Vladimir

Mark Twain is often misquoted as saying, “The secret of getting ahead is getting started.” Although he never uttered these words, he would have been no stranger to the sentiment and the fear of failing that haunts the beginning of every creative venture.

It takes strength to start. It takes even more to realise that what you’ve done is not good enough and start again. So it was for Dundee four-piece Vladimir who deleted two well received EPs, one with artwork by The View bassist Kieran Webster, and returned to the drawing board.
“That was us just mucking about” jokes drummer Sam Taylor. “We (don’t) really see (the EPs) as part of the band” continues singer/guitarist Ross Murray. We were “Just testing what we could sound like, getting into the feel of it.” Alongside Peter Mackenzie on guitar and bassist Joshua Gray, they have been playing music together for years. “We were just all mates really, we all had the same music tastes” explains Ross.

During this time, a tour of England saw them garner a wild reputation after a sound engineer in Norwich had a bad day at the office. “We just over whelmed the guy” Sam remembers before Ross takes up the story. “He told us we weren’t getting a sound check so me and my Scottish accent went up and said nah, we need to do a sound check. He was alright, a bit touch and go, but then we played the gig and I knocked over a mic that wasn’t being used and he just bolted into the toilet. Someone came back to us and said the sound engineer is crying you might want to apologise.” Despite the pleas they felt they had nothing to say sorry for and went on their way, the result of which was a Tweet recommending no one book them in future. It fell on deaf ears.

At the end of last year, with their hard won experience and focus, the band released ‘Come Over’; an aggressive aural assault that squares up to the listener and angrily refuses to back down. “Where we come from no one gives you a chance” Ross remarks. “We got a lot of knock backs, you can’t do this, you can’t do that, so we took it upon ourselves to go out and do it.” The single is their reaction to this scepticism. “I think that (is) the best way to start” smiles Ross, “This is what we are.”

Drawn to the alien greyness of the old Soviet Union, the band chose the name Vladimir as they felt it was vague and gave them space to be themselves. They describe their sound as ‘bleak’, ‘gloomy’ and ‘dark, happy music’ with their live show renowned for its intensity. “It’s full on” agrees Ross, before adding “We’re happy together but I think our personal lives are quite… bleak. Just the fact of being somewhere you don’t want to be.” This he reckons is a common feeling amongst his peers, “No one gives you a sort of hope. You’re told this is what you’ve got to do with your life, this is where you stay.” “It’s quite scripted” declares Sam before Ross continues, “We see that as being quite bleak. We’d rather go do something. Make life better for ourselves. Enjoy it. Go out and do something we want to do. I think there (are) a lot of young people that feel the same way. We’re just showing it through music.”

With a relaxed writing process that Sam describes as “Throw everything together and see what comes out”, all four band members contribute to the music before Ross adds the lyrics. Despite scrapping two EPs worth of material they have no shortage of songs and a good idea of where they are heading. “Yeah, we’ve got it totally planned out” states Ross. “We aren’t (making) any rash decisions. (We’re) taking it seriously and doing everything the way it needs to be done.” The next step has them releasing ‘Smoke Eyes’ on the 7th of April complete with B-Side, a moody take on Underworld’s ‘Born Slippy’. The single, premiered on BBC Radio One by DJ Ally McCrae, is “A bit more listener friendly” according to Sam with Ross seeing the song as “Showing we can do more than one thing.”

Alongside this release the band will be headlining a five date Scottish tour before supporting Kilsyth’s finest The Twilight Sad as they perform their debut album ‘Fourteen Autumns & Fifteen Winters’ down south in the Spring. They are also looking to play as many festivals as possible during the summer with the Wet Nuns’ ‘Detestival’ in Sheffield already in the diary. While plying their trade in front of the more varied festival audience is not without its challenges, the band feel they are more than up to it. “We want to go out and prove that we can play at three o’clock in the afternoon to a field of people” explains Ross. “They’re dark songs but they’re catchy as well. I think they can be total sing-a-long anthems.” Sam sums up their feelings succinctly, “We can’t live off grotty venues forever.”

In March this year, they were nominated for Best Rock Act at the Scottish Alternative Music Awards, one of five Dundee groups up for an award. Both Ross and Sam put this success down to the diversity of music being written and performed in the city. They were joined in the Best Rock Act category by Fat Goth. Anderson, McGinty, Webster, Warder and Fisher were nominated for Best Acoustic Act, Silibil & Brains for Best Hip Hop Act with Model Aeroplanes winning the Best Newcomer category. As Ross remembers, after losing out to Forrest Fires, “There (were) a lot of people coming up to us going “Oh, we’re sorry for you” but I don’t think there is anything to be sorry about, it was great to be nominated.” Putting things in perspective he continues, “Chvrches were nominated last year and never won but they sold out The Barrowlands.” “Winning an award doesn’t necessarily make you any better” adds Sam. Such success has been hard won with Dundee sometimes feeling left out of the Glasgow-centric Scottish music scene. “It’s hard to get people to leave the house, leave the student union or whatever on a Friday night and get them to go to a gig” muses Ross. Sam however, is having none of it. “The last time we played a headline show, the last single launch, it was packed” he argues. “When the good bands play, people come out” laughs Ross.

Vladimir play Glasgow (Broadcast) on the 3rd of April, Perth (Green Room) on the 5th of April, Aberdeen (Cellar 35) on the 11th of April, Dundee (Beat Generator) on the 12th of April and Edinburgh (Sneaky Pete’s) on the 11th of May.
The ‘Smoke Eyes’ single is self-released on the 7th of April.