NYLON - August 2008 - (Page 130) UNDERGROUND, OVERGROUND No, this isn’t an article about Australian marsupials. The Wombats are a band from Liverpool, and we think you’re going to like them. By Karen Ruttner. Photographed by Candice Lawler McCartney may be an impossible feat, but the Wombats are on a promising path of their own. They spent the bulk of 2007 gigging around the U.K. (playing a staggering 270 shows). When I first meet the Wombats, The remainder of the year was spent they’re standing against a wall on East recording their pop gem of a debut, A 3rd street in Manhattan, trying to spell Guide to Love, Loss and Desperation. out their band name with their bodies. Its reception among British music Such antics shouldn’t be surprising, fans has been extremely positive, since the band formed at the Liverpool resulting in what the Wombats see as Institute of Performing Arts, which their greatest achievement to date. by all accounts isn’t that different “We played the Royal Albert Hall from the Fame school. That the three recently, with a full orchestra on stage, members—Matthew “Murph” Murphy, and it was the most ridiculous show Dan Haggis, and Tord Knudsen— ever,” Haggis enthuses. “It’s the most met in that environment might make unbelievable venue, and if a few years them obvious targets for detractors, ago someone had said, ‘OK, you’ve since such schools are often hunting got to finish after this one gig,’ I would grounds for Svengalis looking to throw have said, ‘Alright.’ There’s not much together the next ’N Sync. But that’s farther you can go than a sold out hardly the case here. The boys who show at the Albert Hall.” would be Wombats trolled those halls But such triumph did nothing to aspiring to be a band because, as quell the Wombats’ desire to get even Murphy puts it, “I’m just pretty much bigger. “I don’t think we’ll ever feel shit at everything else.” as if we’ve gotten everything we’ve “I never felt like I fit in there,” the wanted out of this,” says Murphy. lead singer and primary songwriter And, indie elitists who criticize their insists. “We just used it as a place happy-go-lucky pop sound (“Some to be creative and scrounge money people take a stance and they off the government to travel and do stick by it without really thinking gigs and go out and get ass-faced about what they’re saying,” Haggis together.” Blasé attitude aside, LIPA laments) and Spinal Tap moments also provided the Wombats with (a 12-foot inflatable wombat prop some direct access to some of their malfunctioned on their last tour, influences. Institute founder Paul leaving their dramatic encore entrance McCartney was a frequent visitor, accompanied by what looked like instilling a good amount of ambition “a used condom hanging from the in the students. “If you admire people, ceiling”) aside, the Wombats are and you feel like you’ve got the ready to take off in a major way. ability to do something similar, you When asked what their ultimate just wanna be like your heroes, goal is, there is a long pause. ya know?” Haggis says. “Get to that “Maybe like, a full production, with stage and have that same effect on laser lights, on the moon,” Murphy other peoples’ lives.” muses. Knudsen nods, exclaiming, Getting to the same stage as “That’s what I was gonna say!”
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