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Mountain Men Anonymous are Adam (bass), John (drums), Lorna (guitars), Sam (guitars). Teflon Monkey is Rhodri ("spiritual guru"). They both feature on a split 7" on Big Scary Monsters as the first edition of the As The Duck Bit Back singles club. Drowned in sound caught up with them before their gig at the Flapper & Firkin in Birmingham as part of a mini tour together.
Before we got to the juicy questions that don't mention the M, G or N words (that's a lie sort of), we got straight to the adverts on what they would both be doing records wise after the split single.
**Mountain Men Anonymous will be releasing their debut album towards the end of March initially as a limited edition vinyl of 500 and then on CD afterwards. It will be released on independent label, Siberia records.
Then came the MMA hard sell...**
Mountain Men Anonymous: "5 tracks, 40 mins, loads of noise. Buy it!"
MMA: "What was that, what was that?", interrupted another member of MMA, "Don't buy it, it's absolute tosh. There's loads of wicked bands around, you don't want to buy crap like that."
Teflon Monkey's debut single was to be released on January on Super Fury Animals' Placid Casual label so we asked him when it would finally released.
Teflon Monkey: "It was supposed to be January, February, March and now it's going to be April. Soon, probably never!"
Then came the question on how where they live influenced their sound with Teflon Monkey coming from Bargoed in South Wales and the Mountain Men from Gloucestershire a halfway house between the Bristol and Cardiff scenes.
MMA: "I think it's shitest place in the world and second shitest place in the world"
MMA: "It is the shitest place in the world"
Teflon Monkey then told us about his home town and how it influenced him
TM: "only the fact that I hate it there. It's not culturally dead, it is dead"
(This then launched into an competition about who's town was worse which thankfully didn't end in tears!)
It was now the time for the big question about how bothered they were that they might be pigeonholed into convenient scenes by lazy journalists..
MMA: "what like we haven't already" interrupted one member of Mountain Men before I could finish the question.
....post rock like mogwai, godspeed for Mountain Men Anonymous and the new acoustic movement in the case of Teflon Monkey
MMA: "NAM, 10 years time you'll be able to say I was in that" , replies MMA to TM
TM: "I only do the stuff I do cause I haven't got a choice"
But does it bother you?
MMA: "absolutely, I hate it. it's mainly cause if someone hears an instrumental band they think oooh I've only heard of 2 instrumental bands about 20 secs before they think godspeed you black emperor or mogwai cause they've never heard of anything else in that sorta line of music"
TM: "they don't know anything so they just mention Nick Drake"
MMA: "some bits of our stuff do sound like GYBE and Mogwai but a lot sounds completely unlike it as well. We probably sound like bands that are in that genre as well but people only know 2 bands it seems, and that's godspeed and mogwai.". to which Mountain Men add, "It's become a bit of a joke now cause every time we get a review the word Godspeed is in it. We haven't got any cellos, we haven't got any violins, we haven't got any dead cats. That is the climate in journalism, it is like a marketing thing that half the people that write are told what they should write. It's like as soon as they hear its a post rock band or is instrumental or stuff they've already written down loads of words and they just have to listen to it to add a few extra bits"
As they are both on a split single together I asked them if they did another split single which band they would like to be on the flip side.
MMA: "not Teflon monkey"
MMA: "aphex twin, just to meet him. We want to do something different no point in doing a split single with like mogwai or something cause they'll just go oh its a rip off band. There just wouldn't be any point really you want to make different people hear your music that wouldn't otherwise be interested"
MMA: "alice deejay defiantly"
TM: "someone worse than me", is Teflon Monkey's choice.
MMA: "That's difficult. Would you prefer to do it with another folk artist?", ask MMA
TM: "no that's boring. godspeed."
It was now time in the interview for the serious questions. With today being Valentines Day I asked them all what their perfect love songs were.
MMA: "I think it should be a slipknot b-side"
MMA: "keep the light on"
MMA: "joy division - love will tear us apart"
MMA: "something depressing"
MMA: "fireworks"
MMA: "exit music"
TM: "I'll go for a Burt Jansch song."
MMA: "we've got like a whole album of love songs, I think I should do a compilation now. My fave depressing love songs, the equivalent of shine.
MMA: "I've got a CD writer, I could do it tomorrow, probably will actually."
The choice of Exit Music as one of the songs then leads to a discussion about Radiohead
MMA: "I think we should be called post rock cause we like radiohead and we're not allowed to"
TM: "I shouldn't be called folk cause I like Radiohead"
There was time for just one last serious question. Was there anything you love/hate about each other?
MMA: "we are just a mutual admiration society for each other."
MMA "He thinks we're shit and we think he's shit"
TM: "no you think you're shit, I think I'm shit but we like each other."
TM: "I love these people! this month split single next month orgy. that's my plan"
