Questions: Jamie Milton
Responses: Nestor Matthews

Sky Larkin have come out of a lengthy and at times troublesome last two months with fresh faces. Their second album, ‘Kaleide’ has finally hit its release date, to resounding applause. Beforehand however, the band had to deal with a notably early internet leak of the record. This event, and the band’s subsequent actions in dealing with it all, is the focus of our interview with the three piece’s drummer, Nestor Matthews
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You responded to the leaking of ‘Kaleide’ by offering fans a high-quality, 320kbps digital copy of the album if they parted their cash.
Firstly, were you expecting an early leak and had you been preparing this reaction for a while?

Nestor- We had no idea that it was going to leak when it did, Katie said around the time that leaks are like backhanded compliments in that obviously it’s not ideal in any way, but its still kind of flattering. The only reply we could think of was to ‘re-leak’ it on our terms, so that upon pre-ordering you get high quality mp3s rather than something that has been compressed and compressed again to make it as small as possible. If you want to hear our music now, we’d much rather you heard it as we intended it to sound.

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Secondly, is it something you’d consider offering before any future records in order to stunt the momentum of a leak?

N- I think it depends very much so on the nature of the record and the climate into which it would be released. The internet has become an essential tool in getting people in the know about future releases in a multitude of ways and streaming is certainly one of them. However, I think more impatient types would find a way of leaking music whether or not it’s streaming, maybe even using the stream itself, so a lot of it depends on whether streaming would blow the surprise of the record prematurely or intrigue people into investigating further.

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Do you agree with the idea that smaller bands have fewer options than the bigger ones when it comes to dealing with leaks?

N- I would think that bigger bands have more money and lawyers to throw at leaks than smaller ones, but the options of how to cope are more or less exactly the same. Proportionally the brevity of the leak would realistically grow akin to the size of the band meaning that it’s just as difficult to deal with no matter the size or financial clout. Either way you’re never going to completely quash a leak, once it’s out it’s out to stay, so it’s important to act quickly and decisively and in some ways it’s easier as a smaller operation to do that as there are less people to keep in the loop. 
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How did the recording process for the record pan out? Did you find it long and tiresome or was it a quickie?
N- I can’t really put any sort of timescale on it, all I know is that we were there and it was a very saturated and intense experience. Obviously it was an amazing opportunity and great fun too, but for the most part the songs hadn’t been thoroughly set in stone through being played live (more so on the first record) and as a result they still had room to evolve in the studio which meant we were constantly on our creative toes rather than re-treading familiar and/or safe territory. Also, during our time over in Seattle we were only ever really in one of two places; Bog Roll Studios (John Goodmanson’s studio where he kindly let us rest our heads) or at London Bridge Studio where we did the vast majority of the recording, so time often seemed to race by or stand completely still!
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How would you compare ‘Kaleide’ sound-wise to your debut?
N- As I mentioned above, the songs on Kaleide hadn’t been fully formed and ironed out for the convenience of playing live so there was still a lot of potential in where they could go; I think you can hear that potential and the enthusiasm for experimenting with different directions on the record. Our debut album (as are most debuts) is essentially a collection of songs written before we knew they would one day become an album, whereas we wrote the tracks on Kaleide as a deliberate collection of songs which I feel gives the songs themselves and the album as a whole a sense of grounding that the first might have lacked somewhat. Also the year and bit of touring after the first record meant that we all became much more confident musically as a band and independently, allowing us to push and pull at the boundaries we set on the the first album. Rather than hammering out songs that we could play in our sleep, the freedom and confidence meant that we could start recording a track not fully knowing where it might end up and I think that subconscious dialogue and its effects are a noticeable difference between the two records.
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With a month-long gap between album release and tour, how are you expecting the new songs to go down with crowds across the UK?
N- I think people are going to be pleasantly surprised. As I sort of alluded to before, due to the much more creative recording process, I think we’re quite keen not to categorise these songs into ‘playable live’ and ‘not playable live’, so with a bit of practice and a bit of luck we’ll hopefully make interesting use of the dynamic breadth on the record which I’m rather excited about, so I hope that rubs off on people watching and listening. Also, some of the songs are still to find their live feet so I’m really looking forward to seeing what happens there!
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What’s been your record of the year so far?
N- It’s only seven tracks long (what constitutes an album?) but ‘A Small Turn of Human Kindness’ by Harvey Milk still finds new ways to floor me even though I’ve already listened through it more times than is probably healthy!
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And lastly, do you have a favourite song on ‘Kaleide’?
N- I really like playing Landlocked at the moment, I keep finding new bits and pieces within the song that I haven’t noticed before, but I think I’ll always have a soft spot for Guitars and Antarctica too.
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