@ Truck Festival '24
(CARSICK - [from left to right] Tom Armstrong, Jack Hardiman, Jack Richardson and Joe Richardson)
Salisbury’s Local Legends, CARSICK, join us for a catch-up, over a year since we last met, to discuss all things debut EPs, the importance of supporting your local scene, the pressures of having Glastonbury and Jamie T pestering you in your inbox and what really happened in the mysterious “bumper car incident”...
The last time I caught up with Salisbury post-punk quartet, CARSICK, we were squashed around a picnic table on a February evening at one of Salisbury’s limited music venues, Brown Street (now Rude Giant), with only the warmth of their lit cigarettes.
The band were preparing for their hometown headline, a show that’s always sure to be a high energy, but incredibly unpredictable evening, and one that locals desperate for live music and a good night out, something the city mainly lacks, always show up for and give their all to.
Today, we’ve ventured out of our shared hometown and are, for old time’s sake, sitting around a picnic table, just this time in the press area, mutually apologising for the lack of signal at the festival which caused the catch-up to almost not happen, whilst shouting to be heard over Holly Humberstone’s main stage set.
That main stage having been the host for the band’s set today, a huge achievement for the band and the coolest thing to witness for Wiltshire-based music lovers.
CARSICK have played the festival now three years consecutively, having won the band app vote in 2022, then playing the Market Stage at last year’s instalment.
“I feel like this festival has been a very very important part of our band’s growth.” explains frontman, Joe Richardson. “Our first big festival was Truck three years ago, and each time we come back, it gets bigger and bigger. It’s so nice to come back and have that re-affirmation that we’re doing bits and making progress.”
“It’s not even about playing; we’ve been coming to this festival for years just watching stuff, so we’ve always said that Truck has a really close place in our heart because we’ve been coming for so many years.” adds drummer Tom Armstrong.
“We’re the fucking house band now!” jokes guitarist Jack Richardson.
“They have to have us back every year!” bassist Jack Hardiman insists.
“We spoke to Jamie T’s guitarist earlier.” explains Jack R, excitedly. “I saw he had nice tattoos and complimented him, then he said ‘Oh, were you in CARSICK?’ and I was like ‘you fucking what?’ and he said he was in the crowd and watched our set!”
The fact the frontman and guitarist are brothers becomes evidently clear, as Joe opts for a one-up: “That’s so funny because I saw Jamie T earlier and he was like ‘Joe! I’ve been messaging you my whole life!’ and I had to brush him to the side.”
“It’s hard. Jamie’s been begging to get on tour with us for a while. Emails keep coming through and it’s just going straight to junk mail.”
When we spoke last year, the band had just been confirmed to play Truck for the second time later in the summer, and I asked them how they were feeling ahead of the announcement. After gushing with excitement, the conversation quickly took a turn with the band alluding to the mysterious “bumper car incident”, which when probed for elaboration, they suggested it needed “a whole other interview”.
Having seen the band tease other interviewers about the topic, I felt it was time to find out what really went down on the Truck Festival fairground rides.
Expecting it to be CARSICK’s version of the Gavin & Stacey fishing trip, I was surprised when Jack R began to set the scene.
“We had our redemption.” clarifies Jack H, explaining how the band had been on the bumper cars again over the weekend, before an animated Tom spills all.
“We queued for like I don’t know, half an hour, to get on these bumper cars. We got onto the ride and we’d paid like ten pounds each to get on these bumper cars, and they gave us like what? A minute? And then he was like ‘everybody get up!’ and we looked at him and were like, ‘nah, you’re chatting!’ and he was like ‘no, no, seriously get up.’ And then he just kicked us off!”
“We were sat down on the bumper cars and we were like, ‘no, I’m not going anywhere!’” complains Jack H.
“It’s very very vulnerable to be sat on a bumper car with somebody standing full height, like six feet above you, going ‘get off’ and you going ‘no’” sighs Joe, as the rest of the band join in for an exaggerated reenactment of their response.
Jack H is quick to reiterate how they went on the ride again the day before and “had a lovely time” and speculates how they “must have changed management” before Jack R jokes how they’ve probably received his emails.
“We haven’t got our money back, though” sighs Tom.
Bumper car issues aside, the band’s set earlier that day was a success, pulling in an energetic crowd, willing to open up the pit at half two on the first full day. There was even a point where Joe got into the crowd to perform Is What It Is, which the band refer to as their Wonderwall or Mr Brightside .
Joe describes the set as “absolutely incredible”, whilst Jack H opts for “biblical”.
It’s been a busy year for CARSICK, though, and it’s evident how hard they’ve been working to get here. Back when we were sitting in the outdoor bar of Brown Street, the band had just released their single, Runner, which would soon become the lead single for the then yet to be announced, debut EP, Drunk Hymns.
“The response to that EP was a lot more than we expected it to be, and having it on physical vinyl was very surreal,” explains Joe. “I really didn’t expect people to be as into it as they were and I feel like over the course of time…when it came out, it did ok, but as we’ve gotten bigger, the more people have listened to it.”
“But it’s like when we did the tour last year, it was officially the Drunk Hymns tour and I think the majority of that, for me, was like ‘holy shit, people actually listened to it.’ It was insane!” reflects Jack H.
“That was really fun! I think we hit it a bit too hard at the start, though.” laughs Joe, before Tom explains how Joe ended up with alcohol poisoning on his birthday.
“It was a learning curve!” says Jack R of that tour. “But we didn’t kill each other!” celebrates Joe, before the words “just about” and “somehow” are thrown around.
When the aforementioned tour was announced, the band told me how they’d never played more north than Manchester.
“Well, we did that tour. And it’s safe to say the wheels came off the van entirely!” jokes Joe. “And we didn’t know what we were doing!” adds Jack H.
“The whole thing fell apart and we all wanted to kill each other. But I think the main testament to how well you are as a unit isn’t about how you fall out, it’s how you come back together…”
Tom interrupts, much to Joe’s annoyance.
“Let me finish!” he protests. “And we still haven’t come back together.”
Jokes are made about how the band are smiling now but will all be returning to their separate areas of the campsite post-interview, before Joe reflects on the experience in all seriousness.
“We learned a lot doing it and I think we learned a lot in terms of how to give each other space and like loading in, loading out, the journey. There’s a lot that you don’t realise until it hits you in the face.”
“You don’t get taught it until you get thrown in the deep end.” adds his older brother, Jack R. “That two month tour, we were thrown massively in the deep end and there were bad shows and there were good shows.”
“It’s not how you fall apart, it’s how you come together.” reiterates the frontman.
Motivational speeches and an in depth discussion of every little thing that went wrong on that tour aside, the band reflect on their recent shows around Europe, where a couple of days after our chat, they’ll be playing again.
“It’s just constantly blowing our minds. I think everytime we go there now it’s like us? Here?” explains Jack H before Jack R adds, “Being in fucking Germany and the crowd’s singing the words to the song we wrote in our kitchen! It’s like what are you doing?”
The band are heading back out on tour for shows in Bristol, Brighton and London in the autumn. Their expectations?
“Every show sold out!”
“To anyone reading this right now, it will genuinely be the best show of your life. Come down - if you miss this now, you’ll miss us doing the o2 in a couple of years. So make sure you come down to Bristol, Brighton and London!”
Jack H adds: “It’s going to be our biggest capacity shows to date, so obviously it’s a little bit nerve wracking, but after today, it’s gonna be easy! So come down, it’ll be a lovely, lovely time!”
The band recognise however, they wouldn’t be where they are without the local scene and grassroots venues, and especially the late Thom Belk, “a fucking legend who kept the entire local scene afloat by himself and carried the whole Salisbury music scene on his back.” He set up the band’s first show, and they owe where they are now to him.
It’s expressed how despite the local scene suffering, the important thing that’s come from his recent passing is that there’s a Thom Belk Community Fund which has been set up in his memory to help out young bands and artists in Salisbury. The launch show for which is happening on 10th August, a stacked line-up with some of Belk’s favourite local artists playing across the evening at the Arts Centre, CARSICK closing out the night.
“It should be a really good night! A tough one emotionally, but it’s such a cool thing to see everything Tom did when he was still with us, echoing through Salisbury now. It’s still massive the whole community coming together, even in his absence, it’s so fucking cool to see this sort of launchpad for lots of new bands to start.”
The band also discusses how integral grassroots venues have been to their growth as a band.
“It’s so important for people to be able to go to venues that aren’t the o2 Arena. And it’s great when bands make it and you go, ‘oh, I saw them at the Guildhall.’ It’s brilliant! But the next band that’s playing the Guildhall is playing down the road at Joiners. So it’s so important that people actually go to those venues!” explains Joe.
Jack R adds, “That’s a good point, but like on top of that, it’s a space for bands like us, even before this band when we did our first ever live shows, to cut your teeth in and learn not just how to play your instrument, but just to be on stage. So having those grassroots is just so vital.”
“There’s no band at the moment who’s playing arenas that haven’t come up through those smaller venues.”
“And it’s always nice to be up and personal with a band in a smaller venue. Seeing those shows is just so cool - you feel close to them.” concludes Tom.
The band also recognises though the darker side to being a small band in the local touring circuit, expressing some of the negatives through their recent single, Gig Tax.
“The inspiration behind it was the underbelly of a live scene when you’re a new band. I was worried when we first released it that people would think we were only focusing on the negatives, but there’s so many amazing things about playing in a band, even at the start. But there’s also a lot of bad things.
“I kind of wanted to focus on that specifically; like dodgy promoters not wanting to pay you or bands who think they’re bigger than Oasis, but they’re like the size we are. It’d be like me pretending I’m Liam Gallagher.”
“But you do!” laughs Jack R, once again opting for sibling piss-taking.
“I do, but it’s beside the point.”
So does this mean we should be preparing for the track to be part of something bigger?
“Couple more singles.” begins Jack R, before the rest of the band start to drop hints towards a potential up-coming album.
“It’s gonna change the world!” The band claim before, like all CARSICK interviews, it goes very much off piste, the conversation turning to the suggestion they’ll surprise drop the album next summer, no promo, but it’ll all just be covers of Nirvana’s Nevermind.
So what’s next for CARSICK?
Without hesitation, Joe suggests: “Breaking up.”
“No, we’ve got Germany first. Then Reading & Leeds! Then next year the album and world domination.”
It all goes so well…
“Then we’ve got Glastonbury next year…probably” suggests Jack H.
“Yeah, they’ve been emailing me. I’m ghosting them. I’ve got Jamie T and Glastonbury in my emails - it’s fucking annoying!”
“Next thing for CARSICK is world domination! And if they’ll have us back…we are the house band, we’ll be at Truck again next year. At nine o’clock!”
CARSICK’s new single, Gig Tax, is out now! You can stream it on Spotify here.
Drunk Hymns, the debut EP from CARSICK can also be found here, and ordered on limited edition ‘Salisbury orange’ vinyl here.
You can buy tickets for CARSICK’s autumn headline here.
Where to find CARSICK:
On tour:
10/08 - Salisbury, Belko’s Fund Big Launch Bash
17/08 - Exeter, Cavern
23/08 - Reading, Reading & Leeds Festival
24/08 - Leeds, Reading & Leeds Festival
26/09 - London, Camden Assembly
27/09 - Brighton, Hope & Ruin
28/09 - Bristol, Exchange
You can get your tickets for the Salisbury fundraising gig on Saturday 10th August here.
Instagram: @carsickofficial
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Twitter: @carsickofficial
FaceBook: Carsick
KATIE HILLIER
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