Scroobius Pip Cockpit Leeds + Interview with Pip

I arrive at the Cockpit Leeds 10 minutes late for Scoobius Pip's sold out show and the fact that people are still making their way into the venue is a real testament to the headline act today. Scroobius Pip is in unfamiliar territory on his latest tour, he normally performs along with Dan Le Sac but as this is Pip's first solo tour... Dan isn't here.

I walk into the Cockpit, the heart of the music scene in Leeds, and instantly spot Scroobius Pip, he is stood behind his merch table, Why? On this tour he is doing his own merch, this gives fans a chance to meet the man they have payed to come and see. Pip is happy to sell T-Shirts, hats, albums and pose for photos and sign autographs, he is even letting people touch his famous beard. 

The show starts with a loud roar as the lights are dimmed, and American rapper B. Dolan brings his infectious and catchy hip hop to the stage, sporting a giant noose around his neck. Dolan's set lasted about 40 minutes, which is long for a support act, and he even invited fans on stage. One appeared on stage for a dance off with Dolan... which Dolan comfortably won. The second was a Justin Timberlake lookalike who Dolan invited on stage then proceeded  to rap about why Justin Timberlake is a terrible musician among other things. 

When Scroobius Pip arrived on stage, he started off by doing a short DJ set while wearing a green monster mask, before ripping the mask off and launching straight into Introdiction. I manage to look behind me during this opening song and see that the room is jam packed full. Impressive. To sell out The Cockpit is a very impressive feat. 

Pip's set included Let 'Em Come, Try Dying and fan favourite The Struggle in which he claims he is Johnny Depp and he kills people. Death of a Journalist was also included in Pip's set and before he started the song he mentioned a journalist he had spoke to earlier in the day... I think he was talking about me. The set also included the usual Millwall - Leeds United football banter. When Pip finally announced that he had finished and went off stage, nobody moved. Then a chant started, "We Want More, We Want More' and luckily we got more, Pip appeared back on stage to perform Astronaut and for the first time on the tour  Feel it with Natasha Fox. Pip then told the auidence he wanted to get back to the merch table and there were two possible ways of doing this. 1. The audience could part and Pip could simply walk through the middle OR 2. Pip could put some music on and stage drive into the crowd who would then carry him to the merch table... Number 2 won. It was a brilliant sight. 

Read below for a full interview I conducted before Pip's show.

JV - Hows the tour going so far?

SP - Its been going great, the crowd's have been really good, nice and busy with loads of energy, because this is the first tour of my new solo record and its with a live band I was unsure as to how crowds would be because there used to me been with Dan Le Sac and its a completely different feel but its been going down really well, so yeah I cant complain.

JV - Been a big Millwall fan, do you look forward to playing places like Leeds where's theres that big football rivalry?

SP -Yeah I always do, theres always a lot of banter on stage, at the last Leeds gig we did I chose my walk out music as the song that Millwall come out to and just played that when I came out but in all honestly most of the tours we do, Leeds and Manchester alternate as the best crowd each time and im not doing Manchester on this tour so I've got high hopes for Leeds but its always really good crowds that are really rowdy and I enjoy a bit of Millwall Leeds banter.

JV - How do you think Millwall will do this season?

SP - Hopefully we'll do really good, I went to the first game of the season and we looked really strong and then we got a couple of injuries, and we drew about nine games in a row, but now we have a couple of guys back, we've got Henson back and Jay Simpson on loan and we've scored seven goals in the last two games and only conceded one so yeah hopefully we have turned a corner and I think we should be aiming for the play off's again but obviously thats incredibly ambitious for a club of our size.

 

JV - You must be pleased with the reception that your solo album has had?

 SP - Yeah its gone down really well, I wasn't sure obviously how it would go down because its all quite different from what people are used to from me, so I made it with the goal of making sure I'm happy with it but fully expecting a lot of people to go "I don't know what this is" But yeah its been going down excellently which is great

JV - How was the writing process compared to when you write with Dan?

SP - Really similar, I mean me and Dan write quite separately anyway, we do it all over emails and things like that because he lives in Reading and I live in Essex. So yeah it was really similar, I need my own space to write, I'm not great at just sitting in a room and churning things out, its more of a gradual thing, but it was good to get a variation of people like Steve Mason who produced The Struggle, I went up and stayed with him in his cottage and we were in the studio a couple of days just working on stuff there which is something I've never done before so yeah it was good.

JV - In your lyrics to Intrdiction you say your known for writing about most things people wont discuss, do you find it easier to write about that sort of thing?

SP - I just find it all more interesting, its one of them weird ones, particularly when I was just starting out I wasn't a fan of just hearing my own voice, so I never just wanted to rap about me and I live in a small town in Essex and there isn't good stuff to be said about it, "I'm doing this, I just pop down to Tesco and thats it". So I find it more interesting to look at the darker sides of things I mean generally in our lives if were in a dark place or going through some bad times we get out of that dark place as quickly as possible which means writing about it is kind of more interesting because its not somewhere we try and dwell too much we try and get away from that stuff and get into the good things so writing about all the good parties like a lot of people do I don't find it as interesting because you strive to remain In those places so its interesting to explore the bits that we run away from.

JV - There's been a lot of criticism about the British music scene recently, what do you think of what we have here in the UK?

SP - I think were doing alright, I've never been that, I know this sounds horrible but I've never been that loyal to the British music scene, I think as-long as music is doing ok I'm happy with that, but yeah we have loads of good stuff coming out, there's loads of good underground stuff, like a band called Sound of Rum have been knocking around for a while and are just really kicking off they're really good but yeah I think there's loads of good stuff. Everybody gets two worried about the X Factor and stuff like that but that has nothing to do with the music scene, I think it's perfectly fine as a TV show and it does what it needs to do if you tune in you get emotionally involved, wether you hate it or love it but it isn't anything to do with the music industry its just a TV show. It just happens to have a single at the end of it.

"WE"VE ALWAYS HAD SHIT MUSIC AT CHRISTMAS"

JV - Have you never thought about going up against the X Factor like Rage Against The Machine did?

SP - Not really no, I loved the whole Rage Against The Machine against X Factor for christmas number 1, I thought that was great but I think it's purely because I'm a Rage Against The Machine fan. Everybody thinks Simon Cowell has stolen the christmas number 1, but the christmas number 1 has always been shit, its always somebody like Mr Blobby or Cliff Richard so I cant see what he has stolen. Everybody thinks there's always been great music at number one at christmas... There's alway been shit music at number one at christmas, its just he's made a brand out of it which again is fine but people get really disillusioned and think the x factor is a saviour but there has never been anything there to save, its just the christmas number one.

JV - Who are your musical influences?

SP - There are loads, I mean I grew up really loving Punk and then I got into more Hip-Hop and then I worked in a record shop so I got really into Jazz and Indie and all sorts of different stuff, its really varied I mean from Prince and Cyndi Lauper through to Rancid and Glassjaw and in the middle people like Sage Francis and Rakim so there's influence from everywhere and that comes across in the music because people struggle to put me and Dan and now this solo project into a bracket because its not really harder or dirtier then Hip-Hop but its not rally punk because there's rapping, so yeah its a mixture.

JV - So if you could go on tour with anybody in the history of music, who would you tour with?

SP - Oh wow, that's huge... I don't know, it's too hard, I mean there's tons of people around now who aren't huge but I'd love to tour with them, people like Sage Francis and P.O.S and tons of these people that I really love their music and I can relate to it. Me going on tour with Prince, it'd be brilliant but it wouldn't go down well, nobody wants to see me shouting over angry music when prince is about to come on and blow everyone's minds. I saw a band called Death Grips recently and they were amazing live and I try and think when touring, I think of bands I'd want to watch 6 nights a week and I've got B Dolan on this tour and I enjoy the show every night. So it's trying to think of who'd Id enjoy seeing all the time. There's just too many to chose from.

JV - Will there be another Dan Le Sac Vs Scroobius Pip album?

SP - Yeah were planning on starting work on the third record , it was going to be the end of this year but Dan's solo record has been pushed back to the new year so probably later in the new year we will start working on it, so yeah it should come at some point it just depends how long it takes.

JV - Will there be another Scoobius Pip solo album after that?

Sp - Yeah I've kind of got that in mind because I have really enjoyed working on this solo project and I've worked with a different producer on each track and there's a few I'd love to go back to a do a few more extensive work with. Me and Danny Lohner who produced Intordiction and Travis Barker [Blink 182]  have both spoken of doing more stuff together and I love the idea of giving that a go because there amazing artists. 

JV - Finally as a Film Student I feel inclined to ask you what your favourite film is?

SP - It always switches between Buffalo '66 and Harvey, I love them both, Saturday Night Fever is always in there, everyone thinks Saturday Night Fever is just like Grease but its about drugs and dark dark things happening and its just really good. I love film as much as music and there are loads to choose from but Buffalo '66 and Harvey are always fighting it out at the top. 

JV - Have you never thought about going into film?

SP - I'd love to at some point but I've never really had a plan for anything I've done so far. I've always kind of just staggered into things but I'd love to stagger that way at some point because I love it and I'd love to see how I could do. But who knows, here's hoping.  


 If anybody gets the chance to see Scroobius Pip live I advise you take the chance. Scroobius Pip at The Cockpit on Tuesday 1st November 2011 was simply one of the best nights of my life.