Interview with the Britsh Duo River Knight
By Mick Michaels
The Cosmick View: Hello, Mark
and Darren and welcome to The
Cosmick View/MBM Ten Pounder! Thanks for taking some time to chat with
us!
Mark Stone River: Thanks for having us.
Darren Knight: Always up for a chat.
CV: Describe your definition of the band’s sound and style and how does
that definition uniquely describe the
music?
Mark: To me, we’re just 2 friends, writing songs together on an
acoustic guitar without any consideration for any specific genre.
Darren: Although, we definitely don’t fall under the EDM category hahaha. We just play what feels right. We have songs that have never made it out of rehearsal because, to us, they just don’t feel right.
Mark: They may have seemed right at the time, but in the cold light of day they don’t quite cut it. Going back to the original question though, live you’ll mostly hear us as 2 guys harmonizing the hooks and melodies, with 1 acoustic guitar driving the rhythm and tempo…
Darren: Recorded however, we like to add a little bit more. So once we’re finished recording the songs as we’ve written them and as we play them, we’re totally open to adding drums, bass, percussion, synth, piano, strings, electric guitar, etc, etc, but not for every song.
Mark: Each song is different and some songs don’t need much, although we are considering recruiting and seeing how we do as a full band rather than a duo, so I think we’d end up with new versions in that case.
Darren: Our album, “GROW,” is written in a way that it is at its best when listened to in full and in order. The first bar is stark, but little by little things are added so that by the time you reach HEAVEN’S DOOR it’s a full band sound, and then we pull it back again where you reach ELOPE and it’s back to just us and not much else.
Mark: GROW is an aural experience that rises up and then comes back down…almost like it breathes.
Darren: But on our new single UNSPRUNG, we dive headfirst into the full band vibe. Unintentionally, it’s almost like the Yin to Heaven’s Door’s Yang.
Mark: Yeah, those 2 songs are part of the same story, even though they weren’t deliberately written that way.
CV: Today, everyone talks about artist
and audience connection. Is such a level of connection actually achievable for
an artist and if so, how have you made the connection to your fans?
Darren: We interact online. We interact on stage. We interact after
the show. No one ever wants to talk to us before the show hahaha.
Mark: And hopefully, there will be some sort of connection between the audience and the songs themselves. A lyric they can relate to…an earworm they can’t get rid of.
Darren: When you ask about a level of connection, I’m not sure what you mean. I 100% think that a connection between the artist and the audience is achievable.
Mark: Completely, keep interacting, don’t
take yourselves too seriously, and be a nice person…although, we’re still
waiting for that breakthrough hahaha.
CV: Is fan interaction an important part
of the band’s inner culture?
Mark: I’m not 100% sure what you mean.
Darren: We don’t entertain groupies if that’s what you’re getting at hahaha.
Mark: Of course, as a duo/band, fan interaction is important to us, and we’ll always encourage it. It’s one of the stepping stones on the way to success depending on your definition of musical success.
Darren: Yeah, it’s not the be all and end all. I mean we’ll still be writing and playing for ourselves if there weren’t any fans, but when you go out and play live, when you want people to get an affinity towards you, when you want people to give your music a chance, then fan interaction is an important part of any band’s inner culture. Or it should be.
CV: Can a band truly interact with its
fans and still maintain a level of personal privacy without crossing the line
and giving up their “personal space” in your opinion?
Mark: Without a doubt. We can talk to and build relationships with
people online, but they don’t come round our houses, they don’t have our
number. Well, actually, mine is the contact number for RIVER KNIGHT so that’s
not totally true. But no one has ever phoned me hahaha.
Darren: Obviously, when an artist reaches a certain level then it might become a bit more difficult to pop down the shops, or go out for a meal, without having someone try to interact with you in your personal time. But really, when you look at it, there are a select few from each generation that make it to that sort of level. I think the majority of artists can still live their personal lives generally uninterrupted.
CV: Is music, and its value, viewed
differently around the world in your opinion? If so, what do you see as
the biggest difference in such multiple views among various cultures?
Mark: Not in my experience. I’ve sung in a few countries and it’s
always the same. If you’re an unknown entity, getting the footfall and audience
to attend is an uphill battle, and it’s been the same everywhere I’ve been.
Darren: Yeah, people seem to want to see what they know. A successful tribute act is testament to that. So getting yourself in a position where people know your band and know your music is very difficult without decent funds. When I say decent, what I’m talking about is the difference between a band like us that spends somewhere between £50 and £100 a month on promotion, and the bigger companies that have more connections in the industry and have worked with bigger artists - they have a price tag of £800 upwards. And that is one of the cheaper ones!
Mark: And money like that just isn’t available to people like us. We’re fortunate that we know people with recording facilities; otherwise we’d probably still be rehearsing and playing live with no music actually released hahaha.
Darren: I don’t think that would have ever happened. We work hard at what we do and we would have recorded somehow! But it is hard and we do rely on help from friends (photos, studio, etc.) and special offers we find.
CV: Do you feel that a band that has an
international appeal, will tend to connect more so to American audiences? Would
they be more enticed or intrigued to see the band over indigenous acts because
of the foreign flavor?
Darren: I think in general people need to hear a phrase that they can
latch onto, so I do think you are more likely
to find success with people that speak the language your lyrics are in.
Mark: Yeah, at the same time I think it’s easier for an English speaking band to become popular in a non English speaking country than it is for a non English speaking band to become popular in an English speaking country, which is a shame because at the end of the day a good song is a good song. I’ve heard many non English songs on the playlists I listen to and they have great riffs and great hooks.
Darren: But unfortunately, as it is now,
those great songs have little chance of breaking into the British or American
charts. Not even the charts, just the general musical psyche.
CV: Has modern-day digital technology made everyone an artist on some level in
your opinion? Have the actual lines of what really is an artist been blurred?
Mark: {cough} Vocoder {cough}. You don’t even have to be able to sing
to be a singer, just listen to me hahaha. No, no…I’m joking, but I’ll never use
a vocoder.
Darren: I think it’s given everyone the option to be an artist. Making music, well, digital music is easier now than it’s ever been. I’m not sure you could create a good guitar riff digitally. Or write and play something on the piano. But digital music can be made using free software available to everyone online.
Mark: Unfortunately now (or fortunately
depending on your point of view), you can create guitar and piano riffs
digitally. In Studio One there are thousands and thousands of samples that you
can use. But Studio One is not free, and you have to train yourself on how to
use it properly, and if you were gonna spend all that money on a digital audio
workstation and then spend all that time teaching yourself how to use it, why
wouldn’t you just use the money and time to learn to play the instrument.
CV: How would you describe the difference between an artist who follows trends
and one who sets them?
Mark: An artist that sets trends is going to be remembered and is more likely
to have longevity to their career. An artist who follows trends won’t be heard
from the following year, probably become an addict of some sort and have a
resurgence in 20-30 years time when the trend rolls round again hahaha.
Darren: Hahaha. Yeah, trends tend to go
in a cycle. When’s the acoustic indie folk rock duo trend happening? Did we
miss it? Hahaha.
CV: Has music overall been splintered
into too many sub-genres in an effort to appease fan tastes in your opinion?
And has such fan appeasements, in actuality, weakened music’s impact as a whole
by dividing audiences?
Mark: Yes, yes and fucking yes. What are we? Acoustic rock? Indie
folk? Folk rock? We’re guitar music, that’s what we are!
Darren: An example of how genres are becoming convoluted and are dividing opinions would be this, and this happened to us just recently; We sent UNSPRUNG to folk radio station as they’d played another of our songs, STRENGTH IN NUMBERS previously. They rejected UNSPRUNG saying it’s not folk enough, but yet the very same song was reviewed elsewhere and we are referred to as UK Orchestral Folk Duo, who have an international-level approach to Indie Folk Rock.
Mark: The real kicker was the fact that we both consider STRENGTH IN NUMBERS to be far more rock and less folk than current single UNSPRUNG hahaha.
Darren: It is what it is though, and we don’t mind. If somebody doesn’t want to play our stuff that’s absolutely fine. Don’t get me wrong, we’d prefer if our stuff was played but we’re not gonna start a hate campaign based on interpretations. We find genres difficult because we fit so many.
CV: What can fans expect to see coming
next from you?
Mark: More of the same of what we do.
Darren: We’re gonna keep on plugging away, doing our thing. Couple of smaller, more personal festivals booked for 2023.
Mark: And we’re planning on getting back in with our mate to record the second album, so that’s something to look forward to.
Darren: Playing The Joiners in Southampton UK in January alongside Zen Juddhism, opening up for Zephyr.
Mark: And we’re back in London UK either mid March or April. If anyone is in the area for any of those gigs, please follow us on our socials and we’ll hopefully see you there.
CV: Thanks again Mark and Darren for taking some time and talking. It is greatly appreciated.
Mark: Oh no sir, thank you. It’s been great chatting.
Darren: It’s been an absolute pleasure, thank you very much for taking the time to talk with us.
Check out River Knight at:
https://riverknight.co.uk/
https://www.facebook.com/RiverKnight2018
https://twitter.com/riverknight2018
https://www.instagram.com/riverknight2018/
https://www.tiktok.com/@riverknight2018
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxVEbt0DMw-1XOWDXYXGKmg
https://linktr.ee/riverknight2018
https://music.amazon.co.uk/artists/B07NHL1ZW2/river-knight
https://music.apple.com/us/artist/river-knight/1452073261
https://www.deezer.com/mx/artist/59141992
https://open.spotify.com/artist/5cJNhi4M6dMgmTIufE3OUg
https://soundcloud.com/river-knight-613028707/tracks
https://riverknight.bandcamp.com/track/unsprung
https://riverknight.bandcamp.com/album/grow
https://riverknightuk.bandcamp.com/track/heavens-door (Charity single)
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