Conflict Diamonds: Big In Denmark

What’s in a name, asked William Shakespeare some 400 years ago. Not much if you’re Edinburgh duo Conflict Diamonds. They may possess a politically contentious moniker, but they’re not here on some moral crusade. “Really, I just like the words, that’s why I picked it,” confesses singer and guitarist Pete Wylde. “It wasn’t such a big issue then. Kanye West hadn’t done a track about it. Then all of a sudden, these slightly violent, activist types were writing to us, asking ‘hey do you wanna come and support us, play gigs at our rallies?’”

It hasn’t helped their exposure in a world where the internet is a pivotal tool for upcoming bands. “With ‘conflict diamonds’, there’s a huge issue that’s got nothing to do with us,” begins drummer Kevin Murray. “So it’s actually quite hard to find anything about us. But sometimes I check to make sure that we’re still a thousand hits down the Google search.”

If that’s an abject lesson to aspiring bands thinking up world-conquering names, then it seems it’s something the duo take in their stride. Chatting at Kevin’s Edinburgh home, they happily regale us with tales of playing at a Danish festival last year. “All the bands there thought we were the next Franz Ferdinand,” laughs Pete. “They were like ‘What are you doing here? You’re real rock stars!’ We were like ‘Yeah, we’re just teaching you a lesson.’ We were just the same as them, but their music scene’s not as developed.”

It’s a sharp contrast to gigging on home turf. Having played the arse off Edinburgh, they’ve more than a few sobering stories. “Fucking Whistle Binkies, man,” Kevin grimaces. “That was the worst gig ever! Binkies is a cool place but it’s not famed for having really good bands. It’s kinda the place you go to watch pub rock. We were playing and then we’d stop and folk were looking at us going ‘what the fuck’s this?’”

Such trials, it seems, have only helped fuse the steadfast pair. “We’ve had jams with a roomful of people,” reveals Pete. “But it’s different with just two of us. You have to write music in a different way. Plus we’re quite disorganised so it helps there’s only two people that need to turn up.” “And we get to split everything fifty-fifty,” Kevin adds. “Yeah, that as well,” agrees Pete. “It’s basically down to that.”

A four-track EP is nearing completion, full of skewed, dirty garage rock riffs and carelessly inventive drum fills that surreptitiously embed themselves within your psyche before punching their way out at a later date. A musical Alien gut-buster if you will. It’s a long way from the band’s formative music years. “The first CD I ever got given was Queen’s greatest hits,” admits Pete. “I was pretty well glammed up and gayed up as an eight year old, dancing around singing The Show Must Go On in the kitchen.”

A light clicks on in Kevin’s mind: “The first piece of music that I ever recall hearing, that I actually wanted to own, was Bohemian Rhapsody. I just couldn’t believe it. I was thinking, is this classical, is it rock – what the fuck is this?” “Maybe that’s what we are,” ponders Pete. “We’re a Queen-inspired band. We didn’t even know that; we’ve just worked it out just now.”