On The Radar #99 Mind-Reading Space Lasers

BROTHERS Dann and Adam Hignell have created their own take on Band Aid’s classic Do They Know It’s Christmas? to raise cash for The Multiple Sclerosis Society’s Christmas Appeal.

The pair, who write the blog Curious Music For Curious People, were inspired to raise cash for the charity having seen the work it has done to help those with the condition – which includes their father, former rugby player and BBC commentator Alistair Hignell.

Below Dann talks about the genesis of the project, and their plans for the future.

“Strangely, aside from a band in our teens, we haven't done any other music together, despite being quite active musicians all our lives. I guess as years have gone by we've both expanded our tastes. About a year ago we realised we shared a love for spacey, disco-tinged electronic music. We've both got nice synthesizers and music production tools and really enjoyed messing about in the studio together. We weren't sure if it was a joke or not but it sounded good so we decided to pursue it!

“We've historically had pretty different tastes, which is perhaps why we didn't work together for so long. Adam is a relatively popular funk/soul/disco artist under the name of Ewan Hoozami while I am a PhD Music Composition student and composer known as Distant Animals with a passion for sound art and experimental music. The main idea we had when forming the band was to try and find any crossovers between these two very different areas.

“We've played a grand total of two gigs, under this moniker. Our first was last Christmas at the Western. It was really enthusiastically received and I think the main reason we decided to start taking the band seriously. The less said about the second gig the better... we wore masks that we couldn't really see out of and had no idea what we were doing at any point!

“We feel we have something unusual - a kind of theatrical take on electronic music. Making noises with synthesizers is inherently silly and we try and have fun with it. At Christmas last year, Band Aid 30 was happening - and that song was EVERYWHERE. We were madly organising a space-themed Christmas show, and the idea just came to us - Do They Know It’s Christmas… In Space? We played it for the first time and had the whole pub singing along, which made us wonder if we could perhaps expand the idea to raise some money for charity.

“We've been shamefully inactive as far as fundraising since our Dad was diagnosed. We've done a few half marathons but we both feel we could do more, so we threw everything into this! I can't really stress enough how much time and effort went into it - we played, wrote, arranged and produced the whole track, got family and friends to sing with us as the choir and created the video from scratch. It involved a lot of sleepless nights! So far we've raised £500, which is incredible, but only halfway to our goal. We really want to reach £1,000 by Christmas.

“Dad gets amazing support from a host of MS charities both local and national. We really liked the MS Society's Christmas Appeal, as it is all about raising funds for Myelin Research, which most people agree is the most likely path to curing the horrid disease.

“We shot the video in my living room using green screen, and literally all the £125 went on props and costume, most picked up from local charity shops. We were consciously going for a very low budget, Red Dwarf style vibe, using everyday items creatively and just trying to have fun with it. It was fortunate that a lot of our synthesizers made for excellent spaceship controls. And never underestimate the power of kitchen foil.

“The Mind-Reading Space Lasers are here to stay! However, this Christmas campaign is obviously a whimsical and light-hearted affair, certainly compared to our usual musical output. We'll be releasing some more music over the next few months that will probably appeal more to our core audience: middle-aged synthesizer geeks with beards.

“Distant Animals is ongoing, I have recently finished a big work involving more than 30 sound-art street performance across the city centre.

“Adam’s project Ewan Hoozami has been tirelessly working the national (and occasionally international) gig and festival circuit for a while now, and has had a few songs pop up on adverts recently too. One of the similarities between us is we both have a natural suspicion of genre and a complete inability to sit still, musically-speaking, so anyone paying attention will hear a huge range of sounds from the Hignell clan next year!”

Catch the Mind-Reading Space Lasers at Green Door Store, in Trafalgar Arches on Saturday, February 6 as part of a Brighton Noise all-dayer, also featuring The Fiction Aisle, Soft Walls, Lutine and more.

Find out more:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOgN4AzovOU&feature=youtu.be

themindreadingspacelasers.bandcamp.com/

www.facebook.com/the.mind.reading.space.lasers

twitter.com/MRSL_01