CMW 2007: IN-FLIGHT SAFETY
Tuesday March 06, 2007 @ 11:00 AM
By: ChartAttack.com Staff

In-Flight Safety

Hometown: Halifax, NS
Official Website: http://www.inflightsafety.ca
Members:

John Mullane (singer/guitar)
Brad Goodsell (bass)
Glen Nicholson (drums)
Daniel Ledwell (keyboards)

So, you're about to play the big industry event that is Canadian Music Week. What's the most shameless thing you've ever done to promote your band?
John Mullane: The most shameless thing we've ever done was taking out a full-page advertisement in The Globe And Mail, in 72-point font no less. It read:
     "In-Flight Safety. Best band ever, ever... EVER."
     Of course, that never really happened, but I wish it did. In a non-fiction frame of mind, I can remember a time when we were postering for a show years ago. Just picture this: it's the windiest day ever, it's absolutely freezing, it's February, it's Halifax. We were basically frozen to death and fed up with postering, so we decided to launch the remaining 100 posters into the air somewhere on Brunswick Street. It was like a magician releasing his doves into the sky in some sort of grand finale. It was very liberating.

What's the hardest part about being an up-and-coming band?
Are we still an up-and-coming band? Damn it. It is a very great distinction to be known as the "next big thing." It does a carry a sort of stigma with it. Although, it's a huge compliment, it can be embarrassing when you are still being called the "next big thing" four years later. It's hard to meet people's expectations, I suppose. Basically, it's like saying someday we'll be a half-decent band, yet I know people mean it as a compliment... I think.

Congrats on all of your ECMA wins. What's next on the agenda for IFS, world domination?
Thank you very much! World domination headquarters, or WDH, as we like to call it, has suggested we tour Ontario for the first couple of weeks in March and then we're off to Saskatoon for 2007's Juno Awards. Afterwards we will then sneak off to our not-so-secret lair on Gottigen Street in Halifax for most of April and demo some of the new songs we have written for our next album. A few weeks later, we'll jump in the van and head across the country in the summer, hopefully with some festival dates inbetween. There is no rest for the wicked.

Describe your best and worst gigs ever.
Best: I would like to say it was our last Marquee Club show back from the national tour. We had a host of back-up musicians and singers who made the show really exciting, not to mention we brought in those special lights and a fog machine. But in my heart, I would have to say the most fun gig of recent memory was when Night Danger reformed spontaneously in Fernie, B.C. last year.
     Night Danger, for the millions who do not know, is a seven-piece band we started with the guys from Raising The Fawn. I think we have two or three shows to our name, but no major record contract yet.
     So, the story goes, we arrive in Fernie after 13 hours of really harrowing and shitty snow driving, not to mention it's a snowstorm in a small ski town, so the turnout wasn't stellar to begin with. Soon after IFS and RTF finished our sets, on the spur of the moment. We decided to give Night Danger one last go in all of its rock glory. We don't have any original material (yet), but we did blast through our repertoire including Wilco's "I Am Trying To Break Your Heart," Sufjan Stevens' "Chicago" and the Constantines "Working Full-Time."
     People were losing their minds, dancing up a sweaty storm. Perhaps it was one of those had-to-be-there kind of moments, but just picture it: Dylan and Glen bashing away each on their own drum kit, Johnny Crossingham is on Daniel's shoulders, soloing his ass off, while Dan rocks the keys. Scott is on Glen's drum kit playing the hell out of the tambourine and Brad is rocking the loudest, most thunderous bass lines. Our scrappy version of "Working Full-Time" is one of my fondest memories.
     Worst: We played in an arcade in Nanaimo, B.C. to an empty crowd. Literally zero people were in attendance. It wasn't all bad because we met these girls who have a cool band called Old Phoebe, and I played vintage arcade games.

How important is it for your band members to "circulate and flirt" with the audience before or after the show?
I'm not sure how important it is per se, but we do enjoy flying around the audience and chatting with folks, basically trying to get to know our peeps. It's a very natural thing for us to want to meet our fan base and listen to what they have to say, and frankly, just joke around with them.
     We have this policy in the band of replying to every single email sent to the band, and that means every single one, no exceptions. We also make a policy to comment on each of our MySpace friends' sites personally. Comments we are not allowed to include are the phrases "Thanks for the add," or "Rock on."
     We just enjoy being silly on MySpace and it goes a long way for us. I would say that we are at the upper limit of feasible in terms of having time to do all this, but we enjoy it.

Have you ever stolen from someone else's rider? If so, who was it and what did you take?
We played this really fun show on Canada Day weekend last year with Joel Plaskett and Carmen Townsend. Every band was really well taken care of in terms of rider and dressing room, etc. Stealing someone else's rider is a big rock 'n' roll touring no-no. But, for some weird reason a member of our band — who will go unnamed — was convinced that Carmen's band and/or her friends were stealing from our beer stock. It was all very paranoid, like a mother bear protecting her cubs. But in our case it was just a few bottles of beer. Anytime we would leave the dressing room there was noticeably less beer and food in the room, convinced it was Carmen's camp, we snuck into her room and stole a few beers and a bag of Doritos — zesty cheese no less. Later we found out it was mostly our own bonehead friends who were consuming our rider and not Carmen's peeps at all. Sorry Carmen. Clearly, we are idiots.

In 2004, IFS was graded by ChartAttack for your performance at North By Northeast. The reporter gave you a grade of 89 per cent, which put you in the rankings as a band that exceeded the Chart writer's expectations. ("Band exceeds skill and knowledge expectations. Rocked us so hard we peed our pants"). How did this grade make you feel?
That was very nice. We try not to pay attention to those types of things because you can get way too caught up in it. I don't think you would start a band like In-Flight Safety if you were hoping to appease critics. However, we have been blessed with a lot of critical acclaim so, no complaints. There has been the odd critic who has compared us to Vanessa Carlton and Nickelback in the same review. It's all good though. Actually that was honestly one of my favourite reviews of The Coast Is Clear. All that told, I bet we are due for a less than stellar report card this year. We have been working on a few surprise '80s covers to spice things up — maybe that will help.

Have you done anything new or interesting this week?
Sadly, the most interesting thing I did all week was eat an entire Terry's chocolate orange. That was bad idea. Actually, I have been on a rampant search for new music lately. Here are some finds: Youth Group's Casino Twilight Dogs, great album. This young singer-songwriter Dan Griffin, Sun Kil Moon meets Elliott Smith, who is from Hamilton. Malajube, not so new I suppose, and I heard Pony Up! on CBC and it reminded me of how much I love them.

In-Flight Safety plays the Horseshoe Tavern on Saturday, March 10 @ 11 p.m. as part of the annual Chart/Horseshoe/Canadian Music Week showcase.

—Shannon Webb-Campbell