Blackheart Orchestra are billed as officially the world’s smallest orchestra, they comprise of just Chrissy Mostyn and Rick Pilkington, who play 13 instruments between them, although not all of them at the same time. With three albums released under the original Blackheart name and with five more as The Blackheart Orchestra their back catalogue is full of music that is both beautiful and eclectic. With the release of their last album, Hotel Utopia, they seem to have at long last started to receive more of the recognition and appreciation that they truly deserve.
On behalf of The Progressive Aspect and myself, thank you for both for giving us your time for this interview.
Darren: Firstly I’m always been interested in the origins of names of bands, so where did the Blackheart name originate come from?
Rick: I think it was all your fault.
Chrissy: It was.
Rick: We were very much like an acoustic duo in the beginning, so it was kind of it being just me playing one guitar and Chrissy who was basically one voice with some harmony from me.
Chrissy: But it was very, very simple acoustic music. I don’t know where the name come from, I really don’t. But it kind of fits more now we’ve added the orchestra concept because even though some of the songs might be dressed up a little bit, it’s fairly songs based.
Rick: So all our songs are kind of dark. But I hope not too dark..
Chrissy: Darkness too, the way we think musically, and I think genres we love. We are not a sunshine band so I think that’s kind of where it came from.
Darren: You play many instruments during your concerts, but which were the first instruments you started off learning to play when you first began to be musicians?
Rick: It was guitar for me but I didn’t really enjoy the lessons very much. It was too mathematical for me learning scales and theory, stuff like that. I immediately knew I didn’t want to do that kind of music. Then I discovered the Cream album Disraeli Gears and that was what truly persuaded me to play guitar.
Chrissy: Guitar for me too but I like all of these rules. But also you’re like, I don’t want rules, I just wanna write a song. Well, that’s what I was like, so I think we then went on to self-teach ourselves. I probably now prefer piano and keyboards to guitar. But guitar was the first. Now we just buy anything and try and play it, don’t we?
Rick: Yeah, the orchestra is just a concept. The ‘Orchestra’ is the instrument, not us. We are just the conductors who have loads of instruments, rather than just batons.
Chrissy: But there’s some different kind of creative process in it, taking an instrument that you’re not familiar with, or not particularly wonderful with, and then making music with that instrument. It gives you an extra kind of clarity and focus somehow in just dealing with the ability that is lacking.
Darren: Are you planning to learn more instruments and the repertoire? And, if so, what do you wish that you could play?
Chrissy: Cello for me, it definitely would be cello, or something like a double bass.
Rick: I’d love to be a drummer. I always wanted to be a real drummer, that that would be my fantasy fulfilled. We would need a really big roof rack 🙂 or we could do with a really big portable stage, you know, like one of those at music festivals, wheel them on stage then wheel them off again.
Darren: You have been taken to the hearts of the prog community, but what are your musical roots, and what gave you the original inspiration to be musicians?
Chrissy: I used to sing when I was a little kid, before I even knew anything else. I just felt like that was always what I wanted to do, and be. I don’t even know where that came from. We have very different influences. I love lots of kind of Icelandic and Scandinavian types of music and minimalist classical and electronica. I guess a lot of music I listen to doesn’t even have vocals. I love lots of instrumental music. You (Rick) probably have more of a prog and rock background.
Rick: Yeah, definitely a rock background, it was always a great thing at school. I was very lucky to be with a group of other music loving people when we were all growing up in our early teens. Bands from the 70s, they made me just want to be in a band like those great old rock legends and we had a band of school. And we also got drunk a lot.
Darren: Why do you think the proggers love you so much?
Chrissy: It’s an interesting question. We’re not really able to answer that question.
Rick: We’ve no idea why they like us but I guess if we’re going with progress in progressive in the true sense of the word. I think lots of people who like Prog are quite purist with it. But I guess also a lot of prog lovers are just music lovers, especially if it’s a little bit different. And it is not totally mainstream. You know, it is a style.
Or maybe it’s an attitude? I think it was. I think it started off as an attitude. To break free from traditional Blues orientated rock music or pop music. We wanted to break free from that. We didn’t want to sound like the old prog bands at all. You know that their music will be treasured forever. We don’t need to replicate that and try and sound like them.
Chrissy: But we do want to be progressive and progress music and do different things sound different; just a very different approach to songs that we’re trying to create.
Rick: Almost a kind of rebellious nature in the way we want to create what we do. So I don’t even think we think that hard about it.
Chrissy: I think it’s just we’ve ended up with this collection of instruments that isn’t a traditional band format and we paint with a few different instrument, kind of following our instincts and our hearts and our souls.
Rick: We’ve bought lots of instruments that we’ve just fallen in love with and we enjoy the kind of. It’s like having lots of toys.
Chrissy: Absolutely. I think we’ve got to keep our minds really as open as we possibly can and then let music out and let it be big.
Darren: Your latest single, Bloodlines, has just been released. What’s it about? How would you describe the musical vibe?
Chrissy: Well, it’s happy and sad and miserable. All these things mixed together.
I guess it’s like an acoustic rock truck. It’s about all those things that get passed along, our lineage and family histories. So not just how we look with our blue eyes or curly hair but all of the things that get passed along, like intergenerational trauma, things that have happened in our history, that impacts our nervous system and our immune system and everything now – how genetics and epigenetics get turned on and off.
Rick: It’s about how depression and sadness can show up for us.
Chrissy: That’s a hell of a lot of themes in our bloodlines. But more importantly is how the listeners interpret the songs. We might have written it with one idea but they might give it their own interpretation, how that song touches them.
Rick: We’re almost offering a meal for the listener to consume and enjoy. Nutritionally what it gives to them.
Chrissy: It has different meanings for different people, and I think that’s lovely.
Songs can have lives of their own once they leave us. The person who writes a song has no idea what affect those songs will have on others and how important they are to their souls.
Yeah, it’s great stuff music, isn’t it?
Rick: I think I should have got a psychiatrist chair out. We should be paying for this.
Darren: Your latest tour is on until early November, that must be grilling. What’s your view on touring, a joy or do you find it a necessary evil?
Chrissy: Oh, we enjoy it.
Rick: The only things that are evil are the motorways. We usually end up getting stuck in traffic.
Chrissy: There’s parts of touring which are really hard and really gruelling, but we love it and we do it because of love, not because we have to do it. We love our fans and we reconnect with the music and it’s such an important part of our music.
Rick: I must admit some of the elements of touring are very tiring. Stage setting up, can take up to four hours and packing it all away, afterwards can be another two. And then start driving home.
Chrissy: Sometimes we ask ourselves, do we really want to keep doing this? But of course we do.
Darren: What’s stuck in your mind when you’ve been touring? Things that have happened still make you laugh now?
Rick: Peacocks in Australia.
Chrissy: Yes, we were playing a gig in Australia at a venue called The Acoustic Peacock and every single time I sang a high note, all the peacocks joined in. At first I was like, what is it? And then we realised that it was the peacocks in the yard
Rick: We did some really weird things. We played in Orkney on a tiny little island called Hoy, there are 61 people and one tree on the island. All 61 turned up to our concert. Another, less funny time, was when we walked on stage, to play the first number and the mixing desk, blew up. That was interesting.
Chrissy: That is one of the most expensive pieces of kit, but our fans bought us a new mixing desk. Our fans are amazing like that.
Darren: From the Kinks to The Police and even Oasis, many bands have been notorious for getting on each other’s nerves. With the long hours on the road with little or no personal space. Do you get on each other’s nerves?
Rick: Oh, we annoy each other terribly, don’t we?
Chrissy: But it’s useful sometimes because we were driving back from Edinburgh the other night and Rick starts falling asleep so I usually start an argument which is pretty easy and that keeps him awake.
Rick: If in doubt, talk about politics and we both get angry.
Chrissy: We’re close enough that we can argue every day and still be OK.
Darren: Your concerts are full of humorous asides to the audience about some of your songs and you talk about some being musically difficult while others are not, and also how one of you hates a song but it is played because the other loves it. Is that real or is that just part of the act?
Rick: No act at all.
Chrissy: We try to be spontaneous because we just walk on stage with a set list on the floor that doesn’t always get played exactly as it is written.
Rick: We just try to be ourselves on stage and we do take the p*** out of each other in everyday life, it’s part of our normal personalities.
Chrissy: You would find us here in my office exactly the same as you would find us on stage. I don’t think we know how to put on an act.
Rick: The genuine approach is always the best, it is all sincerity.
Darren: Many bands struggle to get people to attend their concerts while your audience fan base is growing all the time. What is your view on the current music scene in attendance numbers for smaller bands and venues?
Rick: The really high prices of big artists really p***** me off because not many people have got a lot of money so if they’re going to go see them, they’re really taking it away from grassroots venues. You could go and see 20 bands instead of one greedy act. In some instances I just feel like it’s gone a little bit crazy. The extremes are huge. I can understand that some of these bands that are coming to the end of their careers and it’s going to be the last chance you’re ever going to get to see that favourite band of yours. But once you’ve paid your £200 to go it leaves a big hole that you can’t then go and see smaller bands like us.
Chrissy: Yes, they’ve blown their budget on one show.
Rick: It’s so difficult to make money out of music, isn’t it? Venues, promoters, bands – no one’s really making any money out of it.
As time has run out we must come to an end so thank you again Chrissy and Rick. It’s been wonderful talking with you.
LINKS:
The Blackheart Orchestra – Website | Facebook | Bandcamp | YouTube | X | Instagram