Interview- Maximo Park

Maximo Park built up a reputation in 2003, when their album A Certain Trigger propelled the band into indie stardom. They headlined the NME Tour in 2006 with the Arctic Monkeys and are known for their musical style, similar to that of The Futureheads and Kaiser Chiefs. The band are about to embark on an international tour, playing to a sold out crowd at the Dome on October 5. Drummer Tom English had a talk to us about festivals, filming and Justin Timberlake.

Hi Tom, How are You?

I'm ok thanks, I'm a bit hazy because I had to get up early for a change! What have you and the band been up to recently? We did the equivalent of the Radio 1 Roadshow in Germany for a station called NRJ in Dusseldorf because we do alright in Germany. We also opened a club in Brighton. We finished that gig at two in the morning and then we had to go straight to the airport, but it was Ok because we got to sleep in Dusseldorf. We played with The Police too, we supported them in Twickenham and I was quite nervous before we did it because the audience weren't interested in us, so it takes the pressure off us! We played really well actually. We played two dates with them and we made the most of it. They weren't expecting something as lively as us which is good.

Do you ever get nervous playing to such large crowds?

Sometimes its strange but normally the big crowds are at festivals and they're massive. We played at Reading Festival on the main stage and when you step out and look at the crowd I actually didn't get used to it at all. The next day we played the same slot at Leeds Festival, but we don't play to crowd's that big that often. It is still too exciting, I'd be worried if I was relaxed!

So how did the festivals go for you? I know you played a lot.

They went really well, they were some of the best gig we've ever had. We knew from the success of the first album we had a good foundation but when we played Glastonbury that was the moment where we got a great reception and the clouds just sort of cleared. It was a great occasion and it was pretty amazing, it was the same at T in the Park. We also played Rock in the Ring in Germany and we were on the second stage and that went really well, but its also twinned with another festival Rock in the Park and I'm sure the people who were there had a great time but it was slightly underwhelming.

So your tour begins on October 1, what are you doing between then and now?

We've got some time off for a change! We have to shoot a video and record B-sides for the next single. We're filming in Whitby Bay so that's good because normally we never reach outside London. They want to film some of it in the caves there, so that's going to be a cold day. And your latest tour, aren't these the biggest shows you've played to? We had a similar tour with the Kaiser Chiefs, but we've never played Doncaster. We've just got a few more rehearsals to do.

Also I read somewhere you're covering Justin Timberlake?

Yes, well we got asked by Radio 1 to do a song from 2002 so as you can imagine that gives us a lot of scope. We had to do something that was in the charts that year and we'd already started playing some Justin at rehearsals so when we decided to do it we did it in the style of the band ESG. They're really punk and they've got this really stripped down way of playing and we needed a quick way of doing the song so we thought we may as well do it in that style.

This article was originally printed in the Doncaster Free Press.