Posted on June 20, 2010 - by Mark Zonda

It sounds better with jam on bread

Every indie bloke knows: ukulele is the new glockenspiel, and especially this year everybody seems gone nut for this ultimate indie instrument. Parties on the beach, secret live shows, ukulele and handclapping have clearly become part of our naivety and pride. That’s why Indietracks Festival 2010 HAD to have its own representative ukulele player. With George Harrison still being dead we found our man on Steve Carlton, also known as Jam on Bread. Here’s some werds with da man.

Mark Zonda: Hi there Mr. Steve. I usually start with questions like “How the project Jam on bread” was born, or “How did you find yourself being an indiepop idol”, but for once in a lifetime let me start with that one: how does it feel to play at Indietracks?

Steve Carlton: It feels fantastic! I’ve wanted to play at Indietracks ever since I started making music and I’ve been begging them to let me play for just as long. They finally got fed up of me pestering them and let me play this year and I’m dead excited about it!

Mark Zonda: You know that I’m jelous about you playing in there! Can I open your show or play on a hot-dog barrow near the anchient church?

Steve Carlton: That sounds pretty good to me.

Mark Zonda: Which are your main influences? Are in there some pieces of Beirut and Neutral Milk Hotel as well?

Steve Carlton: Hmm! I like Neutral Milk Hotel very much and I taught myself to play a couple of their songs when I was learning how to play the ukulele. I did a cover of In the Aeroplane Over the Sea at a gig once but I’m no Jeff Mangum and I haven’t tried to play it since then. My influences are probably quite obvious; Labrador Records bands, pop singer songwriters like Pete Green and MJ Hibbett, Jens Lekman, that kind of stuff.

Mark Zonda: Which are the things making Labrador such a great label? It’s just about the artists it choose or there’s something more? Do you think there’s still someone out there willing to buy CDR?

Steve Carlton: I’m not sure really! They just have so many ace bands! I suppose that’s the most important thing, really. Bands like The Radio Dept, Suburban Kids With Biblical Names, Irene and the Acid House Kings would probably make me fall in love with any label.  I think people are definitely willing to buy CDRs. If the music’s good they don’t tend to care what format it’s on. I’m not sure if this happens in the real world, but it makes sense in my head anyway.

Mark Zonda: Ever slept without your ukulele?

Steve Carlton: Quite often, I’m ashamed to say. My ukulele occasionally gets loaned out to other struggling musician types. Charlotte from Judy and the Blumes sometimes borrows my ukulele for gigs because her’s doesn’t have an internal microphone. I don’t treat my ukulele very well, really. It can usually be found on my bedroom floor under a pile of dirty laundry, which is probably why it sounds so rubbish.

Mark Zonda: It sound supercool! Which other instruments would you like to learn?

Steve Carlton:I’ve decided I really want to learn how to play guitar over the summer. I want to be in a louder band as well as doing Jam on Bread stuff. I also play in a band called Lynx Africa with Mat Riviere and Grace Denton from the Middle Ones where I get to play my ukulele through a distortion pedal, but it’s still not loud enough. I’d quite like to be able to play the cello too, but that’ll never happen.

Mark Zonda:  How did you find yourself being an indiepop idol?

Steve Carlton:I don’t think I am an indie pop idol! I started making music about two and a half years ago. I had a cheap ukulele but had never learnt how to play it properly and then my friend Andy (Pagan Wanderer Lu) decided to put together a compilation about giant isopods. I wrote and recorded a terrible terrible song called ‘Isopod In My Bathroom’ and, for some reason, got quite good feedback. That encouraged me to carry on writing songs and then people just kept asking me to play gigs. That’s it really!

Jam on bread – “I <3 Labrador Records”

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