interview

The Quietus interview the Wolfe brothers about the film "Catch Me Daddy" [excerpt]

OK, let's talk about the music choices. For me, I felt there was a great juxtaposition between what different players in the film were listening to at any given time.

Daniel [Wolfe]: Basically we wrote backstory for all the characters and then we started to write playlists for all the characters. We just let the lads in the car play whatever they want. Me and my brother like a lot of hip-hop and particularly Southern rap. Alley Boy we were mad for at the time. We played it to the lads and they liked it. What's interesting about Alley Boy is it's nihilistic and in that track in particular, there's a nihilism to it that they've got nothing to live for. I just thought there was something interesting in the appropriation of Atlanta rap to Yorkshire. Sameena's playlist was eclectic. She walked into the casting listening to Nikki Minaj, so we know she liked her. Connor is a blues man.

Matthew [Wolfe a.k.a. Watson]: There was a blurring here because Connor [McCarron] who played Aaron was massively into music - Tim Buckley, The Doors, Nirvana. He's a dreamer, an outsider, so that stuff captured that feeling.

The score is spare and effective, can you tell me more about the process of composing it?

Matthew: Yes, I worked with Daniel Thomas Freeman on the score. I'd heard his album The Beauty Of Doubting Yourself and found it very moving. It's a dark album but with strong emotion. Very visual, often conjuring up primal landscapes. I thought we could create something together that would really work in the world of Catch Me Daddy. We wanted the music to feel like it comes from the landscapes. We didn't want recognisable sounds that would pull people out of the story. We used stripped back instrumentation, mainly consisting of piano, percussion, and oscillators, mashed beyond recognition to become a breathing soundscape. The score is quite spare for the beginning part of the film, gradually creeping in as the story progresses. Then much more full on in the second half to mirror Aaron and Laila's descent into darkness as the chaos breaks loose. There was a similar approach to the camera work - starting controlled and breaking down to become more chaotic as we enter night. The opening moments of High Plains Drifter were definitely an inspiration for the score. Also Popol Vuh's score for Aguirre, the Wrath of God, Carmine and Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now soundtrack, and English Tudor choral music.

What role did music play in your life growing up?

Matthew: My dad used to play trumpet, his band backed a couple of soul singers when they came to England in the '70s - Fontella Bass and Clarence Frogman Henry. Music was always around. John Martyn, Van Morrison and Art Pepper would be on loop in my dad's car. I went to music school and after that started gigging, so music's been a big part of my life. Until his death in 2009 I'd go religiously to John Martyn's gigs - some of the best moments of my life. More recently Toumani Diabate is someone that blows my head off live. Other gigs that have really inspired me - seeing the whole of Boot Camp Clik together, also Brand Nubian, and then EPMD at Notting Hill Carnival when I was young.


Saturday 28 February 2015