The Stool Pigeon

In February, the Ralfe Band’s Oly Ralfe moved to Berlin. Frankly, he says, he needed to get out of “hectic” London. So, with their second album Attic Thieves safely in the bag, he packed his own bags and left for what is ominously referred to as Europe’s trendiest capital.

“By going somewhere else, I shed a lot of things about myself,” he says. “It’s a freeing up - I’ve started again - so hopefully that will come out in the music. There’s such a different atmosphere here. It was basically destroyed as a city, then out of that destruction it’s grown again. It’s totally unlike anywhere in England. Anything goes out here; there are no limits.”

Oly flitted back and forth to the UK over the summer festival season and is likely to be back in the autumn to coincide with the album’s October release. Initially underwhelming, with studious listening Attic Thieves becomes a fascinating piece of work from the London/Oxford band, managing to achieve an eerie atmospheric mood within traditional(ish) instrumental confines. However, despite the fact their marketing paints them as such, and Oly appeared in The Mighty Boosh in that scene when they attempted to combine glam with folk, he shies away from the confounded F-word.

“I love folk and traditional music from all over the world, but we’re not a folk band,” he explains. “There are a lot of other things coming into the music. I don’t even know what folk is... it’s this word that gets thrown around endlessly. Maybe it means a directness or a rawness or an honesty and, if that’s the case, I’d be flattered to be called folk. But, at the same time, there are all these clichés of what it is.”

Oly himself hails from London, presumably where he became best buds with Noel Fielding, while the rest of his band come from Oxford. The Ralfe Band decamped to a tiny Oxfordshire village to record Attic Thieves, confirming Oly’s proclivity to seek inspiration in changes of scenery.

“It was easier to work there than in London,” he says. “No one manages to record an album in London these days without a million pounds.”

And despite his association with the Boosh, it can never be said Oly is a scenester. That of London, Oxford and his current more cosmopolitan base, hasn’t touched his music, which has a good claim at timelessness.

“We didn’t have much to do with the Oxford scene, although I know there is one, with Young Knives and Foals,” Oly says. “Let’s just say it’s not quite as vibrant as Berlin.”

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