Ahead of their biggest headline show to date on home soil, two-fifths of Little Green Cars - Faye O'Rourke and Stevie Appleby - sat down with me inside the Clarion Hotel for a chat about the year that's been and the plans for the fast approaching second album.

Little Green Cars play The Iveagh Gardens in Dublin on Saturday July 12th. Tickets and information can be found here.


It's been fifteen or sixteen months since Absolute Zero came out and I can only point to Villagers' Becoming A Jackal as another Irish debut record which has made a similar impact both home and abroad. Did the reception to the record take you by surprise?

Stevie: The whole thing seemed ridiculous from day one. It seemed ridiculous when we even got a record deal and people wanted us to make an album. It coming out and doing well was almost incomprehensible [to us].

Had you any preconceived ideas of how this might change your lives when you signed the deal?

Faye: I don't think we even had time to imagine. We were just doing what we were doing, so I never comprehended what it would be like, the good sides or the bad sides…

I read another interview with you from a few months ago where you were talking about signing to the label and I got the impression that you were saying that the entire process what quite an arduous experience. Do you think that the music industry infrastructure presents unnecessary roadblocks to young bands who are trying to make it?

Faye: I still don't really understand any of that stuff, to be honest. They've got their roles and they know what they're doing, there's a reason for it. You like to think that your own vision is how it should be, but sometimes to make it work you have to go through certain guidelines.

Stevie: The ratio of bands to record labels is way off! That definitely makes things difficult but I don't think that record labels are necessarily everyone's goal.

The last time I saw you guys play was a little gig to about 50 people inside the Bunsen burger joint on Wexford Street. It was great to see an unplugged, completely acoustic set. What was that night like from your perspective?

Faye: Mental.

Stevie: Daunting.

Faye: It was a weird sight. We've eaten there a bit and when I was walking up there was a big queue outside it and I was like, 'are these guys queuing for burgers or for us?'

You were one of the ten acts nominated for the Choice Music Prize earlier this year. Did you enjoy that night?

Faye: Yeah, it was a weird evening because there was a lot of other bands there that we like [but didn't know personally], so Stevie and I felt like dorks on the first day of school.

Stevie: It was nice to meet all those people. It's nice to feel like you're part of something.

About the follow-up to Absolute Zero, the last I heard is that you're rehearsing new material. Where are we with that?

Stevie: We've put a hold on touring so we can start writing it. We've spent about four or five weeks working on it so far.

In what sense?

Stevie: Just practicing. It's coming together slowly. There was a lot of nerves and deadlines with the first record, but now it's slower but in a nice way where we can look at things a bit more meticulously.

Faye: There's definitely stuff coming through.

Do you have a concrete idea about where you'd like it to end up, or are you going to learn about it as you go along?

Faye: I think that it's fair to say that it might not necessarily be as polished sounding as the last one.

Stevie: It's definitely a very different album.

Faye: Yeah, definitely a new direction.

Have you locked down who's going to produce it?

Faye: That's still up in the air. I think we'd like to have our work done first before we know the shape of it before we give it to anyone else.

What was the experience of playing on the Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon?

Faye: It was exactly like you'd imagine!

Stevie: You know the Muppet Show, where the camera goes in and out from the stage to the backstage, it was kinda like that!

Faye: Questlove was beside me when I was getting my make-up done! Ice-T was there too.

You're playing the Iveagh Gardens in Dublin on Saturday July 12th. That should be a fun night!

Stevie: It's the biggest show that we've played here.

Faye: Yeah, I don't know how many people were in the tent at Electric Picnic but it's the biggest headline show we've done at home. I'm very nervous about it….not nervous, I'm excited about it!

What are your plans for the rest of the year?

Faye: We're just focused on getting the rest of this album done and making sure we're completely satisfied with it.

Stevie: We've been in the whirlwind for so long now that it's time to step back. You can kind of get sucked away in your own momentum sometimes… (laughs)

Faye: Getting together, and writing together, is what we're best at.

Hey, that's not a bad thing to return to…