Unsigned Bloxwich band Babytiger talk about their career so far

The thing is, very few could probably use the term 'new' as sincerely as Babytiger.

"Akin to Morrissey I was somewhat of a back bedroom casualty who spent a lot of time planning out an approach long before there was a band or I had songs," frontman Nicholas Miller tells us.

And that plan has quickly brought fruit in less than a year. The 27-year-old from Bloxwich has seen his fledgling group quickly produce a debut single - Sunsets - which was released this month. They've also attached a second track with the release called Nursery Rhymes, with both available to listen to on their Bandcamp page.

And there are also plans for a debut album to be released later this year.

"We know exactly what we want the album to be, but it’s only half finished so we’ve still got plenty to accomplish," he adds.

Vocalist Miller is joined by a geographically eclectic bunch. Drummer Mark Hesford, 27, and 28-year-old guitarist Bobby Love hail from just down the road from Nicholas in Walsall, while their bassist Matt Evans, 27, is from Nottingham and 26-year-old second guitarist Roberto Yanez Schmidt is an Ecuadorian living in Chile.

Think a Midlands core with a dash of South American flair, like Villa in the noughties when they had Colombian Juan Pablo Angel leading their forward line.

"I met Roberto while travelling in South America and we formed a strong friendship," adds Miller. "The world is a much smaller place with the internet and we simply communicate like most people through Whatsapp and phonecalls.

"When we were developing these songs we asked if he’d like to contribute. We heard nothing of his work for months until the day we were in the recording studio, and his engineer sent us these recordings of his mind-blowing guitar.

"I was a bit hungover and having a little nap in the corner. The producer Ant is not easily impressed, but after receiving the files turned to me and said 'you should wake up and have a listen to this, because it is f***ing amazing'.”

Their influences mainly stem from 80s and 90s rock, although their tastes do flow out further than that. They point to Catfish and The Bottlemen, King Krule, Courtney Barnett and Blossoms as key. While The Smiths, Echo and The Bunnymen, My Bloody Valentine, King Adora, Nirvana, Idlewild and Radiohead can also lay claim to their sound.

But more than any of these, David Bowie looms large over their material. Like Bowie, Miller is a big studier of the poetry of William Burroughs, and tries to pay homage to his style through his work.

"The majority of our songs are themed around a Bowellian dystopian past/future expressed through William Burroughs-style cut up poetry which was a big influence on Bowie himself," says Miller.

"The songs live in a strange dreamscape, a blur of past futures and distant memories and an abstract dystopian world. This is heavily influenced by records such as The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, Diamond Dogs and The Man Who Sold The World.

"Burroughs' techniques were used by Bowie, Kurt Kobain and Thom Yorke."

With Sunsets already in the musical stratosphere, attention turns to their forthcoming planned album. So far, Schmidt's contributions have come via remotely recording his parts in his studio in Vina Del Mar, a coastal resort in Chile. But the band want him alongside them for the next phase, and they are arranging for him to come and spend time in the country so they can get it recorded while also fitting in a UK tour.

Called Death Of The Book, the record is pencilled in for an August release on their own label Mourning Recordings.

"We classify real success as being bold and doing something artistically valid in order to produce songs that we’re truly proud of," Miller continues.

"If we do those things well enough then there’s hope that others will like what we do too, and in that scenario ‘success’ in the traditional commercial sense could follow. Art is never finished until there’s an audience for it and that is important to us.

"But the music industry is a strange place these days with greater access to music than there has ever been, but less money for companies than ever before, so talented artists suffer – getting lost in a flooded market."

So they won't just pop out and play the first place that asks them, then.

"Akin to Kate Bush or The Stone Roses we don’t have a burning desire to perform live unless it’s an event that’s really special, and so we tend to keep ourselves to ourselves.

"That said, there’s a lot of good venues for such a small city in Wolverhampton like the Robin 2, The Giffard Arms and The Slade Rooms which harbour a strong music scene."

We're sure that local music fans would agree. And they may not have too long before they get to see Babytiger grow into a full-size roaring beast in any of those venues once they are all together and ready to tour.

Until then, head online to hear their fledgling sound.

l The single Sunsets and bonus track Nursery Rhymes are both available to hear at https://babytiger.bandcamp.com/ or you can search for Babytiger on Spotify. For more on the band, you can find them on Facebook at www.facebook.com/nickbabytiger

By Leigh Sanders