Interview; Alex Robertson (guitarist for Rory Wynne)

Rory Wynne is a Stockport-based musician best known for his infectiously catchy indie-pop records. Having been writing his own music since the age of 11, Rory has gone from strength to strength as an artist, with some feats including supporting the likes of Blossoms and The Coral, as well as releasing his self-produced biggest track to date, Getting Over You, in February this year. I had a chance to chat with Rory's guitarist and co-writer, Alex Robertson, about writing music, working with Rory and what we can expect from their upcoming gigs.

Hi Alex. Can you start by telling us a little bit about yourself and your roles within the band?

Of course. I’m Alex, guitarist for Rory Wynne, I’m from Manchester, and I help co-write some of the songs with Rory as well as perform live with him and the rest of the band.

Which musicians/bands inspired you to start playing guitar?

Well I actually started by playing a lot of metal and rock tunes when I was younger because that was the kind of stuff my friends and I were listening to; bands like Metallica, AC/DC, as well as guys like Megadeth and Pantera too. The guitarist that just really made me want to pick up the instrument and play was Dimebag Darrell from Pantera, he was just so incredible - I mean he could shred like no one I’d ever seen but he also had this amazing groove and melody to his playing. I just knew when I heard the first Pantera record that I wasn’t gonna stop 'til I could play like that. Slash, Adrian Smith from Iron Maiden, and Joe Bonamassa are big influences as well. It’s probably because of those guys that I love the Les Paul style of guitar so much. More recently my music taste has mellowed a bit. I’m a huge Jimi Hendrix fan, and I’m really starting to explore some more Jazz-style playing from guys like Django Reinhardt.

How did you and Rory meet?

We met at school actually, through the various school bands and music societies that we were both part of. We really started to hang out more around our A levels because we were in the same class for music.

How long have you been playing together? How did that come about?

I think it’s coming up to 5 years now? Just short of 5 years I’m sure. As A level Music students we had to do a performance for the end of year school awards ceremony with the whole class, Rory was playing guitar and singing and I was actually on drums! We did a cover of ‘Suffragette City’ by Bowie, and we really had a great time and connected well during the rehearsals and so I just asked him if he needed a second guitarist in his live band and thankfully he said yes!

How do song ideas manifest? Do you come to each other with a specific plan in mind, or do ideas come to you organically and you build from there?

There really isn’t any one way that it happens to be honest - sometimes we get together and both bring some demos of ideas we’ve got and then see which ones we like or which ones we can fit together into a proper song, and sometimes we just come up with things more naturally whilst we’re jamming and messing about and build from there. Often it’s a kind of mix of both. There’s no single formula for writing and I think if you try too hard to write a song in a too structured or calculated way it can feel very forced and not genuine, and that can easily be picked up on by the listener. The best songs we’ve written together have come from a very organic place, where each of our ideas just fit perfectly first time and we don’t need to edit things or try different parts much.

You've mentioned that you and Rory are co-writers. How do you find working with Rory, and do you ever find you have clashing ideas? If so, how do you work through them?

We’ve written so many songs together now it’s crazy. The first was "White Lines", which is on the LP, and the only other two to be released so far are "D’ya Wanna Do It Again" and "Getting Over You". The best of them is coming very soon, but we’ve got so many recorded and saved. I genuinely love working with Rory, we’re great friends and we always have a fun time, music is such a passion for both of us and we’re so similar in taste and vision that when we sit down with our instruments and start writing it feels so good. Of course we have clashing ideas from time to time, and sometimes it can get a bit tense, but I think every song writing team is bound to have those moments, and we’re both really good at putting our ego on the back seat (which is harder for him given the size of it haha). We appreciate each other’s honesty and we don’t take anything to heart; if an idea is bad or just doesn’t work its far more constructive to just be upfront and say we think that rather than try and squeeze it into the song. A lot of the time it’s about simplifying our ideas, which is probably Rory’s best quality as a writer - he’s got a great ear for simple, catchy pop melodies as well as for really effective guitar and synth parts. I think there’s sometimes this big misconception about Rory that he’s hostile or hard to work with, but really he’s just focused and can sometimes be a bit quiet. Once you get to know him well he’s such an amazing guy and he’s got a great sense of humour, I think that’s why we get on so well.

Rory has recorded and produced previous releases. Do you get involved in that side of things?

Yes, I’ve worked on the final recordings and production of the songs that we’ve co-written together that have been released so far, as well as some of the other bands that Rory has produced, such as "Dream Machine" by Bluff. I really enjoy it, although it can be tough sometimes - Rory can be a bit of a perfectionist, but ultimately it’s for the good of the song, and at the end of the day being a solo artist means any criticism is directed almost solely at him, so it makes complete sense that he’d want any tune we work on to be as good as possible.  It’s so satisfying when all the hard work pays off and you can say you’ve helped create a really great sounding tune. Rory is such a wizard with all the software side of production that I normally just pitch in with ideas on structure and parts, or in a more engineer like role.

You have some upcoming shows, including a four-date residency at Zombie Shack in Manchester. How do you prepare for shows? Do you have any pre-gig "rituals"?

As a band we prepare so much in advance for every show. Our rehearsals are pretty intense and the attention to detail from how we play certain parts, to what stage set up we’ll have is really important to all of us. If you mess up you’ll get the famous ‘Rory Wynne look’ to let you know you need to do better haha. We want as few surprises as possible on the day of the gig, the better prepared you are the better a performance you can give. “Rituals” wise we don’t have many! Definitely in the last 10-15 minutes before we’re due on stage we do our own thing. Rory tends to go a bit quiet and psych himself up, I’ll sit down with my guitar and do some warm ups, just playing up and down some scales at varying speeds and running through some technical exercises, before we all gather stage side ready to go on. We like to stay relaxed before that time, just hanging out with each other and the other bands backstage enjoying it all. 

Do you guys have anything special planned for the upcoming shows?

We’ve got a few little surprises planned, yes. One thing we work hard on and really pride ourselves on as a group is the transitions between songs and the introductions, or extended sections we do live. We work so hard on them and it really enhances our performance. The whole idea is to make the show a real experience for the crowd, we don’t want to just show up and perform the songs as they are on Spotify then leave, we want to captivate people and really draw them into the performance to make it as entertaining as possible. Rory wants us to play every show like it’s a stadium show, and it’ll be worth it when we eventually play actual stadium shows! The stuff we’ve worked on for the upcoming shows at Jimmy's in Liverpool and the residency at Zombie Shack is sounding really great, and we can’t wait for people to see what we’ve got in store for them - it’s really not to be missed out on.

What is your biggest musical achievement to date? What would be your dream venue to play?

I guess there’s two that I’m very proud of; the first is definitely supporting Blossoms at Castlefield Bowl in 2017, the place was pretty much full when we went on stage so we performed to around 8,000 people which was such an amazing feeling. The other is probably how well ‘Getting Over You’ is doing as a single so far, last time I checked it had about 65,000 plays on Spotify and continues to grow. Seeing a song I co-wrote do so well is a pretty good feeling! There are so many venues I’d love to play, especially in Manchester as I’ve seen most of my favourite bands and artists play at them! The Arena would be cool, but I think I’d have to say the Etihad stadium. I’m a huge City fan and it’d be a pretty big honour to play at that stadium.

And finally... both you and Rory play guitar at your live shows. Which one of you is the better guitarist? 

I’d have to say we’re both amazing! I mean we both play a different style, Rory’s rhythm playing and his melodic solos are so incredible, he just has this great feel and soulfulness to his playing, whereas I think I’m more of a technical player, stuff like tap-strumming and sweep-picking lead lines or fast riffing, it all really derives from learning to play mostly Pantera and Metallica songs when I started out! But the beautiful thing is how I think our different styles of playing both really complement each other, it feels so natural playing in a band with Rory because of how well our playing gels as guitarists, which a lot of bands either don’t have between their guitarists or have to really concentrate and work on. For us it just all clicks so nicely (except maybe when I get a bit bored and decide to shred away in some parts during rehearsals haha), and I think it really sets our performances apart from some other bands and ultimately makes performing not just more enjoyable for us, but for the audiences we play to as well.

Tickets for Rory Wynne's upcoming gigs are available at the following links; Jimmy's Liverpool

Zombie Shack residency

Words by Alex Vickers

Photography by Chris Patmore