Why Third Man Signees YAK Are Yet To Meet Label Boss Jack White

As we settle around a table and pour a jug of beer into three pots, two thirds of YAK - frontman Oli Burslem and bassist Andy Jones - discuss having known each other since childhood. "We were sat in a van so much last year trying to get this band off the ground and it's good just to be kind of sat in silence," Burslem shares of how comfortable they are in each other's presence.

I know, right? Doesn't Burslem look like a young, hot Mick Jagger! Well, in the flesh, his face is so incredibly animated as he tells stories - ginormous eyes darting about and a lip-reader's dream mouth - that he'd be a shoo-in if they were auditioning for a new Mulligrubs face. He's not here today, but when you clap eyes on YAK's drummer, Elliot Rawson, you'll swear he's related to Jack White (he's not). YAK's No EP, produced by Pulp's Steve Mackey, was released on White's Third Man Records late last year. So have the band been to Third Man HQ in Nashville? "No, I'd like to," Burslem admits. And have they met Mister White? "Never met Mister White, no. To be honest, we saw [The] White Stripes in Wolverhampton and it was amazin'... But we're into us at the moment and we don't care about anything else. And I'd love to meet him, it would be nice to go down there, but it'd also be nice to go to Tenerife and have a nice holiday. But we need to focus on ourselves." Jones offers, "If it happens it happens."

"It would be nice to go down there [to meet Jack White], but it'd also be nice to go to Tenerife and have a nice holiday."

While Jones has a calm presence, Burslem buzzes with natural exuberance. The frontman rearranges his bucket hat constantly, taking it off and placing it on the table in front of him and then putting it back on his head. "I don't think we feel like we deserve to be here," he mentions, sincerely. "I mean, the majority of our lives we've been told we're shit at everything, d'ya know wha' I mean? So this time I feel like we've been given this opportunity and we shouldn't take it for granted, and we should do everything we can."

The dudes are definitely not scenesters, even though they certainly look the part. "I enjoy going to the local pub and just having a chat with some old dudes, or whoever," Burlsem chuckles. "That's my thing." Burlsem also has zero care factor as to whether or not he's viewed as "cool". "My definition of cool is someone who's not affected by their surroundings and doesn't try to be anything else except for themselves around any situation. You could drop Andy in Africa and I'm sure he wouldn't change." Jones laughs while Burlsem adds, "Me? Probably I would."

How bloody awesome is it when you experience a band live for the very-first time and leave the gig pinging, feeling as if you've just witnessed the future of music. YAK live are dangerous. You don't know whether you'll escape without being smacked in the face by a guitar fragment, but wouldn't give up your front-row posi even if someone held a gun to your head. There's no fourth wall at a YAK gig. "It's not just the band," Burslem stresses. "It's the band and the people who watch it, and the combination of the two makes it really exciting." Such was the case at the back-to-back YAK gigs we attended at CMJ in New York last year, the first as part of an NME showcase at Santos Party House, the second at Mercury Lounge. We discuss the Mercury Lounge gig and Burlsem recalls, "I got in a bit of an argument at the second show - with the sound man. I think I said something along the lines of, 'You should be ashamed of yourself'." Jones pipes up in Burslem's defence: "He was a bit shite, wasn't he?"

The band didn't manage to catch any shows by other artists while at CMJ but Burslem suddenly remembers, "We got that fine for drinking booze on the street!" Jones confirms, "Yeah, we got done." Burslem: "But I haven't paid it." To Jones: "You've paid." Jones defends, "Well I did, 'cause I thought [in the] future — coming through [US Customs]." So tell us about the incident that led to the fines? Burslem details, "Literally out of the thing - WHOOP! [Police siren sound effect] Just us three in the band, just walking down the street..." Jones interjects, "First night. We just arrived." Burslem continues, "We were in a bit of a mood 'cause we were all just spaced out and I was like, 'I'm gonna get a beer'. Walk in, like, crack a beer and then we all walk out individually going [impersonates a zombie drinking a beer]. And then it's like, [siren sound effect again]." They were fined 25 dollars a pop.

"I was starting to piss off Elliot, the drummer, 'Come on!'/'No, you're out of time'/'No, I'm always right!'/'Whatever, I'm always right'/'You're always right'."

Post-CMJ, there was a bit of a wait before YAK's No EP dropped, but at least there was a video of its title track to stalk. "That song, unless we give it all our energy and really attack it, it's just nothing," Burslem reckons. "But that song - at some of our gigs it's gone for ten minutes!"

Some trepidation preceded clicking the mouse on "play all" of our personal watermark stream of YAK's debut album, Alas Salvation; just 'cause it's so difficult to capture the essence of great live bands on record. But YAK have worked out how to get the best out of their performances in the studio: "Gettin' angry, pissin' each other off," Jones laughs. Case in point, recording standout album track Curtain Twitcher, during which Burslem reveals his guitar work was inspired by Glaswegian band Fire Engines. After feeling like they were "a bit complacent" in the studio, Burslem confesses, "I was getting more and more pissed off... then we started getting a bit agro. And I was starting to piss off Elliot, the drummer, 'Come on!'/'No, you're out of time'/'No, I'm always right!'/'Whatever, I'm always right'/'You're always right'." Jones contributes, "There was a certain anger in the room."

"More and more anger and then we did another [take] and it was like, 'FAAAAAaaaa,' and I'm like, 'Oh, that's it! Perfect. Got it!'"

Reflecting on this 'technique' for capturing "that live thing", Burslem observes, "I think Steve [producer] was a bit, 'Eh? What's happening 'ere?'"

Mackey also produced YAK's debut album and the lads first met him when they did an exclusive performance for online streaming show, Call This Number. "Basically, what they were trying to do is do something that was streamed live," Burslem tells. "They record it and stream it live and you have to log on it at a certain time. And you have to watch it once and then it gets deleted... They were just filming it and doing the sound mix at the same time. It was just in this garage, it was all DIY."

After YAK's Call This Number performance, Burslem says, "We came out soaked in sweat... And then we were excited by [the performance] - and it's very rare you get excited by yourself - so we were like, 'Wow! That's exciting! And that's what kind of music I like, just rough and ready. And then Steve said he wanted to do some recording, and he said from the start, 'This should be the blueprint... We shouldn't get too fancy about it. It should sound like that'."

"He knew exactly the kind of direction we all kind of wanted," Jones praises.