MidiMidis Take Electronica Back

MidiMidis’ star is on the rise. I should break it down… MidiMidis are a duo made up of Marcus Fairley and Ant Struselis whose music is composed of midi and 8-bit sounds set against trashy guitar music.

They have been taken under the well-travelled wing of Xfm’s Eddy Temple-Morris, and played yesterday at Sentric’s Music in the City in Manchester, an industry event which is an opportunity to get signed basically on a par with screwing the CEO of Sony.

I caught up with Marcus –  an alarmingly pleasant, tremendously articulate, litigator by day who also happens to produce the full-bodied vocals for MidiMidis – the day after they played East London’s super club, Matter.

What was last night like?

‘It was hosted at Matter at the 02 Arena with The Whip and Pendulum and Eddy Temple-Morris DJing all broadcasted live on Eddy’s Xfm show. It was just such a wonderful atmosphere.’

How do you feel when you’re performing?

‘I love it. We weren’t meant to be a live band we were meant to be a project. We did this gig in Staines and we made so much noise that we incited a riot. The club was half full of Indie kids and half full clubbers and riff-raff. All the Indie kids were standing there motionless wondering what was going on. We thought “that was brilliant”. That’s what I like, a reaction as opposed to any ego kind of thing. It’s like with any art, it doesn’t really matter whether you like it. That’s the whole point.’

Are there any recurring themes in your music? Are they about specific things in your life?

‘Yeah, they’re very personal and very honest and a lot of the lyrics are mainly written out of fear of losing something – happiness generally. I’ve got a bit of a problem with happiness. I’m more of a conversationalist than a conventional lyric writer. A lot of songs are freestyled,  maybe something will happen in the crowd – like someone will fall over and then I can’t help but put that into the song live and then I’ll think, “that sounds alright actually!” so when it comes to recording usually – like with the single – the songs are finalised about ten minutes before recording.’

Who do you take inspiration from? You look really Robert Smith-esque…

‘Oh thanks I really take that as a compliment. Lou Reed – I just love the Velvet Underground, The Strokes and Radiohead. In terms of influence, if you go on our MySpace, there’s a really huge list and it might look like we’re taking the piss but actually I’m influenced by all sorts of things. I’ve got this real obsession for looking for stuff that normally a lot of people think is rubbish like, “oh, that was a bad second album” or “that’s not as good as this or that”. So I think “why not?”. You can get so much more out of other people’s failings and learn so much more than from listening to the perfect melody.’

You’re originally from Reading, but what do you think of the capital?

‘You’ve got a glorious nightlife, I love the place…I love the buildings, I love the people I just love the confusion people have and the apathy you know the expressions on people’s faces. London’s just so busy, it’s wonderful, and I really enjoy it. I certainly want to live here at some point. I don’t have a romanticists view on London because places are just places and what makes a city or town the way it is mainly the people and the architecture.’

What aspirations do you have as a band?

‘To be hugely successful.’

That’s a good aspiration

‘We’re the only artists that are doing what we do in the country and so if we don’t do it someone else will. It’s not an ego wankfest, it’s just true.’

MidiMidis play 93 Feet East on Saturday 31 October.

Debut single Ambulance Café is out on Monday 2 November.