Hotels Interview
The interview (phone) with Blake Madden from Seattle band Hotels is available to download now in full ( 23m45s, 70MB approx ) - we had played a short extract on this week's show. The conversation ranged over film music, casinos, manipulating mood in pop music, John Barry, being based in Seattle, playing bass while singing, surf guitar, and of course the excellent new Hotels album On the casino floor . These were my thoughts on that album, from a few weeks ago. Hotels - On the casino floor (Hidden Shoal) A concept album of sorts from the Seattle band with a madly ambitious premise, too good not to quote from the press blurb. The plot concerns a " secret agent, his former mentor and current arch-nemesis, and a nefarious prince's plan to destroy Earth during the grand opening of the universe's only outer space casino complex " (!). This would be good enough in itself but happily the musical chops match the scale of the ambition, with elements of surf-rock and po...