A car park beside a children’s playground in Porthmadog in the pissing rain was hardly the obvious meeting place for an interview; indeed, waiting there like a lemon for Estella, I felt more like a gangster than a journalist. Mine was the only car in that sodden patch of tarmac until Estella guitarist Asa pulled alongside, to be joined ten minutes latter by a van containing his brother –Estella’s other guitarist, Kaz – and their sister, the vocally gifted Lauren Bentham. Yes, she of Best Female Vocalist in Wales fame, voted such in the 2001 Radio Cymru Rock And Pop Awards. Such a surreptitious meeting as this had me subconsciously peering nervously through the rain for violin cases…
As we dried out over a pint at a cosy pub overlooking Porthmadog harbour, I discovered that the trio have another sister who also sings; in fact she’d sung with Estella at last year’s Eisteddfod but had eventually “chickened out”, according to Lauren. Four family members in one band? You do know I’m going to have to call you the Welsh Partridge Family, don’t you?
Kaz grins. “Yeah, well, in the past we’ve been called The Osmonds…”
The band grew up alongside Anweledig in Blaenau Ffestiniog – in fact, bassist Rob’s brother is none other than Anweledig’s keyboard player, Joe. “We grew up playing football together and fighting each other,” says Asa of the two bands’ relationship. Perhaps it was inevitable, then, that the Benthams would go on to make their own music, although 21 year old Lauren insists her brothers had been hassling her for years to sing.
Kaz explains: “I knew Lauren had a good voice. I was just waiting for her to mature. Waiting for her tits to grow! She used to be a pole so I was just waiting for the pole to start sprouting! But we knew her voice was good.”
In 1998, their first year together as a band, Estella played mainly covers, acoustically, with bongos, although at that point the band was made up of just three members – Lauren, Kaz and mental drummer Phil. Eventually Rob and Asa joined, and in August 1998 Estella played to a rapt Eisteddfod audience that contained none other than the WBW team.
These days the band’s fans include a certain extremely famous Welsh opera singer who very much enjoyed Estella’s performance at the Rock and Pop Awards.
“The memory of the awards is like a complete dream,” grins Lauren. “This woman – I don’t know who she was – she was sitting with Bryn Terfel and he was watching us and she came up to us and said ‘Bryn really liked you, he thought you were really good.’ I was like, oh my God, oh my God! When I told my gran she was out there boasting to all her friends! It was mad, really mad.”
Having been blessed with a very distinctive and ballsy voice, is Lauren influenced by any of Wales’ other well known female vocalists such as Cerys or Andrea Parker?
“I can’t say Catatonia really, no,” Lauren admits. “But I’m influenced by Andrea because I know her now, and I’m influenced by her because she’s so clever. I’d love to have her knowledge.”
Could you see yourself doing the pop star bit? Going to the Met Bar and all the other things that supposedly go with megastardom?
“I don’t think stardom necessarily comes with that sort of lifestyle,” Asa muses. “You don’t have to… I know if you get signed to a record label you’re expected to, but…”
Okay then, say EMI offered you a deal on condition you move to London. Could you do that?
“I would,” says Lauren without hesitation, “and I think these two would as well. Phil definitely would – in fact, he’d probably be there before us!”
Drummer Phil – who bears an uncanny resemblance to Animal from The Muppets – shares his time between Estella and his other band, Mim Twm Llai, whose singer/guitarist is Anweledig’s guitarist Gai, who it turns out wrote Estella’s most well known song, “Dwisho Byw Yn Y Saithdegau” (I Want To Live In The Seventies).
“He didn’t think it suited Anweledig’s style so he reckoned it would suit us,” says Lauren.
“He was at our house one night, jamming, and said ‘I’ve got this song, it’s not really us’ so he played it and we thought it sounded good,” explains Kaz. “It was never a recorded song, he just played it and sung it to us.”
To say the song was more Estella’s ‘style’ is in itself a bit of a gamble, because true to many North Wales bands, Estella don‘t seem to stick to one musical genre. They’re definitely funky, often jazzy, occasionally quite poppy, yet in a bizarre twist their live set contains an amazing ska version of the old Welsh hymn Calon Lân… How do they explain that?
“We’re influenced by a lot of different styles of music,” says Kaz, “not just individual bands. If you want to go into individual bands then maybe Pink Floyd, Red Hot Chilli Peppers, all kinds of jazz, Bob Marley…”
You can hear the jazzy bits and the reggae bits, yes, but there’s… well, there’s something else, isn’t there? Something quite indefinable that makes Estella what they are.
Kaz’s reply is vague: “The range of music we all listen to is pretty varied. There’s something good in nearly every bit of music you listen to, really…”
When it comes to the ambitions question, Asa’s answer confirms what I’ve suspected all along: Estella are perhaps the least egocentric bunch of utter non-arseholes I’ve had the pleasure of interviewing in many a moon. “I’d like to just be able to make a living out of it really,” he says, “to be able to live comfortably. If you’re able to live comfortably out of it, and you’re a bit famous, then that’ll do.”
If there’s anything left to be said about this gorgeous band, it’s probably best left to the band themselves to say it. “We’re a young, vibrant bunch of musicians willing to give it a crack,” smiles Asa. “It’s always been our dream to be famous for being competent musicians. We want to have a professional look about us. And we are getting professional…”
Kaz laughs. “And we’re good looking… well, apart from Phil!”
Asa smiles knowingly: “Ahh, but there’s only one Phil… thank God!” |
