Interview: Veiled (FKA The Nocturnal)

Liverpool-based post-punk band Veiled (FKA The Nocturnal) recently played a lively headline set at Nottingham’s The Mist Rolling Inn, concluding a long night of various Goth and Goth-adjacent artists. Their set mixed a range of memorable original tracks with excellent covers of post-punk classics like Transmission and Spellbound, culminating in an unplanned but energetic encore performance of their debut single, Girlblend. Characterised by haunting vocals, tight musicianship, an atmospheric guitar tone layered with flanger and distortion, and occasional off-stage dancing, their set made for an unforgettable end to the night. Having just arrived in Nottingham, Izzy (vocals), Adam (guitar), Isabella (drums), Bea (bass), and Taylor (keys) all sat down for a brief interview.

The first question a lot of people ask in interviews is about inspiration, and what bands have influenced your music. I was wondering what bands you would rather die than be associated with?

Isabella: That’s a really good question!

Izzy: Oasis.

Adam: Oasis!

Isabella: Oh, I agree.

Taylor: Aw, poor Oasis.

Adam: Especially because we’re based in Liverpool, any of the Liverpool indie scene, just the copy and paste-

Izzy: [interrupting] alright don’t get us cancelled!

Izzy: What’s that band, [redacted], because they have that paedophile.

Isabella: Oh yeah, any bands with paedos in it honestly.

Adam: That’s always a good answer! That’s a long list.

Isabella: That is a long list, yeah. And unfortunately, some of them make good music.

Izzy: [to Bea] I feel like you should have an answer for it.

Isabella: Yeah, come on Bea!

Bea: Fuck the Beatles.

Adam: I like the Beatles!

Isabella: Ok, basic bitch.

Izzy: They’ve got Paul Mcartney though…

More of a [Rolling] Stones person?

Isabella: I’m more of a Stones person I’d say.

Have you by any chance heard that The University of Nottingham is ditching its music course soon?

Isabella: it is?

This is a trend with a lot of unis, and I was wondering what your experience has been of music underfunding generally, and how it has impacted your journey?

Adam: I think you only really see the tip of it when the course is getting cancelled, but you see the little bits of it every day, when it’s the venues being shut down, or the bands not being paid. If you’re just walking by on your high street, it’s not right there in your face, but as you get into it you do notice. Like little things, and eventually they creep up and become big problems.

Taylor: My college in Wigan has stopped doing their BTEC courses for music, so now they only have A Level music, where they used to have music technology and music performance. If I didn’t have music technology going into Uni, I would’ve had no idea what I was doing, and I think it’s really upsetting that they don’t do it anymore, because like, people don’t value music education because they don’t realise that—like yes it’s informal employment, and yes there’s like a lot of gap between what people are earning, but without that education you’re not gonna get anywhere, because how are you supposed to know how to do things?

What is your assessment of the current UK goth scene, whether just in Liverpool, or countrywide?

Isabella: It’s not massive in Liverpool. There’s like club nights, once every two months. It’s not great. We haven’t seen it be massive—maybe we just haven’t been to the right places.

Adam: The best way to describe it, is that there are little covens, if that makes

sense? Little pockets of it, but it’s not like a big overarching thing, not in

Liverpool at least.

Izzy: I feel like the further we go North, the bigger it is.

What is next for the Nocturnal?

Isabella: Album.

Izzy: Suicide pact.

Adam: The drive home probably.

Isabella: [sarcastically] that’s hilarious. But yeah, we’re recording an album.

Music-wise, it’ll be that…

[The others laugh]

Isabella: These guys can’t take anything seriously!

Taylor: We’re still recording vocals, aren’t we?

Izzy: Yeah. We’re doing an album, and hopefully a UK tour. And hopefully… success!

Isabella: And then we can get round to… the Grammys, and then we can smash the Grammy and be like “fuck the Grammys”.

Taylor: Fuck the Grammys!

Adam: I can’t wait to go into rehab.

Isabella: It’ll probably be me or Bea in rehab let’s be honest.

Izzy: [to the band] biopic?

Isabella: Biopic, yeah.

Adam: I wanna be played by Denzel Washington…

Tarot, the debut single by Veiled, is available to stream on Bandcamp

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Sami De Jong

Images by Grace Edwards

Edited by Liz Clarke