Over the past three years, Halcyon Days have built themselves a reputation as possibly the most popular band on the Belfast club scene to operate within the Christian marketplace. Given the track record of that scene, one which brought us Split Level and Iain Archer among others, that is plenty to make some of us sit up and take notice. Last year, however, Halcyon Days made many more people raise themselves in their chairs with the release of their second full length album, Alkaline Times, an album which caused UK mainstream magazine MOJO to announce: "Only the homegrown hegemony of Halcyon Days's Alkaline Times (Kingfisher) responds [to the American indie invasion] with enough brazenly lunatic talent--like That Petrol Emotion wrestling XTC on steroids."
The phrase Alkaline Times can sum up so many images. I asked drummer/manager Stephen Orr what it meant to the band: "During the monumental 12 hour journey down to Eastbourne to record the album we talked about a lot of things and one of the things we discussed was what we should call the album. Alkaline Times was what we came up with. Actually I think it probably just sounded good, but as we discussed it, it began to take on more meaning. Alkaline is like a corrosive material that scratches away to see what's beneath. I think that's an analogy for what we're trying to do lyrically, scratch beneath the surface of Christianity and faith to see what's underneath, looking for what's real. Looking at problems--doubting, fear. I think it sums up the album; we tried to push beyond the level of superficial level. It‘s also a phrase that is to do with the times we're living in. The world in a way is quite bleak."
Pretty lofty aims, but the band are certainly heading in the right direction if this is their aim. Tracks like "European Tales" from their first album and "Rocket Fitter" from the newer release have a strong thread of literate songwriting which distinguish the band from many of their peers.
"Three years ago, 1995, Rick
[Johnston, vocals] went inter-railing around Europe with a friend and basically
"European Tales's" was the tale of his European summer. The experience
he had, 'coming home with a new way of thinking,' coming home changed as
a result of travelling. The end of the song's about the political and religious
situation in Northern Ireland," Orr told me. "Rick wrote the lyrics for
"Rocket Fitter" too. In Belfast there used to be a shipyard called Harland
and Wolff. It still exists but it's not quite as famous as it used to be--they
built the Titanic, it was the main shipbuilding place in the UK. Over the
years the shipbuilders spent some of their time building their own projects,
fixing motorbikes or whatever. "Rocket Fitter" is about a man who built
a rocket. The reason he
did it was so that he could
escape the world and I suppose it's an analogy for all the people who are
trying to escape all the crap that's in the world and all the crap that's
in their lives."
Returning for a while to more typical matters, I asked Stephen to tell me about the formation of the band.
"About four years ago, Rick, Gareth [Black, guitarist], and myself met at Queen's University, Belfast and we decided it'd be a good laugh to get together and play some music and write some songs. So we did that, we used to practice just the three of us, no bass player, getting together every Saturday. None of us had ever been in a proper band before and it was good craic [fun/laugh] and basically we thought we ought to play a gig. We had to bring someone in to play bass for us. A few months later we met Jonathan [Gibson] through some mutual friends so he came on board. He'd never played bass guitar before our first gig. That went well and we started from there, playing lots more gigs in the university area. Our key audience were students and we built up from there."
The band estimate that 70% of their mailing list is made up of Christians, probably because outside of Northern Ireland they play mainly Christian events and are distributed through Christian channels. Inside Northern Ireland things are so much smaller that they can distribute their albums independently, getting them into HMV and other mainstream stores, where they sell well. The fact that their main audience is still students is perhaps not surprising given the subject matter they choose to cover.
Some would say that given the opportunity to play to such a mixed audience Christians should use their platform to directly "preach the gospel," while others prefer to express themselves through their music and simply be honest about who they are. I wondered what Orr's reaction to this idea was: "I think that there is a place for all perspectives on this spectrum. Different non-Christians will respond differently to different approaches, and so if all Christians just do 'their thing', what they comfortable doing and what they feel God wants them to do then that should naturally cover all areas because we are all so different."
So where do Halcyon Days's lyrics stand within this spectrum? "Halcyon Days’s lyrics communicate powerful truths in a creative a interesting way. I can say this because I don't write any of them!" was Orr's response. It is obvious that as a band they are more concerned with exposing truth in any of its forms than simply pushing one narrow agenda, but the band does not go to any lengths to hide their faith.
Given the strength of Belfast's Christian music output, and Orr's role within it (as well as playing in Halcyon Days, he is also one of the Maroons and runs a management company, Badger Management), I wondered what artists Halcyon Days have worked with. "In the past we've played quite a bit with Disreali Gears. We're good mates with the Ronnie Magnets, we've played a good bit with the Booley House, we obviously know the Maroons well, we've all played with Iain Archer before. Gareth in particular has played on national television with him and Iain Archer has played with us."
"In the past we've supported Martyn Joseph, Eden Burning, Julie Miller, the Electrics and Split Level. Mostly though, we used to play a lot in the early days with the almost mythical post-punk groove based Petrol Fumes who are sadly now defunct. if you ever see any of their early stuff make sure you get it. We've also played with Juliet Turner and Frank Ferguson and have recently been asked to record a track with Barry Bynum (legendary American vocalist/guitarist from Liberation Suite) for his new album. We have also played with and are good friends with Brian Houston who produced our first album."
Quite a string of connections. In terms of influences, the band swings more towards Radiohead and U2, with vocalist Gareth also enjoying such artists as Bruce Springsteen and John Denver. Drawing lyrical influences from C. S. Lewis and G. K. Chesterton among others, this is one band who have a lot of promise before them. They'd love to tour the US, and are looking to record again in early 1999. Judging by Alkaline Times, that release could be one of next year's highlights.