Wolf Alice drummer Joel Amey has spoken to NME about the band being ambassadors for this year’s National Album Day, being the most nominated act for the Mercury Prize ever, the power of the format and the importance of expression in these fractured times.
The band, fresh from becoming the most-nominated band for the Mercury Prize ever after being shortlisted for their recent fourth LP ‘The Clearing’, were asked along with Nova Twins, Architects and Iron Maiden to be ambassadors for National Album Day 2025 – with this year focussing on rock music.
“We’re never shy of the fact that we love albums,” Amey told NME of their role. “I don’t know if it’s a generational thing but I remember going out and buying them, and there’s a romance about the importance of them. I also live with the great privilege that I can go into the studio for a few months and make one. I love that and feel very lucky.
“I’ve got nothing against the ‘singles’ culture and mixtapes are so important, but records mean a lot to me, that’s why I’m selfishly thinking they’re very important. They’re snapshots of where your artist’s head is at. It’s a moment of time. In an age when music is being treated as so disposable by corporations that shall not be named, it’s still important to put albums at the forefront because they’re your lifeblood and your connection to your audience. They’re what make you real.”
He added: “We’re lucky to be able to get up on stage, but we only got there because of our albums.”
National Album Day returns on Friday October 18, with events to celebrate the format alongside vinyl re-releases of classic records by the likes of Liam Gallagher, Iggy Pop, Manic Street Preachers, Patti Smith, Hole and many more.
Check out the rest of our interview with Amey below, where he told us about why the album still matters as a body of work, the importance of speaking out and making your voice heard, as well as advice for young artists, and his own favourite new and all-time records.
NME: Hello Joel. You recently received your fourth Mercury Prize nomination – making you the most shortlisted artist ever, as well as having won it already. How does that feel?
Joey Amey: “That’s what someone told me the other day. I was like, ‘That can’t be right? What about Arctic Monkeys?’ I Googled it, and apparently we are. That’s cool! I didn’t realise it. The Mercury Prize has a history with it, and it’s still hard to believe we won it [in 2018 for ‘Visions Of A Life’]. It puts the spotlight on a lot of different genres and some underground stuff alongside the mainstream. It’s cool to see all of that presented together.”
What do you make of your chances of winning this year?
“I reckon I’d put £500 on CMAT. I love that album [‘Euro-Country’]. I think she’s awesome. When I listened to that album, it just really connected to me. Ellie [Rowsell, singer] was telling me about the title track, and it’s such a brilliant song. The way she approaches sonics on that record is so fucking brilliant. I wouldn’t be putting money on us.”
What would you spend the prize money on if you won again?
“We still haven’t spent the last lot! We have plans on what to do with it and what it should be invested in. We want to make sure that we don’t spend it frivolously. Can it help somebody else make an album? It would be nice. If we won again, not that we should, it would be great to put it with the last lot and use it to help people that maybe aren’t at that stage of their career but could be.”
It’s hard to keep people’s attention in playlist culture. How do you respond to that? How do you break through the noise?
“I’m part of playlist culture; I’ve discovered some of my favourite new albums from playlists. It’s really hard. It’s a push and pull. We’ve just got to keep supporting new artists and outlets for them to express themselves and create a career. There will be a certain song that becomes massive because it was playlisted in a certain way, but making an album is how you evolve as a writer, a lyricist, a poet, a drummer, whatever. It’s so important to culture and the evolution of the artists we have today.”
A good album is a world you can jump into. How would you describe the world of ‘The Clearing’? Did that reveal itself as you were making it?
“We had more conversations about it than we’d ever done before. It felt like an experiment to me because we chose to write differently to how we’d done in the past. Our previous records are all quite different, but it’s quite ‘Wolf Alice’ to go away, everyone writes, then we pull together what we think is exciting. That has really benefitted the band before. But with your fourth album, you ask, ‘What’s going to be exciting for us?’ It was this idea of making a cohesive body of work where the songs come together more coherently than before. That was a challenge for us. It really made us focus on our songwriting and every single chord change. ‘Do we need to stack 85 guitar tracks to get the same point and emotion across? Joff [Oddie] is an incredible guitar player, why don’t we just challenge him to do that?’
“We wanted all the parts to be chosen and more bespoke to the song. It was about honing in on what was important. It was a really fun thing, but we evolved out of our limitations. ‘The Clearing’ is our most experimental album in that sense, because we’ve never made one like it.”
As you said, albums are a capsule of a time and a very important mode of expression. That becomes a more important vehicle when the world is on fire. Wolf Alice have been vocal supporters of Palestine and said that doing so should allow others to feel less afraid and alone. Do you feel like the backlash is lessening through so much artist solidarity, and that the focus is shifting from the culture war to the atrocities themselves?
“I don’t know, because I’ve seen certain people use their platform and gone to see what kind of response they’ve had, and it can be volatile and violent. There are artists who screenshot DMs they’ve received just for speaking out. I don’t know. I just know that I’ve learned a lot from seeing people use their platform. It doesn’t mean that you have to agree exactly with what they say, but it’s about having a conversation. That conversation matters. We need to remind ourselves that it’s OK to have a conversation with someone with different opinions to yours. It’s OK to use your platform if you feel comfortable to do that and you see a moral cause. You learn that privilege as an artist.
“I applaud anyone who’s using their platform in today’s day and age to try and get a resolution to what people are experiencing.”
Wolf Alice have also been staunch in fighting for artist rights and the grassroots. Do you feel as if some good may come about now that the industry seems more open to that conversation?
“It will only get better with action. Everything seems to fall on the responsibility of the artist sometimes, which can be quite overwhelming. It’s got to pan out on so many different levels: from labels to government to music being taught in schools more, so people can find a love and respect for it. We’re gonna do our bit, I hope more people do theirs, and that’s where the hope comes from.”
What advice would you give to a young artist who might think that ever making an album is a pipe dream?
“You can make an album, fine! Don’t wait for the world to give you the thumbs up to be creative. Don’t wait for the world to give you the green light to do what is inside you. I applaud anyone who has time to make something any way they can. What is a conventional method these days? They’ve all been completely chewed up and spat out and rightly so. Good art always finds a way. Just have fun with it. Make a band with your friend. Make art on your own. There’s no right or wrong way to do it. I used to sit in my teenage bedroom and dream about what I’m doing now.”
Is there an album that gets played on the Wolf Alice tour bus without any skips or arguments?
“My favourite record that’s just come out is that new Die Spitz album [‘Something To Consume’]. I think they fucking rock. ‘Throw Yourself To The Sword’ is my favourite song at the moment. We’re also touring with a songwriter called Willy Mason who we’ve all been fans of forever and ever. We just reached out to him and he agreed to do it. That made me rediscover his record from 2007, ‘If The Ocean Gets Rough’. Everyone in the band listens to that record. There’s a track called ‘Save Myself’ and it’s incredibly poignant. People should go listen to that.”
What three albums would you take to a desert island?
“Oh shit. I’m gonna take ‘Surf’s Up’ by The Beach Boys, the first self-titled album by The Bronx, and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young’s ‘Déjà Vu’.”
National Album Day 2025 is on Friday October 18. Visit here for more information.
‘The Clearing’ by Wolf Alice is out now, with the band currently on tour in North America before returning to the UK and Europe for an arena run in the winter and Australia and New Zealand in the new year.