new band but now I think we’ve got something to help us focus better.
Would you change anything now it’s finished?
Jamie: No, at least not at the moment.
Dale: At this moment in time, no. I genuinely wouldn’t. I’m so happy with how it’s turned out and I’m proud to be putting it out.
Is there anything else you would like to share with the world?
Dale: Be excellent to each other.
Jamie: Free wooden pallet, pick up only, message band page for address and time.
Kieran: I love lamp.
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