THE WINTER OLYMPICS STORY

The Winter Olympics are a dance-punk rock band from London. Inspired by the DIY dignity of the Dischord label, the literate disco of LCD Soundsystem and the no-nonsense stadium-slaying standards of Def Leppard; they are not like the other bands.

14 FACTS ABOUT THE WINTER OLYMPICS

1) The Winter Olympics are Martin Bowman (guitars) Andrew Wagstaff (singing) Simon Oldham (drums) Neil Mackay (bass) Pippa Wragg Smith (singing) Agatha Mlynarczyk (keys).                    

2) Martin met Neil and Andrew at college. Andrew met Pippa in an indie disco. Simon and Agatha joined the band as competition winners.

3) The band first formed six or seven bass players ago in 2002.

4) At the time Andrew was trying (and failing) to be a music journalist. His writing might not of won him any prizes, but it did give him a wealth of ideas about what a PROPER band should be like. He started telling Martin all about it in the pub, and is still doing so today.

5) A proper band should be AMAZING. In a proper band, every note should be played like you’re headlining Reading. Even if you can’t really play. In fact, especially if you can’t really play. Being able to play isn’t actually that important, being AMAZING is. In proper band’s songs the words should mean something. Even when that something is stupid. Proper bands might be funny but they’d better not be joking. Proper bands should never apologise for rocking. Proper bands should never say “this is a new song” until they are at least as big as The Stones. If you’re just Dermo from Grumblebuggy playing to three drunk dudes and the lady who does the coats, don’t you dare mumble something about your new song. Just do the hits. The coat lady deserves better than your sorry shit. Proper bands shouldn’t worry about being successful. Being AMAZING is success in itself and it doesn’t really matter if no one knows it. Proper bands should be punk rock but also punctual and polite. It might be nice if they bought you all a drink for the effort you’ve made in going out to see them too… That really would be amazing. A proper band should…. (you get the idea).

6) Partly to try and achieve this vision (and partly as an excuse to be allowed out on a school night) Martin agreed to start a band. It was originally called (against his wishes) ‘Bowman’.

7) The band changed their name to The Winter Olympics in homage to the unheralded sportsmen and women of the winter games. People who put in four years’ of back breaking, heart-aching, training and toil, a lifetime of painstaking preparation, sacrifice and compromise, for just four breathless minutes of lung-busting glory or grisly defeat. That’s the spirit of The Winter Olympics.

8) After six years’ of their own back-breaking training and toil, the Winter Olympics’ released their debut ep ‘The Winter Olympics I’ on their own Office Rock imprint. It featured ‘Feeling European’, a song all about the ups and downs of a holiday romance; sex and the City Break set to a mile high beat. The track later featured on the cover mounted cd of The Word magazine.

9) In 2010 The Winter Olympics’ released two further eps: The Winter Olympics II and The Winter Olympics III.

10) All three were recorded and produced beneath a pub in Streatham and at ‘the other’ Abbey Road in Croydon by cosmic scouse alchemist Paul Hollingsworth of Gold Future Joy Machine. They were mastered by John Davis (Joy Division, Led Zeppelin, R.E.M. Florence and her effing Machine).

11) The eps’ sessions were overseen by real-life 70’s guitar hero Luther ‘Ariel Bender’ Grosvenor (Mott the Hoople, Spooky Tooth and Stealer’s Wheel) the man who played the guitar solo on Gerry Rafferty’s Baker Street (I know what you’re thinking, Baker Street has a guitar solo? Listen to it again, it’s phenomenal). Luther was insistent that the band try and capture the joyous abandon of their stadium-friendly live show on record and even more insistent that he be allowed to lay down, “a proper bloody solo” on The Winter Olympics III’s lead cut, ‘The Great Outdoors’. It’s likely that he’d still be playing the solo now if the pub hadn’t been closed down. The dude’s a legend.

12) The Winter Olympics’ new single, The Winter Olympics’ IV, is the band’s most chart-friendly work to date. Featuring the would-be-smash hit singles ‘I Miss the Nineties’ and ‘This is the Fourth Time I’ve Been in Your House’. It’s available through Office Rock on 14 March 2011 on CD and cassette (yes!) and digitally through iTunes, eMusic and Amazon.

13) The world-class video for ‘I Miss the Nineties’ was directed by Chris Hemming (Cornershop, Elvis Presley) and produced by the great Passion Pictures (Gorillaz, Of Montreal, those ‘Compare the Meerkat’ adverts). It was filmed in Martin’s kitchen and shot on a budget consisting solely of beer and pizza.

14) The band’s long-awaited debut long-player ‘Profit and Loss’ is out in later this year, eight years behind schedule but still five years ahead of its time.

Thanks for your time, it’s really appreciated. You can read more about the band over at www.thewinterolympicsband.com or www.myspace.com/winterolympics or www.facebook.com/winterolympicsband. You can follow our tweets at www.twitter.com/winter_olympics.

Cheers

The Winter Olympics x