Check out our interview with indie-rock innovators – Ali In The Jungle!
For the unfortunate few who don’t know who you are, would you mind introducing yourselves?
Ali In The Jungle: We’re Ali In The Jungle, a 4 piece from Milton Keynes (UK). We combine sharp wit with raw supercharged piano, indie rock, progressive and post-punk revival styles, and love swapping instruments, genres, and jumpers in front of live audiences.
In the effort of getting to know each other better – if you could be a sandwich, what sandwich would you be?
Ali In The Jungle: Coronation chicken. You don’t think the combinations should work together, but they do so well. We’re all very different musicians stylistically, with loves for different genres. Also we’re great fun at street parties.
Tell us about your latest release…
Ali In The Jungle: We released our debut EP Anyway back in February. It’s an upbeat mix of styles, incorporating post-punk, glam, blues, and classical guitar, all into our indie/alternative style with pulse pounding piano, and banterous lyrics, exploring social hypocrisies and paradoxes.
We’ve also released a video for our track ‘Drunk Generation’, which we made in lockdown; critics are calling it a ‘DIY (Drink It Yourself) Subterranean Homesick Blues’.
Have you had much chance to tour?
Ali In The Jungle: We’ve been doing an EP mini-tour in the UK, but it’s been cut short for the moment due to COVID-19. We’re looking forward to the reopening of venues, and continuing our tour, albeit without the festival dates which have been cancelled/postponed till next year.
The highlight so far was when we supported ‘drunk folk’ artist Beans On Toast. Watch the full gig here.
Have you got any crazy tour stories you can share with the world?
Ali In The Jungle: This is the most middle-class anecdote, but here goes… We were in some competition or something, and we ended up having breakfast with our local MP and his assistant. This was years ago, back when we were more interested in our HP Sauce than the Houses of Parliament, but yeah, a seriously bizarre morning by all accounts.
Here at Upside Down Shark we discuss a wide breadth of pop-culture, including music, movies, TV, video games and the like. So with that in mind, if you could have a track featured in anything, what would it be?
Ali In The Jungle: A bloodied Tarantino scene.
Name one thing on your band bucket list
Ali In The Jungle: Gotta be to go on Celebrity Pointless one day. I was gonna say to play in New York or at Glastonbury or something, but more bands have done that than have been on Celebrity Pointless and we like to pave the way.
What would be your inspirational quote to share with the world?
Ali In The Jungle: “Do the opposite” is our mantra. Whenever we get stuck writing, we try the opposite of what we’d expect to come next and it’s always worked.
What does the rest of 2020 have in store for you?
Ali In The Jungle: Two more video releases! ‘I Don’t Even Know You’ on the 17th July, and ‘People Change’ later in the year, so keep an eye on our YouTube.
We’re also writing the music for a short film by Chloe Kennedy called Making Waves, which will be on BBC iPlayer!
Also keep up to date with us via our Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.
What’s your favourite shark?
Ali In The Jungle: Bruce from Finding Nemo. That whole alcoholic’s anomalous joke in that section is incredible, and a reminder to some that “fish are friends, not food”… They’d definitely like our song ‘Drunk Generation’.
Many thanks to Ali In The Jungle for sitting down to chat with us. Listen to their debut EP!
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