As Royal Blood gear up to release the 10th anniversary edition of their self-titled debut album, the duo spoke to NME about the making of the record, its impact, and befriending the likes of Queens Of The Stone Age and Jimmy Page.
Earlier this year the duo – made up of frontman and bassist Mike Kerr and drummer Ben Thatcher – kicked off celebrations for the 10th birthday of their first record with a handful of special gigs, including two nights at London’s O2 Academy Brixton.
“They were epic,” Kerr reflected of the shows to NME. “It was also great because the way we set the show up was to play the whole record in its entirety, and then bust into a bunch of other songs post that record. It really refreshed what a Royal Blood show is and could be.
“We had our fans that have been there since that record, but then this whole new wave of people who perhaps discovered us on album three who are now part of the club. It felt like a very connected moment with our fans.”
‘Royal Blood’ saw the band go from being “independent lone rangers trying to find ourselves shows” playing cosy pub gigs, to winning BRIT and NME Awards and playing huge stages at Glastonbury and Reading & Leeds in 18 months. The record went double-Platinum, as well as bagging a four-star review from NME which declared: “Their impact will surely stretch beyond rock’s confines”.
Ahead of the release of the 10th Anniversary Edition of ‘Royal Blood’, the band discuss their relationship with the iconic album, being inspired by their now-pals Queens Of The Stone Age, and what happened when Led Zeppelin icon Jimmy Page went to one of the band’s earliest shows.
NME: Hi Royal Blood! Did you ever imagine that the album would have the impact on fans that it has?
Mike Kerr: “At the time that record came out, it was a bit of a whirlwind. I don’t think we would truly take stock of what was happening. Hindsight is a great thing, because you look back and realise how wild it was. For people to build long lasting relationships with things, you need time on your side.
“It’s one thing having a great new song that you’re into, but when there’s a song that you love and it gets baked in with your memories and where you were at that time when it came out, when time moves on those songs become more than just a catchy song that you like, they become a meaningful portal back into that era.”
What was your intention when you went in to make the album?
Kerr: “The first three or four songs on the record were just our demos that were self-funded recordings, that we honestly only recorded with the idea of: ‘We’ll make EPs that we sell at shows’. We were completely independent lone rangers trying to find ourselves shows.
“I think those songs would have been ‘Figure It Out’, [You Can Be So] ‘Cruel’, and maybe ‘Come On Over, something like that. That was really step one of recording our album, and then obviously at the time we didn’t know those recordings would kind of change our lives the way that they did.”
Did you sense you were onto something?
Kerr: “We also perhaps didn’t recognise how good those recordings were. We spent £300 on that EP, and we did it in two days. Over the period of putting that music out and finding someone to publish us, finding a manager, suddenly there was a little bit more than £300 in the budget to go and record. We found ourselves not being able to top the recordings we made for such little money. I don’t think we recognised how much of a good job we did on those first three recordings”.
What memories really stick with you from making the album?
Thatcher: “We split our time between three studios, and the writing process normally started off at Brighton Electric studio. Once we had the idea and the song, then we’d either go to this place called Nam, which is just outside Bath and it was quite a modest studio that some of the songs were just coming alive in.
“The other studio was Rockfield Studio [in Wales] and there we did a lot of horse riding in between our takes, and that studio has a legacy, Stone Roses being there and Queen and Oasis, and so we really found ourselves enjoying the time that we had there, and recording there.”
What were your influences back then?
Thatcher: “Queens Of The Stone Age we were quite inspired by; how they recorded the drums with Dave Grohl. That was an avenue that we went down in the recording side of things, and just limitations. We wanted to show Mike’s singing and his bass playing, and drums, and that be it. We were very conscious of not adding too much, mainly because we wanted to play it live, and we wanted everything that we were recording, we wanted to be able to do that and make it really loud live.”
A lot of early commentary about the band, which is perhaps a little reductive, would be ‘I can’t believe it’s just two, and it’s so loud!’…
Kerr: “It’s interesting as that’s still a thing, and I always take it as a compliment. Because despite the amount of amazing two pieces that came before us, there must be something just surprising about two people being able to pull off a rock show. Three people don’t seem to get any credit, but when it’s two, people become quite impressed.”
Ben, you mentioned Queens Of The Stone Age, who you’ve since toured and recorded with. How was it to have a relationship with your favourite band blossom like that?
Thatcher: “Amazing. It’s always quite nerve-wracking when you meet people that you’ve looked up to and have inspired you, but they become normal very quickly. Touring with them is so natural for us, there’s no boundaries between us, and they’ve become really good friends of ours.
“They still inspire us today, watching them play live, it’s like no other band you could see, and they’re just so talented and work together so well as a band.”
This record took off very quickly, going to Number One and winning awards. When did you first realise that something was happening?
Kerr: “We felt like the frog in the water, and the temperature’s being turned up one degree at a time and you can’t detect the boiling point. Although when you take a few steps back and you realise: ‘Oh, that was only eight months’. It felt so incremental. There were so many landmark moments that were happening to get to that point.
“Honestly, for me the first moment I felt like something was happening, as small-minded and naive as it might seem, is the first time we played a show and it sold out. There might have been 50 people there, but it was this idea of, ‘There are more people outside that want to come, that aren’t able to’. That idea people care about what we’re doing, and it doesn’t feel like we’re trying to kind of prove anything gave us this feeling of, ‘Something’s happening’.”
Glastonbury was huge too…
Kerr: “The first time we played Glastonbury, Ben was like, ‘Have you seen what’s going on out there?’. I walked up to the stage [and had a look], and it was that same thing was happening, where the tent was full and there were more people outside that wanted to come in.”
Thatcher: “Glastonbury was a big moment for us, where I don’t think we really realised what the extent of that show was going to be like. Honestly, I didn’t think anyone would be there. I thought there’d be a couple of 100 people. I remember at that time we were on the tour, we were selling out like 200 cap venues. And it came to that, and it was thousands and thousands of people, and it was a bit of a shock and a real high.”
Were there any moments you look back on now and think, ‘Man, that was huge’?
Thatcher: “When people like Jimmy Page would turn up to our shows, or Lars [Ulrich, drummer] from Metallica. Those moments where we’re just two kids from small towns outside of Brighton, and did not ever expect to ever see Lars Ulrich at the dressing room door. Or Jimmy Page coming to our first show in New York, moments like that were pinch yourself: ‘What is going on here?’”
What do you remember from meeting Jimmy Page?
Kerr: “We heard the rumour he might be coming, and it was at the Mercury lounge in New York which holds about 200 people, so it’s on the intimate side. I just remember walking onto stage, and in that venue [with] the dressing room you have to walk through the crowd to get to the stage, and I walked out the dressing room door and I literally brushed shoulders when I walked past, and was overcome with a wave of excitement and fear.
“I also have the memory of opening up the show, playing that first song keeping my head down, and when I plucked up the courage to look up [and] gauge what his reaction [would be], and I just saw him with a big smile on his face, loving it. That moment will never leave me.”
When you look back on your debut album now, what is your relationship with these songs?
Kerr: “It’s still a record that we live and breathe really, at every show. At least half of it we consider a fundamental part of our live show still. This decade coming around and looking back there have been a few songs we’ve dusted off and put back in the set which have been a bit of a blast from the past, but it doesn’t feel old, it feels fresh. Because we play songs from that record still, they’ve also grown with us and how we play them live has changed with us. They’ve adapted themselves a little bit. It all feels very fresh still, it doesn’t feel like an old relic or anything like that.”
The 10th anniversary edition of ‘Royal Blood’ will be released on August 16.