IN THE EVER-UPDATING CATAlogue of rock comparisons, some must be as feared as much as others are welcome.
It's hard to imagine how being crowned "the new Kaiser Chiefs", for example, might sit well with any band who intend to call themselves artists, despite the obvious commercial benefits. "The new Arcade Fire" is no bad thing, on the other hand. A
group which manages to emulate the musical scope of Win Butler and co in any way are surely on to a winner.
Edinburgh's Broken Records are one such band. "I've always loved bands who use big arrangements and make a lot of noise," says singer and guitarist Jamie Sutherland, "So the likes of Spiritualized and Mercury Rev influenced my writing in one way, but at the time we got together bands like Beirut and Arcade Fire were just coming through, a whole bunch of groups who made it acceptable to use violins and accordions in a rock setting. It convinced us we could find an audience and that we had something half decent to offer, and we just settled into it from there."
The genesis of Broken Records was fairly casual, initially basing itself on Sutherland, his violinist brother Rory and guitarist Ian Turnbull, whom Sutherland knew at university in St Andrews. Also studying in St Andrews were pianist Dave Smith and drummer Andy Keany, although they didn't meet the rest of the band until everyone lived in Edinburgh. This is also where bassist David "Gill" Fothergill and cellist Arne Kolb (the only non-Scot in the group, originally from Berlin) entered the fold.
"After university everyone gravitated towards Edinburgh," says Sutherland, "It's where we all met and where the nucleus of the band will always be. I've played in bands ever since I started university, though – I even dropped out of uni to follow music. So we played with the Fence Collective a couple of times up in Anstruther, a couple of fleeting encounters which involved Kenny Anderson (King Creosote) burning the CD by myself and Ian's first band, Moodswing Whiskey."
Moodswing Whiskey, of course, is a song by Jeff Buckley, and Sutherland laughingly admits this early group was "more than a little influenced" by the singer. By the time he returned to his home city of Edinburgh, though, he was more intrigued by the work of transatlantic folk rock star Conor Oberst, who had founded the Saddle Creek label on the basis that his alter-ego, Bright Eyes, would be its flagship artist. In this case, Broken Records the band would front Broken Records the label.
"I couldn't find a band for love nor money," says Sutherland, "so I wanted to record other bands' music for them, and then get them to back me on my own songs. I never really got past recording just myself, though, so Ian and I ended up meeting people as we slowly worked our way round the Edinburgh open mic scene.
"At one point it was myself, Rory, Ian and Arne doing this reverb-heavy acoustic set, kind of like the Dirty Three, until we supported (Edinburgh rockers] Degrassi at Bannerman's one night and realised they were so much louder than us. That's when we knew we needed a rhythm section."
Sutherland is conscious that Edinburgh isn't the most fashionable musical destination in the UK, but he also contends that the large amount of talent there is unfairly overlooked. Certainly, he doesn't think Broken Records would be the band they are without the city they live in.
"There hasn't been a better time to be in an Edinburgh band than right now," he says. "It's not a cool city, the spotlight isn't on it, but then we've never been a cool band. We just want to make quality music, something that's interesting and that we're happy doing, which isn't tied to wearing skinny jeans and being affiliated to a scene. There are a lot of great Glasgow bands, but it can feel very scenestery over there.
"The only thing about Edinburgh is the lack of confidence, and although some really good venues are coming through, bands still don't seem to realise they can just get out there and do it. But now there are bands like us, Found, Chutes, the Acute, all great Edinburgh bands. Eagleowl, they're another fantastic group who people don't necessarily make the effort to go and see. They don't realise they have all this great music on their doorstep, but I think these attitudes made us even more determined to get out there and play to people."
It's a time-honoured tale of hard work and practice paying off, then. The last year has seen Broken Records play the T-Break stage at T in the Park and the Best of T-Break night during the Edinburgh Fringe. Their debut single is being released on Young Turks, an imprint of XL Records, while their PR is being handled by the head of press at EMI, whose CV includes Radiohead and Coldplay.
"We keep getting told by these lawyers, 'You're a seven-piece band, you'll never make any money'," says Sutherland. "But we're all young, we have no major home commitments, and all we want to do is go and play music to new audiences. Whatever happens, we're getting to do that right now, which is quite a nice position to be in."
• Broken Records launch their single, If the News Makes You Sad, Don't Watch It at the Bongo Club, Edinburgh on 16 April, and support Sons and Daughters at the Raigmore, Inverness, 21 May, and Moshulu, Aberdeen, 22 May.
