Name: Sly & the Family Drone
Members: James Allsopp (tenor saxophone), Kaz Buckland (drums, electronics ), Matt Cargill (electronics, voice, percussion), Ed Dudley (electronics, voice), Will Glaser (drums, electronics)
Interviewee: Matt Cargill
Nationality: British 
Current release: Sly & the Family Drone's new album With Love is out now.
Hometown Recommendation: Well, I live in London, so I'm, you know, extremely lucky to be here surrounded by amazing creative spaces. There's theatres and music venues, independent bookshops, record shops, as well as beautiful green spaces. I would say anytime you're in London, seek out your best underground music venue and go to a show, support your local art centre.  

If you enjoyed this Sly & the Family Drone interview and would like to know more about the band and their music, visit their official homepage. They are is also on Instagram, bandcamp, and Facebook. 



When it comes to experiencing the sensation of “energy” as as a listener, which albums, performances, and artists come to mind? 

Probably seeing Lightning Bolt for the first time. It blew my mind and changed everything. The sheer sort of physicality of their music, their literal energy, how they're both playing and how the crowd is sort of feeding off them. That intensity was something that I was so excited by. 



I think the first time I saw them was in 2006 – I travelled up to go and see them at the boat club in Nottingham with Lords and Blood Red Shoes. It was insane, fully incredible and then tried to see them as many times as possible when they came to England. 

Brian Chippendale's stuff as well, like Black Pus, was just that distilled on his own, putting out that intensity and energy and his creative artwork as well is endlessly inspiring.



There can be many different kinds of energy in art – soft, harsh, healing, aggressive, uplifting and many more. Which do you tend to feel drawn to most? 

I like a lot of abstract music, instrumental stuff, which has all of those things. 60s musique concrete stuff has all of those energies and feelings and intensities and can be very intense, very aggressive, strange, bizarre, atonal, - but also very beautiful. 

I have had a hard time explaining that listening to death metal calms me down. When you listen to a song with a particular energy, does it tend to fill you with the same energy – or are there “paradoxical” effects? 

I've had that experience as well in seeing Wolf Eyes for the first time, it was like a transcendental out of body experience. 

You've got very intense abstract noise coming at you, but it sort of put me in a state of Zen and calm and excitement and the same. 

[Read our Wolf Eyes interview]

When I've seen Sunn O))), particularly if it's in a seated venue – I remember seeing them in, I think maybe Barbican or Queen Elizabeth Hall and absolutely zoning out and being put in a total like sleep state, dropping off. 

But not because it was boring - It just felt this sort of overwhelming kind of wash. Maybe it's something to do with being in the womb or something.

In as far as it plays a role for the music you like listening to or making, what role do words and the voice of a vocalist play for the transmission of energy?

Well, for our stuff particularly, I use voice a lot but there aren't any written lyrics, I'm not really using words. Sometimes I am, but they're so buried within my feedback loops and layers of electronics. 

Nobody can understand those words. But you can still convey a narrative or a feeling, an expression, and get that energy across.

I love people like Audrey Chen and Phil Minton, of course, who can do so much with just their voice, but not through words. Cathy Berberian too- totally amazing, that can convey every emotion without using words

When it comes to experiencing the sensation of “energy” as as a creator, how would you describe the physical sensation of experiencing this energy? [Where do you feel it, do you have a visual sensation/representation, is there a sense of release or a build-up of tension etc …]

I particularly used to get it when I was playing on my own, just practising or rehearsing at home. 

If you're locked into what you might call a flow state of intense concentration, and you're just so in it, enjoying the sounds and letting them wash over you, it feels like a huge release of tension when that dissipates. And that's a wonderful feeling to experience. 

I think when Sly play, there's this sort of communal energy of tension and release when it builds to a crescendo and there's a whole room sort of going for it. That’s one of the greatest feelings

When it comes to composing / songwriting, are you finding that spontaneity and just a few takes tend to capture energy best? Or does honing a piece bring you closer to that goal? 

With Sly, particularly, we are mostly improvised band. All of our records are recorded live of us all playing together, capturing the moment in the room. 

It might organically change when we come to record them or, you know, they develop over time if its an idea we’ve been playing live. But generally it's the sound of us playing in the room and It's very hard to replicate that energy and excitement if you have to do multiple takes

For With Love, what kind of energy were you looking for? 

I lured the band into our rehearsal space under false pretences. I was like, you know, we've had a busy year of playing, we were feeling good and I just wanted to get everyone together and have a play. Then I decided that I would set up microphones and just press record.

And the sound of us playing together is what came out. There was minimal editing, so I’m not really arranging anything, just refining that captured sound. Then that became a record of six tracks and that's our new album.

What role do factors like volume, effects like distortion, amplification, and production in general for in terms of creating the energy you want?

The physicality of loud, amplified music is a massive part of what we do. 

If you're at the mercy of a sound tech who isn't sympathetic to what you're trying to do, they can just turn you down and it loses that energy. So we started bringing our own PA system and then our own amplifiers and using them as monitors. 

We’re physically playing in the room in the round, so people are close to us, the audience can feel the resonance of a drum or how a speaker moves and pushes that air - people can physically feel that. Then there's natural distortion of like a cranked speaker, but also different effects and changing the sound in real time. 

A lot of it comes down to wanting to feel that excitement and physicality from being close and it being loud.

In terms of energy, what changes when you're performing live on stage, with an audience present, compared to the recording stage? 

When we're playing live, it's all about the audience. I want them to be close and for them to feel that. 

There are times when the audience becomes part of it as well- drumming with us and joining in the cacophony

How does the presence of the audience and your interaction with it change the energy of the music and how would you describe the creative interaction with listeners during a gig? 

There have been times where there were barely any audience and the feedback you get from people in the room can really amplify the energy – we feed off that. When it feels good in the room, personally I feel it ramps up the performance. 

There are times when we are responding to each other and you can feel the audience's movement and their energy, the drums may go out into the crowd and theyre joining in and it feels organic. 

There have been times where I've sort of tried to make it happen but maybe the audience aren’t as enthusiastic or they're not getting the rhythm or it just hasn’t worked. 

It doesn’t happen every show but when it feels right, there’s this communal crescendo that feels really great.

What kind of feedback have you received from listeners or concert audiences in terms of the experience that your music and/or performances have had on them? 

It always feels nice to receive positive feedback from people, when they've enjoyed a show or if it's felt good. 

We played this wonderful gig in Aveiro in Portugal in a wonderful theatre, and the production was amazing - the sound and lights were brilliant, but there was just no one there. Lke, two people came to the show and they stayed for all of it and watched us and we still played the way we do generally, but they were very sweet and stayed and chatted a bit after.

Enjoying the music and energy together - that feels great. 

Would you say that you prefer to stay in control to be able to shape the energy or do you surrender to it and allow the music to take over? Who, ultimately has control during a live performance? 

As I alluded to before, back in the day, we might have been at the mercy of a sound tech who isn't sympathetic or thinks we're just a noise band or doesn't want to allow us to be loud. We always prefer to work with the sound techs so they understand what we're doing and they can contribute and help us. 

There have also been times where there have been power cuts or something has happened, so all the electrics have gone off and there's just the acoustic instruments. People in the crowd have joined in, or it's us just sax and drums and that can feel really powerful as well. And then somehow we've timed it perfectly and the power comes back on and we all plough in together. 

So there are elements like that, that, that are out of our control, but we can still shape the performance and, and apply it in almost any space. I love to be able to do that. I love playing outdoors, we’ve played some amazing festivals outdoors which can have a great impact on the performance and the vibe of the whole thing. 

There are elements that I like to be in control of, but it's ultimately us who shape the narrative of the gig and how we're playing together - the light and shade of it all or the quiet or loud parts and the dynamic interaction of all of us playing together.

The energy that music is able to generate can be extremely powerful. How, do you think, can artists make use of this energy to bring about change in the world? 

Of course music's incredibly powerful and can be used in many, many different ways. Sound can literally be a weapon, you know, literally sonic warfare. 

However in more of a positive aspect, I think people being a community and coming together to enjoy music is so powerful in itself and we're so lucky that we're able to do that and bring people together