MacD on Music: Manchester By The Foyle

We’re officially into the 53rd week of January, which means that it’s only another six weeks until February and some brilliant gigs throughout the town.

One such gig will be taking place in Bennigan’s on the 16th and features one of Derry’s finest exports, Quentin Wylie in not one, but two bands.

Quentin will be playing bass in Sad Sells (also featuring Xavier Jacques on vocals/rhythm guitar, Zachary Jacques on lead guitar, Rose O’Leria on keys, Alfie Meller on drums and Black Utah on synth) and is singing/playing guitar with GETNER (also featuring Ruairi Coyle on drums, Charlie Barber on lead guitar and Ted Downer-Wills on bass.

I caught up with Quentin and Xavier recently to talk about the bands and the gigs: Quentin: “We’re basically bringing two bands back from Manchester to play Bennigan’s. We decided it would be a good idea to do two shows in the north.

“We’re playing Bennigan’s on the 16th February then Belfast supporting the Switch on the 18th. GETNER are headlining the Derry one and the Switch are headlining the Belfast one. It’s basically our two bands coming back with the idea of starting Sad Sells supporting tour.”

Xavier: “Sad Sells have been alive for the past six to eight months. This project was birthed out of an open mic I run in the centre of Manchester where I’ve started a project and invited a lot of my friends, including Quentin, to come and join a group and it went from asking musicians to help out to forming quite a strong band, rather than just supporting musicians, which is really exciting.

“What I wanted to do was not rely on promoters very much, who maybe have favourites in the industry. I wanted to create some sort of communal support system within a group of musicians over a period of, say, eight weeks.

“We’re going, like Quentin said, back home to Derry. He’s been able to organise that. We’ll be able to do London and across to Liverpool and we’re also organising for those bands to come and play in Manchester, so the Switch are supporting us in Gulliver’s in the Northern Quarter on the 22nd of March.

“Other people supporting us over that period of time of around eight weeks are also supporting us in Manchester as well. We’re really excited at the prospect of going over seas for the first time to play a gig, organised by our very own Quentin Wylie. It’s going to be an exciting opportunity.”

Quentin: “It’s off the back of our latest single release. We’ll being releasing quite a few more this year, that being Sad Sells. GETNER, hopefully, will be releasing a single either on the night of the Derry show or just before. Then both bands are starting a run of shows after that. Not together but separately, with the Derry shows kicking that off.”

Xavier: “We put our single out in October, which went a lot better than we were expecting it too. It’s gone very well. We’ve had the great opportunity of being on BBC Radio 6 for the first time, which is really exciting and from that is why I want to put on this string of gigs supporting other musicians, to keep that momentum going.”

Quentin: “We’ve found it quite useful basically doing gig swaps around the country where we’ve said ‘we’ll give you a gig here if you give us a gig there’ type thing, which is how it’s kind of worked out with the Switch. Both projects are quite new.

“I’d say GETNER are about six to eight months as well. I hadn’t played bass in a band for about ten years until Xav was like ‘you hang about with us enough, you may as well play bass’.

“It’s a testament that both bands are coming back and playing Derry together as well. Obviously, both are round about the same stage with singles. Obviously Sad Sells is doing a lot better with it’s Radio 6 play.

“We’ve already been back in the studio to record two more tunes, just last weekend and there’s a plan to get back in relatively soon, so by the end of this tour we should have plenty of songs recorded in between.

“The same with GETNER, there’s the intention to get back into the studio straight after we come back to put out some songs in March.”

And that’s it from Quentin and Xavier. GETNER, Sad Sells and the Switch will be playing Bennigan’s on the 16th February and Union Bar in Belfast on the 18th. Sad Sells’ single ‘Between the Covers’ is out now.

Both bands can be found on Instagram @getnermcr (GETNER) and @sadsellsmusic (Sad Sells).