March 30, 2011

Goldray, a London based rock quartet, play their first Galway show in Monroe’s Live on Thursday, December 13. The band is the brainchild of guitarist Kenwyn House and vocalist Leah Rasmussen. Kenwyn is also the guitarist with Reef, the English rock band who have enjoyed a loyal following since scoring hits like Place Your Hands and Come Back Brighter in the nineties. He explains how his latest venture got off the ground.

“We’ve been writing on and off, while I’ve been doing Reef stuff as well, over the past four years,” says Kenwyn. “But the Goldray thing started with me and Leah deliberately deciding we wanted to write an album about two-and-a-half years ago. We’ve just been writing and recording since then, getting a band together. Andy Treacy, from Faithless, joined us about a year ago. And we’ve recently recruited a guy called Geoff Laurens, a young guy from Camden. We now have the full, complete band.”

Goldray have recorded most of their music in Kenwyn’s home, but to get the drum parts right the band went elsewhere.

“The drums we’ve done in three different studios; Metropolis in London, a small place in Kent called The Granary,” Kenwyn says. “We’re the process of doing the last couple of drum tracks at Olympic in London – not exactly an unfamous studio, considering the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin made a lot of their records there!”

Speaking of Mick Jagger and co, did Kenwyn have a spare grand to stand in the front row at The Stones’ reunion gigs in London recently?“No, I didn’t!” he laughs. “It’s funny; when we were with Reef we supported the Stones for a couple of nights. They did some warm-up shows in the Brixton Academy in ’96. It was funny, because they gave us the broom cupboard – we got this one little room with buckets and mops in it, and they got every other room!”

The Stones, at their peak, had Bill Wyman on bass and Charlie Watts on drums. Does Kenwyn value the power of a rhythm section?“Oh, it’s vastly important,” he says. “Me and Leah are vocals and guitar, and you’re going to write the songs with those, or piano. Then you’ve got to turn what you have in your head to something that works in a room with a drum kit and a bass guitar. Some ideas work better than others, but bass and drums together – it’s what allows people to relax when they listen to you.”

Goldray’s drummer, Andy Treacy, has been vital in pushing the band forward.

“He’s played with Groove Armada, Moby and Faithless,” says Kenwyn. “So he’s spent a lot of time doing dance based stuff but his heart lies in late sixties/early seventies rock like The Band, Bob Dylan, Crosby, Stills & Nash and Jimi Hendrix. So me, Leah and Andy all have a similar taste from that era, a Zeppelin/Doors kind of vibe.”

Why does Kenwyn believe the influence of bands from the Flower Power era has endured for so long?

“That was very revolutionary era, both musically and in the world,” he says. “It was a time when great freedom came to the world, generally. It was like John Lennon said ‘before Elvis, there was nothing’. Imagine living in a world before Elvis Presley – people did, apparently!

“In the sixties there was a lot of freedom, and I wouldn’t want to go back to a world without it,” he adds. “And at this moment in time, I think that freedom is being challenged and I think we should stand and be free. That sound and the music of the time reminds us that’s what people like us should be doing. I just don’t see us living in a free world. I see more and more CCTV, ID cards – this is not the sign of a free society.”

As a member of Reef, Kenwyn has toured all over the world and played to full arenas, living the life of a successful rock musician. With Goldray, he has gone right back to the beginning, grafting and playing club shows. How does it feel to be starting all over again?

For more, read this week's Connacht Tribune.