My Alamo

Received wisdom has it that intimate and emotive music must be quiet, considered, and preferably strummed on acoustic guitar. Rock'n'roll history has, thankfully, provided us with a succession of bands who've obliterated such foggy notions with the concision of a guitar ploughing into an amplifier...
Groups like Nirvana, The Who, The Pixies, who alloyed corrosive noise with a yearning passion and an idiosyncratic, individual worldview that spoke powerfully to their audience. Prepare to add My Alamo to that hallowed list.

Though just finished recording their debut album, at Swansea's Mighty Atom studios (with the capable aid of producer Joe Gibb, famed for work with Jane's Addiction, Funeral For A Friend and God Machine), My Alamo possess a colossal confidence in line with their skyscraper tuneage, carving epic, addictively melodic rock on a grand scale, but always retaining a bittersweet emotional punch.

They formed eighteen months ago, in the Birmingham suburb of Moseley. "If Birmingham has a 'bohemian' area, it would be Moseley," says bassist Dijg, of the birthplace of Duran Duran's Nick Rhodes, home to a network of film-makers, artists, and musicians.

"It's like Wonderland Avenue, beneath grey Birmingham skies," says singer/guitarist Jamie. "It inspires us."

Jamie and lead guitarist Zach had been playing together in bands for a decade, since meeting in high school. During a period when he was 'between abodes', Jamie found shelter sleeping over at a friend's flat, which is how he met Dijg, who also lived there. "I came home from a night out, went to put my coat away" remembers Dijg, "And there he was, asleep in the cupboard!"

The final piece in the puzzle, drummer Dan joined the group in early 2007, discovered dawdling in a drum-shop. Soon after, they chose their name, the product of a group brainstorm with a bunch of their mates in a nearby pub.

"First we decided upon the word 'Alamo," remembers Jamie. "It's a powerful word, with lots of different connotations. And 'My Alamo', well, it's like you're taking control of it, taking something negative and making something positive."

They're a group of many shared and divergent influences, but a shared focus on where they're going. Jamie was given a guitar for his thirteenth birthday, but had actually wanted a surfboard. Sulkily, he ignored it for a year, until he felt an urge to pick it up...

"I learned three chords, spent three years strumming them," he grins. "Then learned a fourth and started writing songs..."

They're a group inspired by - and dedicated to replicating - that buzz you get from hearing a truly great piece of music, that hairs-on-the-back-of-the-neck sensation. "Something that really connects with you," explains Zach. "I always felt I couldn't quite get enough of that buzz from other peoples' records, but playing my own music is a different experience, like getting that hit every single time."

That feeling's contagious - My Alamo's dynamic, dramatic molten-rock anthems will leave you buzzing again and again, a perfect cocktail of angular riffage, muscular noise, passages of grace and tenderness, and nagging, fire'n'sugar melodies.

There's no grand concept, no manifesto to be declared or mind-games being played: all My Alamo care about is their music, fashioning the best record that they can, and taking it to as many people as possible.

"Live shows are chaotic, an explosion of energy," offers Jamie. "For me, making music is all about creating something, and knowing someone else is going to hear it. I don't think I'd see the point of it, if people weren't going to hear it."

"At first, you play guitar for yourself," continues Zach, "But then you get the chance to play for other people, and you realise the inspirational part of making music is sharing what you've done with an audience. When kids start singing your words back at you... It's started already, regulars at our shows, and kids who've downloaded songs off the 'net, singing the chorus back "It all comes full circle."

For My Alamo, this is just the first step. They're savouring all the small victories along the way (like a storm-tossed trip across the Irish channel to play the Oxegen festival and an opening slot at download that's only bonded them closer, the ace video for '1994' filmed by a friend who made something stunning out of a non-existent budget, a national radio station playlisting their demo), not entirely sure where the journey is leading them, but not really caring, just sure of their desire to move forward.