Psychedelia-tinged rockers Oh White Mare launch their new single, All Right, at Jimmy’s Den this Saturday, April 11, with support from Husband and Buddy Phoenix. TRAVIS JOHNSON has a word with erstwhile singer and guitarist Ross Wood.
What’s the Oh White Mare story?
OWM was essentially formed back in 2012 over lunches at a city Lebanese restaurant where myself and Jeremy (Balius) talked music. We got Sam (Hair) and Craig (Bradbury) on board, then spent much of the next year in an old attic writing tunes and building the band’s sound. Live gigs followed and this culminated in the release of our debut EP in late 2013. Since then we have strived to refine what we do, with more recording and many new songs written in recent times. The release of the single All Right marks the culmination of this and sets us up for the future.
What’s your sound? Who are your key influences?
At its core, we play garage rock, though this is incorporated with 60’s psychedelia and some more melodic moments to keep it interesting. Key influences would be bands and artists like Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, Jack White and Neil Young.
Tell us about All Right.
The skeleton of the track actually predates the band, though wasn’t really brought to the group until sometime into it’s existence as the focus has been elsewhere. Initially being more a traditional sounding acoustic track, the dynamic and sound altered significantly as the ideas piled up – to become centred around the rhythm section and keys break with the multilayered vocal overlay.
There were several tracks recorded in that session, and it initially wasn’t the one we thought would be a single (as there were more obvious options), but there was universal agreement from more or less anyone that heard it that it was a strong and interesting tune, hence here we are…
Where did you record and who with?
It was recorded with Andy Lawson at Debaser Studios. He’s a guy we have worked with a lot over recent years and it’s a super easy process as Andy is excellent at what he does, plus has an understanding about what we are going for. Specifically on All Right, we feel all the sounds and dynamics came together as we wanted – in no small part to Andy.
What’s up next for you guys?
Going forward we are really looking forward to having a good stretch of live shows, and we are keen to get a few more tunes recorded to follow up on this release.
