If you like alternative, mumbly noise pop, you need to listen to Passion Pusher, the lo-fi solo project from Edinburgh based James Gage. With a prolific bandcamp full of his bedroom recorded, drunken fuzzy melodies, and live sets featuring a changing set of talented Scottish musicians, Passion Pusher is captivating. Likening to early Wavves demos, U.S surf rock and Mac Demarco, he is a ray of sunshine on a relatively gloom filled Scottish scene - despite all the lyrics about being rejected by girls. I sat down with James to find out more about the past, present, and future, of Passion Pusher.
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Luna: Thanks so much for taking the time to talk to me! First, let's talk about the origins of Passion Pusher. Where did the name come from?
James: It’s an erotic novel from the 50s about lesbians
who steal high school students and fill them with heroin and cocaine and then
fuck them repeatedly. I read that at about 11 years old and wanted that to be
me. Making music was just to get girls, basically. Ugh, I’m such a lame-o.
Luna: Sounds like a book I need to read. Moving on from vintage drug smuggling lesbians, what, or who influences you when you're writing and making music?
James: Pavement mostly, I think every song’s a rip off
of a Pavement song, or, I like to do the sneaky thing and go back to like Los
Zafiros or The Flamingos and then steal lines from them, because nobody really
listens to them anymore. Mostly
Pavement to be honest, and Daniel Johnston’s a big thing. A lot of the stuff I’ve
been writing lately has been about Nintendo 64s, and Sega Megadrives. I was
listening to Alex G and that reminded me I’ve got all this old gaming shit, so
I started digging through it, and basically writing about my friend’s accident
last year, and then my ex girlfriend...uh, there’s a lot of bad blood there. Or
maybe it’s just me, you know. I’m a terrible guy.
Luna: You're not! I noticed online that you're really into Twin Peaks, like, the header on your Bandcamp profile is the Twin Peaks logo, and your music is influenced by it too. What do you think is it that fascinates you enough to keep it as a running theme in your songs?
James: It’s like the middle classes of it all, like
there’s a really good quote from David Lynch where it’s like, when he was a kid
he lived in this really nice suburban area, and then he remembers going out and
digging out into the grass on his front lawn, and he found a whole ant hill and
they were all feeding off each other, and that just kind of, really fits along
with how I view the world, maybe.
Luna: I'm a fan of David Lynch too. So, tell us about your upcoming releases, Couch King and Gawd Bless America.
James: Couch King was recorded with Billy, Kay [both from
Herbert Powell] and Derek from Antique Pony. [Derek] plays saxophone on one
song. It’s just like two notes he plays in it. Like, we went out for a fag and
came back in and he was like “I managed to record some sweet sax for you”. I
was like “Thanks man!” The Gawd Bless America tape came about through Kieran
[of Herbert Powell] being like, you should definitely come to my house, and I
was like yeah man, that sounds cool. Then suddenly all of Herbert Powell
arrived. They just appeared. It was like me, Kieran, and Billy, then suddenly
Kay arrived, and I was like, hey, we may as well just finish this entire thing
off. We recorded like 3 songs and I ended up getting them to scrap them because
I wrote better ones. I’m basically planning for the release show to be “Jim
Passion and the Passionate Band”. And I’m gonna buy some American flag track
pants to wear.
Luna: That definitely sounds like a good look. Speaking of shows, as a solo artist, what's your live set up like?
James: I steal most of the band from alansmithie, like
Andrew and Ru, and I steal Herbert Powell as well for other shows. They’re
great for it. I’m like, hey man, you wanna play against some music for me? They’re
just like, yeah, sure man! I got Kieran’s brother Gregor in to play bass for me
at the Flat 0/1 show, that was something else. We tried to hand the bass off to
someone at a recent Edinburgh gig, but nobody was having it. Not one fucking
bit. We got a really terrible review of that show too. It was so terrible, we
were so drunk. We were smashing up bottles and saying terrible things about
other Edinburgh bands.
Luna: That doesn't sound like your best gig to date. Do you think you have had a "best gig"? Or maybe just one that sticks in your memory?
James: Favourite gig I’ve played, fuck. It depends if I’ve
enjoyed it or the audience enjoyed it. There’s ones that I’ve really enjoyed
but the audience has like, booed me and shit. I think for me, the Flat 0/1 show
in July was amazing, that was such a good vibe, it’s a cool venue and great
bands played and it was just a really great night.
Luna: Flat 0/1 is a really cool venue. Are there any other venues you particularly enjoy playing?
James: None in Edinburgh, they’re all terrible. Probably
The 13th Note? Or Flat 0/1. Just because they’re, like the closest
thing you can get to a DIY venue here, where it’s kind of like, I just like
playing in shit cheap basements really. It fits my music and I love it.
Luna: You've played shows with an array of Scottish artists, could you reccommend a few of your favourites? And not Herbert Powell. We've given them too much free press already.
James: But The Herbies are my guys! Sean Armstrong, The
Yawns, Andrew R Burns, alansmithee, Pinact, as well, they’re absolutely
amazing, they’re going to like, New York. They’re playing the CMJ festival, I
was like, I want to be Pinact.
Luna: So aside from wishing you were Pinact, what are your plans for the rest of 2014?
James: The vinyl, that’s going out at the end of the
year, and I’m trying to book shows in Poland as well. The vinyl is being put
out by Song By Toad, and it’s gonna be me, Sean Armstrong, Alan, Andrew R Burns
and Now Wakes The Sea, with twenty minutes each. And we’re all shitting
ourselves about it because we’re all fucking terrible. Song By Toad have picked
the worst people to put on a record together. We’re all talented in our own
right of like song writing and stuff, but when it comes to like, “sit down and
record this song”, for us, we all freak out and drink too much, or like, it’s
the same with me and Sean where with me and him it’s a really spontaneous
thing, we record the bass line of a song and that’s it done, but Andrew’s kinda
like obsessed with getting it perfect, he spent like 3 days recording a guitar
bit for one of his songs, recording it over and over and over again.
Luna: Thanks so much James! I'm looking forwards to hearing the upcoming releases.
James: No problem! It's been great.
Keep up to date with Passion Pusher on twitter: @PassionPusher1
Find out more on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PassionPusher/timeline
Listen and buy on bandcamp: passionpusher.bandcamp.com
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