ISHMAEL ENSEMBLE

A heightened sense of ambition marks Bristol-based quintet Ishmael Ensemble's third album Rituals. Building upon the cinematic, enveloping sound that has resulted in sold out shows across the UK, Europe and beyond, Rituals expands upon their sound considerably, bringing out the dubstep and dance music influences that had always lingered beneath their jazz-tinged veneer. TANK spoke to frontman Pete Cunningham on process and change. 

TANK You recently released your new album Rituals. What were your expectations going into the recording of the album?
ISHMAEL ENSEMBLE We wanted to do something different for our own sake first and foremost. I was less worried about what people thought of it. With the previous album we were quite quickly caught in the net of the UK jazz thing – no disrespect at all, that was always very beneficial for us – but I think we always found that quietly funny. We’ve always been more influenced by dub and electronic music. It felt like a bit of a disservice to those proper jazz musicians who have spent 18 hours a day for the last 20 years learning their one instrument. In this album we wanted to capture something closer to our live sound which is much bigger, heavier and louder, capturing the five of us who make up the bedrock of Ishmael Ensemble. In the previous album, we collaborated with vocalists and musicians in the Bristol scene. We went on to tour post-lockdown and there wasn’t the budget to take ten different vocalists to do one song each – we’re not Gorillaz or Massive Attack – so we honed in on what the five of us could do with our instruments to make things feel interesting. We lent more into our own influences which brought up a more electronic and post-rock sound. That naturally became the new record. We were very happy to do something that didn’t feel like, “But we’re a jazzy band. What would Gilles Peterson think of it?” I think the beauty of the project is that people have come to expect something different each time. It’s a nice place to be in as opposed to having a big hit and everyone wanting a replication of that song that they fell in love with and take ownership of.

TANK It’s funny you mention being lumped in with the UK jazz scene. Perhaps it’s because you let individual players participate in the band, that you have a jazz mentality as opposed to a jazz musicality.
IE I totally get the jazz mentality. That’s the music I listen to and it obviously has a massive influence: I play saxophone, the band’s called Ishmael Ensemble, some things point in that direction. I think it has more to do with the time at which we emerged. If we were around in the ‘90s we would have been labelled a trip-hop or electronica band; if it was the ‘80s we’d probably have been called a post-rock or post-punk band. We just happened to be at the time and place of the UK jazz thing.

TANK I guess that underlines the arbitrary nature of giving anything of genre. It’s not completely useless but it’s always culturally, geographically and historically specific, undergoing constant shifts.
IE I think those terms are more for the audience to feel part of something as opposed to the bands. I don’t know musicians personally who think in those terms. It’s not how it works if you make music. There’s definitely a thread across genres in all the music that I listen to but I don’t think I could define what that is. How differently we all listen to music became really apparent on this record. It would be the five of us in a room sharing ideas and we’d all respond to things completely differently. You might play someone something you love and they would be like “Oh I don’t have an emotional response to that”. Our guitarist Mullins is very much a big pedalboard person, and if you play him something faintly electronic he'll be like, “That just sounds like the fucking Vengaboys”. It’s so subjective it’s not really worth worrying about. Even within your own band everyone has completely different sounds.

TANK How did you workshop these songs? Was there a single method or lots of different ways?
IE I wanted it to feel like there was an emotional tone throughout. It’s almost a second coming of age in a way. Three of us have got kinds now. Holly had cancer a few years ago and came through that. We’re stepping into a new phase, getting older and dealing with real things like having kids or serious health problems. We wanted to make sure the five of us were present on the record as musicians, be they Rory’s big heavy drums or Mullins's big washy guitar walls of sound. I wanted the band to be true to themselves. 

TANK I like the concept of capturing an artistic truth. Do you ever do the reverse and look to create something artificial?
IE It works both ways. Even though I say this record was the five of us, it’s the five of us and then me taking all those bits away and making something completely new. It’s almost always remixed. A lot of the synth sounds are actually just me chopping up guitars and making them sound like a weird synth. 

TANK I bring it up because of the Yellow Magic Orchestra covers you did. They’re kings of making an instrument sound unlike itself. Was that ever recorded?
IE It was never recorded. I think every band should have a phase where they play other people’s music though. It gets you in a totally different mindset for writing. It was a really healthy way to reimagine our own process. Just playing 12 notes that someone else has written can be staggeringly different even if I’ve written one almost identical.

TANK I wanted to ask a bit about the title. What are the “rituals” in question?
IE There were a few different names but Rituals was the one we stuck with. Getting older, you start to get a sense of who you are and what it is that helps you get through life. I don’t want it to be as black and white as “it’s about this ritual that I do”. It’s more about things we have developed as humans to get us through. Rituals are these meaningless tasks that make us completely human and unique and help us. I guess that’s something we could all take ownership of. Throughout her treatment, Holly certainly had a lot of ritual behaviours. If you’re having regular medical checks there are ways you prepare yourself for those things. In the same way, you prepare yourself for welcoming a child into your life. The way I see it, it’s evolutionary. Rituals are what allowed us to develop beyond other species: the ability to cope and get through shit times and not buckle and be self-aware. It’s almost a way of being religious without being religious. It isn’t praying to a God to save you, it’s realising that you can save yourself in a way. So much music comes from places of hardship. Working down a mine is a horrible existence but rituals like singing and being present with other people make it bearable. I think the mental health crisis is happening in parallel to our detachment from these daily things that keep us grounded, level-headed and present. It’s so funny, we’re all just desperately trying to find our way back to being happy with the norm.

Rituals is out now.