MuzicNotez: First off, it’s an honor to be doing this interview with you, thanks for taking the time to sit down with us.
Introduce yourselves, what are your names and rolls in the band?
Sharp Practise: Nigel Clothier (vocals and keyboards), Simon Foley (guitars), Ryan Lawson (bass) and Michael Elwood (drums).
MuzicNotez: How did you meet and form up? How long have you been together?
Sharp Practise: The current line-up of Sharp Practise got together in 2009 during the recording of Banging the Rocks, our third studio album.
MuzicNotez: How did you come up with the name Sharp Practise?
Sharp Practise: We got our name from the first record company we worked with. Nigel had sent them some demos on which he had played all the instruments himself. They assumed they’d heard a band and wanted to sign that band. When Nigel confessed to this piece of “sharp practice” there was only one thing the band could ever be called.
MuzicNotez: Who were your musical influences, idols, or bands growing up that have helped mold you into the band you are today? Or helped mold the music that you create?
Anyone playing intelligent, adult oriented rock music. Special mentions for Heart, Magnum, Rush and Def Leppard.
MuzicNotez: What’s the greatest concert you’ve ever been to or performed?
Sharp Practise: We had a great night in Glasgow during our most recent UK tour. Two good, theatrical support acts, a raucous crowd (some in fancy dress) and a wonderful reaction to our music, especially the new songs, from a diverse audience. For us, it couldn’t have been any better.
MuzicNotez: What’s the ultimate goal you want your music to achieve, or for you to achieve in your career as a musician? Any particular message you wish to send?
Sharp Practise: We just want to play as well as we can, keep improving our technique, get tighter, entertain people and give them something to think about. We’ve no political statement to make, we just want to be part of the soundtrack to people’s lives.
MuzicNotez: You recently released your latest album ‘Steal With Pride‘. How does this album differ from your previous releases?
Sharp Practise: It’s far more English than our previous albums, not just in the phrasing of the lyrics but also in the sound. It looks back far more to the great British rock acts of the ’70s, like The Who, Free and The Small Faces, which we suppose is our musical heritage as we are a band from the UK.
MuzicNotez: You have received numerous awards over the years, how does it feel to have your music validated like that?
Sharp Practise: It certainly helps your confidence to know that there are people out there who appreciate what you’re doing. It encourages you to keep going in this competitive business and makes up for the frequent knock backs you get. It’s also very humbling to win an award when you’ve seen the quality of the other nominees and think “they’re very good, we’ve got no chance here!”
MuzicNotez: What else are you working on? What can we expect to see and hear from you in the future?
Sharp Practise: We’ve just started working on writing the next album. The lyrics are pretty much there, the music is on the drawing board and coming together. We think the new record will be less eclectic than our previous ones and more focused on a single style.
MuzicNotez: Anything else you wish to say about yourself or your music? Any message for your fans?
Sharp Practise: We encourage people to make music and to keep working on it. Even if it’s not popular enough to make it your living music is still a great thing to take with you through life – it takes you to places and puts you in touch with people from all around the world that you’d never meet other than through a shared interest in music.