No Age

No Age’s Randy Randell and Dean Spunt are trying to recall how many gigs they’ve played this year. It’s doesn’t last long because even if they had been counting, they’d have lost track a long time ago. A rough figure of 400 is mentioned and while seeming initially ridiculous, it’s less so when you consider they’ve been regularly been playing two shows a night as well as producing one of the year’s finest records, the ultra-exuberant Nouns. You’d call them hardworking, were they to have any of it.

“Shit man, we’ve been doing two shows a night for, I dunno,“ says Dean, the drumming half of the stripped down duo. “If all we got to do is play two shows a night - I know we play every day - but that’s not that hard. A lot of people say that’s fucking crazy and fucked…”

“We like playing the music, there’s nothing to it,” interrupts guitarist Randy.

They do this a lot, interrupting, finishing each other’s sentences. In fact, when listening back, parts of the interview are lost to the excited pair talking over each other.

“We just drive around all day,” Dean continues. “We sit around. We eat. We play one fucking show for 30 or 40 minutes, what we can’t play another 20 minutes, of course we can. Sometimes you’re tired but the second show is always fun. It’s always fucking crazy.”

And it is. Later No Age will tear up the crammed Camden confines of Bar Vinyl with Gun Club and Misfits covers after playing the wholly less interesting environs of the Electric Ballroom. It’s both refreshing that the D.I.Y ethos born in Los Angeles’ now famed punk venue The Smell hasn’t been diluted an ounce and that No Age just get better and better live. It was however a need to transfer songs best to a live setting that bore a great influence on the conception of Nouns.

“With the songs on Weirdo Rippers (2007‘s collection of EP‘s and singles), we couldn’t play a lot of them and even the one’s we were playing sounded so sonically different,“ Dean explains. “I think we just got good sonically live. We got loud and we were definitely thinking we want to make a record that we can play songs that we like and songs that are bigger sounding and basically have fun playing live.”

“Something that we could be on the road with for over a year but still playing every night and thinking ‘yes’,” says Randy.

The result is indeed loud and fun - a concise, urgent 12-track record in the truest punk sense but one that endures because it has so much more. Nouns is warm, often giddy and totally underpinned by a sharp pop sensibility. When I tell them I love Nouns for the very same reason I love much of The Replacements and Husker Du back catalogue, their eyes light up. Not at the comparison, just because you can tell their simultaneously remembering their favourite Westerburg or Mould song.

"I think we were trying to write songs that you could listen to 10 years ago or 10 years from now that aren't driven by anything that is around today,” Dean says. “You can put on The Replacements Let It Be and it sounds amazing. Some of the Husker Du production is a little… but the songs are great songs.

“We listened to At The Drive in on the bus this morning,” Randy interjects. “And thought, wow, that was that time.”

“Yeah that was a real this is what’s happening now but we're not trying to be of the time, we‘re trying to be more classic.” It’s Dean again by the way. “There‘s not one style or one thing, it‘s just a good song but we just happen to be in the radical punk side or whatever."

The idea of doing anything remotely radical took a kick in the teeth a couple of weeks before we meet when pre-election, Randy was forced to change an Obama t-shirt on CBS’ Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, citing the frankly bizarre equal time rule. Despite venting his frustration shortly after, does he still feel aggrieved by the altercation?

"It definitely felt like a kick in the stomach,” Randy admits. “It just seemed like an obvious gesture to wear a shirt, how can anybody fight that, it's not the most obvious political statement. So to have to think about it was ridiculous. It's important to take advantage of the platform you have, you've got the stage, records, a website where you can say what you believe in so I thought I'd take that chance and when I couldn't it was very upsetting. It didn't make any sense, it's some fucked up rule based around commerce and finance and the idea of having the media so controlled seems ridiculous."

Was he encouraged though by the support he received throughout the online media? Nearly ever blog/ website going carried his comments.

"I appreciated it. I was glad it was able to get out there and people were able at least if nothing else think about how do we see what we see on TV? Ultimately I thought it was a very small thing but I felt like it was something I wanted to voice my opposition to. I didn't expect it to catch fire. it was just a t-shirt."

Before we let them go - the pair are in much interviewing demand tonight, noticably more so than tour mate Los Campesinos and Times New Viking - what, now the 2008 is drawing to a close, have been the year’s highlights?

“Being able to play and not have a job, being artists supported by our art,” Dean says simply. “Traveling and playing for people who want to hear the record…”

“We met Kevin Shields,” Randy giddily includes.

“Yeah we met Kevin Shields!“ says Dean just as excitedly. “But just making a record that’s fucking awesome. I put it on the other day after I hadn’t listened to it in a couple of months and thought this record fucking rips. And this was like a week ago when we were on a plane and I grabbed Randy and said ‘this record’s fucking awesome.’ To me that’s the best part and I hope it ten years I still think it shreds. That’s the goal.”