Muttley - Featured Artists
Manchester Punk Scene

Introduce yourselves and tell us what you've been up to recently?
We are Muttley, we are a punk rock band and lately we have been rehearsing and planning/organising the next step for the band as we want to release an EP and tour over the summer.

And how did you get together? The name?
The band started when I (Dan) decided I was leaving uni and that I wanted to get straight in to a band when I got back to manchester, I was really excited about a couple of songs Simon had written and recorded while he was at uni, so we decided we'd work together in a band, he knew a drummer and we booked our first gig (coincidentally with Designer Magazine) unfortunately that drummer left and we had a friend fill in for quite a while before Neil joined and now we're working on getting Neil caught up on the two years worth of songs we've got written for the band. The name was just a decision Simon made, we'd spent months trying to think of original names that would fit with the music, eventually Simon made the decision and we've never looked back.

Who are your biggest influences?
Influence wise there's a lot going on, between the three of us we all like different areas of punk, Simon leans more towards punk rock bands like NOFX, Green Day, The Explosion, early Blink, MXPX, I'm just a big fan of music, bands like New Found Glory, Man Overboard, Dropkick Murphys, The Streets, The explosion and Neil likes more straight up punk bands like Transplants, Rancid, Bad Religion, Distillers and CKY.

Which is the one song you with you'd wrote and why?
For me it's on song by the Streets off the "Everything Is Borrowed" album, Mike Skinner is a brilliant songwriter and really shows his ability on this album. Outside of that though, Early Mojo have some fantastic songs, my favourite is a song called "Bigger Than Me", that's the kind of song that I could get really excited about playing live if it were mine.

Here at Designer Magazine we're all about supporting the scene.. which are your fave local bands and why should we check them out?
There's a great crop of punk bands around at the moment that we've met over the last few years, we're actually playing with three of our favourites at the end of the month (27th April at NQLive), Early Mojo are fantastic, Social Aneurysm have just released an EP that has got some cracking songs on, Dead Retinas are a cracking band too, I'm looking forward to hearing them with their new singer. there's plenty more though, Better Than Jesus have some fantastic songs and are pretty funny live, Running With Lions are playing with us at our next Designer Magazine gig (The MCR Tribute Night) and they're a talented bunch of musicians. There's Sam Smith and Company, Sam has this great stage persona, very intense, he really gives it some and he's got a great group of guys around him. Landmarks are pretty awesome, we played one of our first gigs with those guys and they've had great quality songs from the start.

What's your biggest promo tips you can give to other local bands? How do you push your band forward?
Make friends with other bands, go to other local gigs, be proactive in supporting other local bands, early on you'll find that once you're friends are tired of paying to see you live, the bands you play with and go and see are the first group of people that are genuinely supportive of your music, not just turning up because they feel obliged to.
Second to that, give yourself plenty of online presence and get good at it, I'm not very good at it, but I post frequently and try to be as interesting as I can when we're not gigging, giving people something to talk about when we've not got any new content to give them.

What's the best gig you've played to date and why?
Each gig has it's plus points, we've never really had a genuinely bad set, but the gig that stands out is the first gig we did with Neil at Retro Bar, it was a great crowd and being onstage without pants on was really fun, seeing Simon with his shoe's still on after he'd dropped his pants too has to be one of the funniest things I've ever seen on stage. Dropping our pants on stage isn't a regular occurance, we'd recently seen Mike, the singer/bassist from Early Mojo get nude onstage at the academy, and Mat (the other singer and guitarist) came to see us, I just felt like I needed to do something to at least try and match the silliness of that night.

Where do you go for pre gig food and where do you go post gig clubs in Manchester?
Taco Bell seems to be the pre gig food of choice, it's cheap and delicious. Post gig it depends on the night, we've been lucky enough to play a fair few weekend gigs, so going out afterwards is easier to do, satans is great night out, as long as nobody requests one direction. in general though we'll drink in the bar of the venue.

What do you like most about Manchester?
The quality in variety, in other towns and city's I've been to, there's usually two or three clubs, a few more resteraunts and a few pubs (most of which are wetherspoons) and they aren't always the nicest places to, In manchester you have these in abundance, there's plenty of wetherspoons, but there's also plenty of different types of pubs, there's sports bars, cocktail bars, and clubs, there's more than just the printworks which is very dance music orientated, there's places like satans, deadbolt is a good night out with a fantastic playlist. gigs are the same, there's local promoters that put on great metal nights, promoters that put on great indie nights, we are properly spoilt for choice in every aspect of what we want.

Best gig you've been to of all time (and why?)
I've been to too many to have an all time favourite, but Green Day were amazing at the MEN a couple of years ago because they're one of my all time favourite bands, Dropkick Murphys at the Ritz was amazing beceause DKM just have an abundance of singalong classics. Slam Dunk festival a few years back, the main stage just had an immense line up in terms of the music I like, New Found Glory, Hit The Lights, Four Year Strong, Set Your Goals, Deaf Havana (when they were good) were on the stage opposite, All Or Nothing were great, even though they were on really early on.

What one book would you say all of your fans should read and why?
it's a toss up really between, "God Hates Us All" By the fictional character Hank Moody from the show Californication, it adds a bit more depth to the character and the way he interacts with life and his friends and family, even if the story gets a bit ridiculous towards the end and the other book is "The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-Time" because it's just a really good story.

Fave movie or TV show of all time?
Community. it is hands down one of the most creative TV show's I've ever seen, it's the kind of show thats probably got more laughs in the background than in the dialogue because of the way the show sets up story lines and follows up the interactions the cast have outside of the show, an example of how clever it is, is the clipshow the did that showed them doing things outside of the show's timeline.

Which football team do you support?
Manchester United. I was brought up a united fan, it's getting harder and harder to enjoy watching them play, but that just makes the games more excited. The best match I've ever seen, or at least the most exciting, was the champions league final against chelsea, I was watching it in footage in manchester, it took me an hour to get to the bar the place was packed, when john terry missed the penalty and united won, the place went mental, I thought the floor might cave in, every one was all over the place jumping, the pool table actually looked like a pool with the amount of beer that had been knocked over.

And finally we're all about the live sweaty gigs - final chance to say why we should check you out live?
You should come see us live because we're better live than we are recorded, we put on the best show we can, we might not hit it note perfect every time, but we play with heart and we try and make it the most fun we can for every body, even if it means dropping our pants for some cheap laughs.

And if we want to know more whats your facebook / twitter addresses?
http://www.facebook.com/muttleypunkrock
http://www.twitter.com/muttleypunkrock
https://www.youtube.com/muttleypunkrock
http://www.soundcloud.com/muttleypunkrock

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