Well, if you're mostly familiar with us through Facebook, you could be forgiven for thinking that the mind behind Bad Elephant Music is a man named Huw Elliott. Hell, you may well have found these very words through a post made under his name.
You'd be wrong, of course. David, Martin, Stefan and James are the white-hot core of the label. I'm just the digital face.
The face, and the ill-advised apron-clad power pose.
Not pictured: regret.
But today, dear reader, I'm giving you a look behind the curtain. You're finally going to find out what it's like being Bad Elephant Music's number one (out of one) Public Relations Gremlin.
If it's a weekday, I'll be roused by the incessant trill of my phone alarm. It's earlier than I'd like, and sometimes I'm tempted to stay in bed out of spite, but David has assured me that, if I don't get up in good time, he can hack my phone and play We Can't Dance at foghorn-level volume. Nobody deserves that, not even my terrible morning self.
I'm studying for something called a "degree" at the moment - I'm still not 100% on the specifics, but I am reliably assured that it'll significantly improve my future ability to buy Magic: the Gathering cards, so I persist. I'm usually in Central London by early afternoon, and I'll spend a couple of hours talking about history, or war, or the history of war.
It's not until I get home that the real fun begins.
Nuts and Bolts
Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday are scheduling nights, time to queue up a post for the following morning. News, discussion points, pretty much anything goes as long as it's at least vaguely label-related - and it can be pretty bloody vague. I got away with posting a photo of an elephant's trunk with the caption "coming soon" once, so I'm still pushing the limits.
Tuesday is the hard one, though, because that's when I have to choose the Wednesday track of the week. If something is new or resurgent or otherwise relevant, that gets top billing, but it can be surprisingly difficult to pick something if there's no obvious choice. I have legitimately just rolled a die before.
Monday, Wednesday and Friday are sharing days. I used to have a consistent timeframe for when I shared out the morning's post to all the various discussion groups, but student life has proven far too mercurial and weird to let that happen. I have a list of groups that get everything, and I'm currently working on finding more places to share more selectively for music that might appeal to narrower crowds. Same deal with Reddit: finding the right communities has proven the toughest hurdle.
Saturday is a special night, because that's when I usually write The Trunk. I tend to write the whole thing in one sitting - it works for essays and it works here too - and then give the whole thing a spellcheck before blasting it out haphazardly into the intertubes. Sometimes I have a topic suggested, but more often than not I have free rein to write about basically whatever I please. Even myself!
Ups and Downs
I'll be honest, I find some of our bands a little more challenging to listen to than others. I can respect the musicianship in almost every case, but I'll admit to being a child of my time when it comes to musical preferences. My tastes lean fast and heavy, and it can be difficult for me to wrap my head around the slower, mellower stuff, though there are plenty of exceptions.
But there are perks. BEM puts out a lot of music I genuinely enjoy - my favourite act of ours is The Fierce And The Dead, who I was lucky enough to see live recently, and I'm also fond of The Rube Goldberg Machine and Konchordat, to name just a couple. And I get a copy of each and every one on the house!
On a more practical note, the job's done wonders for my work ethic. I'm not sure what I'm going to be doing with my life once I'm out of uni, but getting into the habit of writing for an audience on a regular basis has been very good for me, both my writing skills and my ability to work to some kind of consistent structure.
So I'd say I do enjoy gremlinhood, on balance. Hopefully I get to keep being a gremlin for a while yet.
Status Update
Fukushima Surfer Boys is finally out, and The Divine Abstract is ticking down steadily towards its November 3rd release. Get yer preorders in now!
David and Martin had a great time at Summer's End last weekend - David, especially, has been playing a lot of the bands he saw there around the house. This weekend is looking substantially quieter at Elephant Towers, though.
Review Roundup
Just a couple of reviews of the new hotness that is Fukushima Surfer Boys this week. "Trojan Horse reinvent prog, again," says Joe Banks of PROG, and, while that's a bold claim, we do see where he's coming from. Meanwhile, Ben Forrester, from Birthday Cake For Breakfast, says in his review that the boys are "ready to fry our brains out" and "as eclectic and eccentric as we've come to expect for them". Top stuff!
See you next week for more Trunk - until then, do not adjust your sets.
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