Sitting down for a chat with Neil Halstead, lead vocalist for Mojave 3, is an interesting experience. In town for a show at Lee’s Palace last week, the charming singer with shaggy blond hair immediately starts talking about how music has been in his life from a young age. “My father was an electrician, but he taught piano to a bunch of the local kids,” he explains. “He taught me to play piano a bit when I was growing up. And then when I was 11 I picked up a couple of guitars. Didn’t get very far, though.” Halstead has clearly come a long way since that time. Mojave 3 has been going strong for eight years now, and the UK quintet recently released their fourth album, Spoon and Rafter.
Halstead and bandmates Rachel Goswell and Ian McCutcheon started off in a band called Slowdive on famed London imprint Creation Records. They eventually split up, and Halstead explains matter-of-factly, “We sort of carried on and formed Mojave. The rest of the guys were just basic friends who kind of helped out with the record, went on tour and just sort of became part of the band.” Those guys would be latest additions Alan Forrester and Simon Rowe.
When asked about the title of the new album, it’s hard to tell whether Halstead is being serious or just joking around. He says of the ‘Spoon’ part, “‘Spoon’ is kind of an old English expression which means ‘girlishly amorous’.” As for the word ‘Rafter’ being added on: “We just liked the idea of people who travel exclusively by raft.”
Mojave 3 has long been a favourite of rock critics and the indie kids who lap up the latest sounds from across the pond, but Halstead says the band doesn’t feel pressure for their albums to do well. “Not at all. We make records the way we want to make them,” he explains simply.
Spoon and Rafter took nearly a year to make, largely because most of the band members have other commitments. “Mojave isn’t a full-time thing for any of us,” Halstead says. “Everyone keeps busy and we try and get together to do Mojave stuff when we can.” Halstead has been very successful as a solo artist (with last year’s Sleeping on Roads album) and bandmate Goswell is set to release her own solo work this year. Taking time with the recording process allowed the band a unique experience. “It became quite a reflective experience because every time we came back to it, we’d think, ‘Oh, okay, let’s change this or do this differently.’ It was purely a matter of finding the time to do it,” Halstead notes.
Mojave 3 are often classified as a folk-rock band, and compared to acts like Wilco, Nick Drake and Belle and Sebastian. Halstead describes his band’s sound as being very eclectic with a “pop edge.” Halstead goes on to explain that the band, despite all its success, tends to be uncertain of what public response to their music will be. “I don’t know whether what we do is something the majority of people are going to be into. A lot of people just say, ‘It’s too slow for me. I can’t dance to it.'”
Recent critical and fan response is enough to prove that people are indeed into the warm, spacey Mojave 3 sound. But Halstead is pretty sanguine about the band’s place in the realm of popular music: “I don’t know that we are that successful, actually.” It could be the fact that the band is not as well known in North America as in Europe, though from their packed Lee’s show, it’s clear the band has more than a few devotees here in Toronto. Halstead notes that Spoon and Rafter has had rave reviews in countries such as Germany, France and England, so perhaps this album could be the band’s answer to fame in North America.
“You make records and they go out there. It’s kind of like sending your children off into the world,” he explains. “It’s really hard. You’re proud of what you do. We never have a big kind of career plan about these things.” He looks at the ceiling and adds playfully, “It’s in the hands of the music gods.”
Whether or not Mojave 3 will be putting out more albums in the future, Halstead is again very to-the-point, only saying, “Yeah.” As for more solo stuff from Halstead: “Yeah, possibly,” adding, “I don’t know what kind of record it would be. It’s always fun to do something different and work with different people.” Whether he’s playing with Mojave 3 or as a solo act, it’s obvious that Halstead is committed to making records-because, he quips, “I’m not much good at anything else.”
