Glasgow indie veteran Stuart Dougan (formerly Smash Williams, French Wives) returns on his own terms as The Quilter. Inspiring the same magnitude and euphoric nostalgia as Phoenix or Arcade Fire, new release ‘Bolt The Door’ EP is a driving collection of timeless indie-pop. DMCWORLD grab a world exclusive with the main man…
Hello Stuart! Welcome to DMCWORLD, great to have you with us. Where in the world can we find you today?
Hello DMCWORLD – thanks for having me! You can find me in Glasgow, Scotland on a fairy miserable, grey and windy evening.
What is the music scene like there? Has it started to recover from the coronavirus pandemic?
The music scene in Scotland in general and Glasgow more specifically is fantastic though obviously like most, it has had to endure great hardship recently with the pandemic. Glasgow has always had a really vibrant and supportive community for emerging artists and the city is full of really passionate people so I have no doubt it’s going to bounce back as we start to exit lockdown and hopefully get back to normal life soon. It’s a notoriously resilient country and there’s plenty of examples of artists who have adapted and thrived amongst the challenges of the pandemic admirably with live streams or recorded shows (Twilight Sad, Carla J. Easton, Honeyblood for example) and there’s still been success stories like Mogwai securing their first number one album. I think it’ll be exciting to see what folk have been working on with the extra time they’ve had and can’t wait until we can all get back to playing and attending shows again!
Did you grow up there? Do you think this has effected your music?
I did grow up in Glasgow and it has definitely had a positive effect on the music I make. There’s such a rich history of bands from Glasgow that are driven by melody which is something I feel like I’ve been immersed in and has hopefully rubbed off on me. That sense of community has been really important too, whether it’s in the venues and bars that people congregate, being exposed to so many different bands, or seeing people achieve things on an international scale from small local roots. There’s plenty to draw inspiration from!
What’s the story behind your artist name ‘The Quilter’?
The Quilter is a basically a silly in joke with my friend, Guy. We shared a flat and the morning after a party we’d had, I walked into his room covered head to toe in a duvet and half asleep (and definitely still drunk) he said ‘have you come to vanquish me quilter?’. The joke at the time being that I was some sort of super villain that had the power to control duvets (…you probably had to be there!). Long story short, he had me saved as ‘The Quilter’ in his phone for years and it felt unique enough to work as a musical moniker!
What’s the idea behind the music video for “the long weekend”?
The song is all about feeling isolated and wanting to reconnect with people, something I’m sure we can all relate to after the last year. It’s basically a straight forward representation of ‘we can do things on our own but it’s always better if we do them together’. It was supposed to be a really simple shoot and edit as we didn’t have much time but the footage we shot got corrupted so they only way to salvage it was by taking (literally) thousands of screenshots and doing stop motion animation instead. It was torturously laborious and I wouldn’t be in a hurry to to do it again, but it’s probably turned out much better for it so can’t be too mad.
Your EP ‘Bolt The Door’ comes out June 4 – what are the influences behind the project – thematically and musically?
The songs on the EP are actually written and recorded across quite a long time, some during the pandemic but the majority beforehand. They tend to focus on some challenging situations I endured but they don’t tend to wallow. Even though they deal with difficult periods to time, I think they’re songs packed with hope and defiance. I think I’ve been guilty with previous projects of subconsciously trying to write in a way that would appeal to certain people and with The Quilter I just literally make music that I enjoy and I feel like I’ve really achieved that with these songs.
What artists are on your radar at the moment?
I’m quite bad for keeping up with new music which is incredibly hypocritical as someone who spends a lot of time trying to punt his own new music! I’m also quite bad for getting into bands long after they were new and exciting but it sometimes presents nice moments of serendipity. I got really into Wolf Alice recently and their new record it out the same day as my EP so I’m looking forward to that!
Where is the best place to keep up with you?
Either twitter or instagram, both of which are @the_quilter
Just to round things off, once the EP is out, can we expect anything else from you in 2021?
Absolutely. I’ve had some frustrating experiences in bands over the years where some really good work has gone unreleased through one reason or another so my intention with The Quilter is to be prolific and there’s plenty planned for this year after ‘Bolt The Door’ so watch this space!
*****
D I S C O V E R:
