(Note: this interview was used for my uni course, so some of it references things that have already happened! sorry!)
Chris Collis, the drummer from quintessential math-rock three piece TTNG is a very nice person. He makes fascinating, intricately complicated music. He works in a local library and drinks at an independent coffee shop. He recommends me a remarkable book, him being a proud non-fiction aficionado. Alan Watts’ ‘The Way Of Zen’, a historical guide to Buddhism, filled with thoughtful quotes like “A certain amount of "sitting just to sit" might well be the best thing in the world for jittery minds.” He even offers to pay for my drink as we sit down, settling in to talk about preparing for touring Asia, moving on from being labelled, and looking back at the music they created all those years ago.
TTNG are set to return to Asia this May with support from Mylets (who makes music on his own with a guitar and a loop pedal) on their upcoming tour, a region that notably has a larger online following for the band than their home continent.
“We’ve been to Asia before, but it’s exciting to go back. We’re doing places that we haven’t been – China… Malaysia… Hong Kong and some other places.”
Heading to a brand new set of venues in a far away place can be an intimidating prospect, but Collis appears confident in the wake of it: “We don’t really hold any expectations ahead of any shows now. We just go and enjoy playing to people. Japan has always been really good to us; the math scene is really well received and attended there. We’ve always had fun, and some of the Japanese bands that’ve supported us have been incredible – they always put us to shame! The rest of Asia though, I’m not really sure. We love travelling, so thought we’d give it a shot and see what happens.”
It’s a fitting metaphor, given the band changed their name after realizing the irony of their joke about Oxford’s low crime rate wouldn’t hold up on the world stage. You can sense from his chuckling that he isn’t too worried about being shown up, but I can’t help but ask if it’s a fear for the band. “There’s a lot of people recording themselves online being amazing at instruments on YouTube and stuff, and that’s always amazing. It can be very inspiring, but also really just demoralizing because now all these amazing people have come out – I’m sure they were always there but now I’m just really aware of them.”
TTNG are a band that has always been subjected to genre labelling and comparisons. ‘This band sounds like TTNG with X or Y thrown in’ is a common phrase in the math rock scene.
“When we first started, people would just say ‘Oh yeah, they sound like American Football.’ We were like ‘Yep!’ because we love that band, and that naturally worked its way into our sound, purely because we loved listening to them so much. I think it’s the easiest way to relate to a new band. We’re classed as a ‘math-rock’ band, but I don’t really see it that way anymore. To me, it’s annoying because I think most math-rock sounds the same anyway. It’s not really anything I listen to outside of the band anymore. I just felt like music was taking over and I needed to move away from it. I know Tim (guitars, Chris’ brother) felt the same way too.”
I wonder if this straying from the genre is affecting how he creates music, but he assures me the band are set on their sound: “We record the albums for us, it’s a fundamental thing. If we didn’t like the music, what would be the point? I think it’d be apparent to anyone listening to. We write it because we like the music and we like playing it together and want to hear them recorded well. If other people like it, then that’s a bonus!”
TTNG have been around since 2004, and have shifted around a variety of members, down to their current state of 3 members - vocalist and bassist Henry Tremain completes the trio. They’re split around the UK, each in different cities and meeting up to record or rehearse for tours. This change in dynamic really makes me curious as to how the band feels about old work, and how it’s affected their processes.
“Recently, I’ve been listening back to our old stuff and wished the production was better, but also I’ve realised it doesn’t matter that much. I found some older stuff on a drive and thought to myself, ‘Wow, why didn’t we record this properly, this is great!’ but we all have stuff like that in half-finished demo form that will probably never see the light of day. In 2013 we had albums worth recorded that we just trashed that I thought were really quite good.”
“For our last album we’d wanted to go to Chicago and record there, so we made that happen, set it up and got that done. We did it in a different way to the last one, recording live onto tape. It was hard work, but I know that Tim and Henry loved it. I struggled a bit making I was set up properly for each take. It only takes one mistake for us to have to stop and start again, so that was intense.”
The band have come a long way from the four people messing around over a decade ago, making sounds like the bands that they had grown to love, and experimenting with what the boundaries of their genre held. Collis looks almost lost in nostalgia talking about the early days.
“When TTNG started out, we were just playing in a shed at the end of our garden and we all lived together, so things have changed pretty drastically. I don’t think whatever we do next will be the same either.”
