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The last time I spoke with Big Special, it was the summer of 2022, when we played a small gig together in Birmingham. Since then they have skyrocketed, releasing their debut album Post Industrial Hometown Blues<\/em> (2024) and its Deluxe<\/em> edition (2025), as well as touring the world, not only headlining and supporting, but also playing big festivals like Glastonbury. On the back of their latest Deluxe<\/em> album, and in the build up to supporting the legendary Pixies on their UK tour, I reconnected with Big Special to dive deeper into what, for me at least, if you\u2019ll pardon the obvious word play, makes their sonic presence so big and their lyricism oh so special.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n The first track we heard from this Deluxe<\/em> edition was Stay Down Lazarus<\/em> with John Grant, which sees you take a more atmospheric and theatrical approach. What was the process for this song?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Joe:<\/strong> We\u2019d crossed paths a few times and are big fans of his. That dark, doomy sound brings the gothic imagery into a modern postindustrial place. We use religious imagery in the song as well, and the sonic side of it reflects those lyrics.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Cal:<\/strong> He\u2019d been listening to us for a while which was mental to hear. It came together quite quickly from a song we\u2019d had lying around for ages and it\u2019s led to a good friendship. We went on tour together and its quite surreal being around someone you\u2019ve been listening to for so long. He\u2019s a lovely geezer.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Your imagery often pairs the romantic and gothic with the mundane everyday \u2013 \u201cIt\u2019s not a phoenix you saw, it was a gull on fire\u201d \u2013 How do you form those kinds of witty lyrics? Are you actively pursuing ideas or do you just go about your day and let it happen?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Joe<\/strong>: It\u2019s years of influence and just being a fan of stuff. I make a lot of notes, even if it\u2019s just the word or the sound of a word; like it could be \u201ccan\u201d, that stood out to me today and I\u2019ll come back to that at some point maybe. We\u2019ve been recording a lot more and it\u2019s the first time I\u2019ve been trying to do those note revisions while in the studio, and we\u2019ve been so busy touring and its egged me on to get stuff finished. I\u2019ve faced learning curves and writers block, but you need to look at it like there\u2019s times when you\u2019re writing and times when you\u2019re not. I\u2019m better now, I don\u2019t panic when I\u2019m not writing. This is me reloading, taking shit in, so that at some point I get the next flow going.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n There are several remixes on this deluxe album, from the likes of Andy Bell, Sleaford Mods, Public Service Broadcasting, and more. Did you always know you wanted variations of these specific tracks? Were any notes or hints given to the artists involved?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cal<\/strong>: We didn\u2019t have much say in it to be honest. We had all the files of the album\u2019s tracks and just handed them off to artists we liked. We just said we wanna see what you do with it creatively with what you like from the album. The less we were involved the better.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Joe<\/strong>: The fun of it from our side is to hear how people interpret our stuff. As we carry on I\u2019d love to get more and more remixes of our stuff and see what people do with it.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s cool that even though that\u2019s the case, they all come together quite cohesively. There\u2019s similar vibes and atmospheres; still dystopian but in a way that\u2019s different to your classic soul-punk sound.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Joe<\/strong>: It was nice how it came together like that. Our album is varied but still cohesive. It\u2019s interesting to see how different artists made different things that go together. Maybe the cohesiveness is a subconscious thing in the writing.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Are you inspired by the sounds these different artists have produced for you? Do you think you might incorporate them into your work in the future?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Joe<\/strong>: I don\u2019t know. A lot of stuff goes into us subconsciously as music fans but we haven\u2019t really spoken about that. We tend to just pick a sound pallet of instruments and mess around with it, so who knows.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Cal<\/strong>: We\u2019ve got such an eclectic sound, it feels like we can do whatever the fuck we want. It doesn\u2019t take a lot of thought to add new sounds in; whatever we\u2019re liking at the time just bleeds into the mess. I think you have to keep your influences as broad as possible. You can catch lightning in a bottle, but a large portion of the creative process should happen after that as well. I feel like we\u2019re so much more connected to the music we make because we\u2019ve poured over it for so long and really put the hours in.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Joe<\/strong>: I do think we\u2019ve found a way to straddle the line between different methods of making music. It all starts with improvisation and fun but it\u2019s about revising and picking things apart and building these sonic collages to play on stage.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Speaking of the stage, your tour with Pixies is coming up. Are you big fans?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cal<\/strong>: We\u2019re so lucky, it\u2019s felt like a real natural progression with Pixies. We\u2019ve crossed paths with them in all sorts of places. In Benidorm we played the same festival as them, and then played a couple of tour dates with them in Europe and hit it off really well. It\u2019s been a very steady build and they proper love it now. We\u2019re buzzed to be on the UK run with them now.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Joe<\/strong>: I definitely have been influenced in my writing by Pixies and Doolittle<\/em> and that loud-quiet-loud dynamic they popularised. Pixies are like The Matrix. When The Matrix came out, every film after that wanted to be it, and when Pixies came out they changed music and everyone wanted to be them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Words by Thomas Pilkington<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Photo Courtesy of Chuff Media<\/em>. No changes have been made to the image.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The last time I spoke with Big Special, it was the summer of 2022, when we played a small gig […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":650,"featured_media":35811,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[3523,9],"tags":[7560,3,3054,802,4513,4781,96,1206,19],"class_list":["post-35806","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interview","category-music","tag-big-special","tag-cardiff","tag-cardiff-student-media","tag-interview","tag-new-album","tag-pixies","tag-quench","tag-quench-magazine","tag-review"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n\n
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