Introducing :: Dinosaur Pile-Up

2008 was a good year for Dinosaur Pile-Up. A clutch of quality support slots (with bands like The Automatic and The Kills) and some outstanding headline shows (Club NME @ Koko) has helped to propel Matt Bigland, Tom Dornford May and Steve Wilson into the mass public consciousness. Live, DPU are a hulking monster of rock machismo, splayed legs, riffs, insane drumming and the biggest bass sound you’ll hear in your life. ‘Traynor’, the newest single from Dinosaur Pile-Up is out now, and it’s a spanking tune; mean and moody, with riffs that threaten to burst out from the audio file and give your head a good kicking in. It’s no doubt that Mr Bigland has no desire to steer the Dinosaur into becoming anything other than a stadium killing, ear ripping rock beast, and with tunes like ‘Traynor’, he may well achieve his goal much faster than anyone will have expected. After sending a few basic questions to Matt himself at his headquarters in Mount Fire, we received this eloquent correspondance…

Lets have your vital statistics please! Name, Age, Shoe Size and Occupation!
Matt Bigland! 23! 12 or 13 depends on the shoe! Fantasy Character!

Where were you born, are you native to your hometown of Leeds?
I was actually born in Kendal, Cumbria; A strange village, somewhere beyond the boundaries of time and style… Although a pr-etty hot spot for some over 50 tourist action… Intense! I moved to Leeds to technically study, but ended up quitting a week before I even started the course and moved anyway with the aim to join a band… I would later go on to start two more degree’s, finishing neither… Result; University 3 / Matt 0

In all honesty, has ‘the riff’ ever gone out of fashion?
Not in my house.

Do you have to be in a certain focused mindset to write the killer riffs in songs like “Traynor”, or do other factors, such as good films or other non-musical media help you find ideas just as well as sitting around with a guitar?
It’s definitely a delicate balance between controlling very highly trained neural vibrations only learned by the original Ninja tribes of the Japanese Chugoku Mountains, and concentrating on other external influences, such as Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sylvester Stallone, sometimes even Steven Seagal or Jean-Claude Van Damme. Somewhere between these two extremes is a realm some people like to call; The Riff… Although the realm is of course somewhat of a mental state, some like to believe that there are parts of it so powerful; that they bridge the gap between the imaginary and the impossible. The most powerful of these parts is called “Slay Valley” and it is rumored that this mental state is where the greatest, most mind collapsing of all Riffs are created… Arnold Schwarzenegger is said to have been created in “Slay Valley” in the form of a Riff, but crossed over and became human in a freak surge of mental power, materializing on the set of Conan The Barbarian… Ever wondered why he looks so confused in that movie? He’d just been CREATED!!… It’s obvious when you think about it.

There is a lot of self referencing and personification of objects in your lyrics. Do you use your music as a type of catharsis or self-help, or is it just simply what comes out of your mind onto the paper?
Um… The second one I think. I just try not to over think it. So whatever it is that ends up on that paper I try to make sense of it and then just leave it alone you know? Like a vicious tiger… You just got to let it be…

How are you responding personally to the success achieved by your band in such a short time. Is it a surprise, or more of a slow build?
Um, it’s not really the type of success you have to ‘personally respond to’ I don’t think… I mean, yeah we’re doing ok, but it’s not like David Letterman is throwing his pants off yelling “DINOSAUR FUCKING PILE-UP KIDS!!” … Now THAT I would have to personally respond to…

What are your opinions on the ‘Grunge Revival’ tag that has been slapped on you and fellow Leeds boys Pulled Apart By Horses as of late?
I don’t really think there IS a ‘grunge revival’. I just think there’s a bunch of bands that like to ‘slay’ (if you will), and that might have loved those bands from the nineties… That’s it. It doesn’t mean there’s some sort of freaking Nirvana re-make growing somewhere, nor does it mean everyone wearing lumberjack shirts is some sort of new/old scene being reborn. There’s some fundamental differences that make the revival of grunge impossible… 1- We’re English. 2- the year is 2009, not 1994, and 3- There really doesn’t need to be a third does there?

You can’t ‘re-create’ something like that, and nor should you need to… I think it’s cool that there are a load of bands coming around now that love to rock out or play heavy or loud shit instead of playing sexy clicks with sexy beeps, but it doesn’t mean it’s grunge coming alive again… It’s just guitar music coming around again, thats all. And about time too right?

True. Well, thank you very much for taking the time to speak with us. One last question, what are dinosaur pile ups plans for the near future?
Um… Single out sometime near the end of march, ‘Traynor’… Um… E.P i think maybe, after that… Sometime soon…
Maybe make a band with Steven Seagal… Called Riff Lord.
I would love to eat pancakes right now…
Just me, on a couch, with some pancakes…
That would be nice.

‘Traynor’ is out now. Their next gig is on the 9th of April, where they will be playing at XFM’s Big Night Out at the Brixton Academy. For all you French types, DPU hit the road from the 15th to the 18th of April as part of the Les Inrocks tour, and for the rest of us here in Blighty, they will be coming back to play a few more dates in late April and May. Beyond that, one assumes, many many more shows, as DPU travel the world, converting more and more people to the all encompassing grace, beauty and power of the riff.

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