Concrete Playground

Still on a high after celebrating their big win at the NME Awards a few days earlier, Robbie Furze, one half of new British band the Big Pink, sits back in his studded leather jacket, moments after hopping off a plane from Heathrow to Kingsford Smith, and recaps the events of the aforementioned awards show.

“Well I didn’t get to meet Slash,” the lead vocalist and guitarist smiles, “but we did perform with Lily, which was . . . cool.” He breathes it out, as if it hasn’t quite had a chance to sink in yet. “I always dread these things, and it was a big night. Performing and being nominated is nerve-racking — so as soon as we won and it was over, we just wanted to party,” he says, with a mischievous grin.

He and the other half of his band, Milo Cordell, were presented the prestigious Best Track Award (beating the Arctic Monkeys, Animal Collective and Jamie T), after performing the winning song ‘Dominoes’ back-to-back with a cover of 'You're So Vain', accompanied by Lily Allen. They also presented an award to New York band the Drums. After the formalities, the pair partied so hard that Milo misplaced his passport somewhere in the haze of the evening. “He missed his flight to Sydney,” laughs Robbie, “Let’s hope he makes it to our first Aussie gig!”

While Australia’s attention has been mostly diverted by new Brit acts Florence and the Machine and Mumford and Sons over the past few months, Big Pink have fast become one of the most hyped new bands in the UK. After winning the Radar Award at the NME Awards in 2009, the pair was quickly signed to 4AD Records and shipped off to New York to record their debut album A Brief History of Love. But Robbie insists it’s not all been peaches and cream: “I love the fact that people are talking about us, but it creates a lot of resistance too. All of a sudden there are people who just want to be the people that hate the Big Pink, because apparently everyone else loves us. If you love our music, great, but if you don’t like it, just don’t listen to it.”

Robbie and Milo, who have known each other since they were 16, mix electronic beats, distorted guitars and dreamy vocals to create a sound that is abstract yet melodious. Their award-winning track ‘Dominoes’ infests itself in one's mind, its addictive chorus returning to you in mid-afternoon daydreams. They write about love, but not necessarily love songs. When asked to define the Big Pink, Robbie says instantly, “We are just a rock ‘n’ roll band. I mean it’s got different shit going on, and I could say, like: noise, rock, electronic, whatever, but at the end of the day we are just a rock ‘n’ roll band.”

Listening to A Brief History of Love, it’s not hard to imagine each track being played to a packed sports stadium, a la Muse, in the not-too-distant future. “In the studio, Milo and I like to write choruses that make us throw our hands in the air. There’s a lot of dancing and swaying. When we wrote 'Dominoes' we thought we were just pissing about and didn’t realise what we’d created. Now people are calling it an anthem!”

When playing live, they borrow the talents of two close friends to play drums and bass. But when asked if they’ll expand, Robbie is unsure. “I think creatively there will only ever be two of us, because we agree on everything. Every other creative process I’ve ever been involved in has always been such a long, boring, drawn out process, with everyone trying to put their opinions in . . . with the Big Pink it’s just me and Milo, and it works — it’s a much quicker, easier process.”

Both of music stock, Milo runs the independent Merok record label, which discovered Klaxons and Crystal Castles, and is son to the late 1960s pop producer Denny Cordell (who produced Procol Harum's ‘A Whiter Shade of Pale’ and Joe Cocker's ‘With a Little Help From My Friends’), while Robbie is a former guitarist with Alec Empire.

Over the past year, the band have experienced backlash due to their strong music industry roots and associations. “When the album came out, the interviews were all about us personally rather than our music: where we came from, and who we knew. I was like, I don’t know where the XX live, or who Alex Turner’s best friend is, but everyone seems to know where I live!” says Robbie, “I think people have this visual image of me and Milo in a skyscraper on the 35th floor in glass offices, laughing about how successful we are because we know how to cheat the system. It’s ridiculous; Milo runs his record label out of his bedroom and I was in a cross-punk band for four years. We started out with real low expectations of what we were going to do. There was no strategy. Me and Milo love each other so much, we just want to hang out.”

The pair, who tend do everything together (apart from, in this instance, catch planes), named themselves after the debut album of Bob Dylan’s the Band. Robbie, who was named after the Band’s guitarist, Robbie Robertson, says “My parents were big fans when I was growing up. I didn’t really like them at first, but they started to make sense to me in my teens. The whole idea of the Band, they symbolise to me the real deal. They toured for 15 years; they lived together, they probably died together. The whole idea of a gang is so cool. Milo and me always talk about having matching jackets, like the T-Birds. I guess that’s what being a band is like, it’s just another word for a gang.”

After tying up their tour in Oz (the two were successfully reunited just in time for their Aussie shows), the band is headed to the US to play Coachella festival. But Robbie has his sights set elsewhere. “If we don’t play Big Day Out next year we’ll be seriously pissed off,” he says. “Ever since I was little, I wanted to go. They fobbed us off this year, told us to wait until next year when we’ll be billed higher up. We had an argument, but as long as I come back next year, I’ll be happy. It looks like such a cool festival!”

The Big Pink’s debut album A Brief History of Love is out now.