Words by Dan Keeling Noble Rot Photographs by meets ecstatic synth- SHOOT FROM THE CHIP SHOOT Benjamin McMahon poppers Hot Chip “Gordon Ramsay used to cook here a long time ago,” says Hot Chip’s Joe Goddard, reading the menu at Chez Bruce in Wandsworth. “When I last ate here, a friend from uni was working in the kitchen and I absolutely loved it.” To Joe’s left, fellow band member Al Doyle is enjoying his first drink of the evening – Vouette & Sorbée ‘Saignée de Sorbée’ Champagne – after a day rehearsing in a nearby studio for the band’s imminent support headline slot at Hackney’s All Points East festival. With their new album heralding a high point in their long career (it’s their seventh), the aptly titled A Bath Full of Ecstasy has a blend Dan Keeling: Do you cook at home? Joe Goddard: I cook all the time. I’ve got a Green of synth melodies, bouncing house basslines Egg barbecue and cook a lot of seafood, as well as buying a lot of nice wines from Bottle Apostle to try and soulful vocals that makes it one of our to pair with it. I’m interested in the weirder side of wine. This Vouette & Sorbée reminds me of a records of the year at Rotter Towers. Imagine delicious sparkling red from near Barcelona that I’ve been drinking recently called La Rosita by Pamela Geddes. It’s dry and fruity: it tastes like sparkling Erasure jamming with Daft Punk, Laid Back and Ribena to me, and I’m into that! Frankie Knuckles in a lift, and you might be Al Doyle: It’s delicious and quite unusual – it almost tastes like Pét-Nat rather than Champagne. somewhere close. Noble Rot meets confirmed DK: What’s the house speciality chez Chip? gastronauts Joe and Al for dinner (with wines JG: Lots of Thai and Asian seafood: scallops, from some of our favourite vignerons at prawns, chillies and herbs. DK: What three bottles would you recommend for this year’s La Dive Bouteille, see ‘Going someone just getting into wine? Underground’, p18) to talk street food, enforced AD: I would go classic: a Mosse Anjou is a great Top: Joe Goddard and Al Doyle, Chez Bruce, entry wine, or if you're spending a bit more, then a 22 May 2019. Above: Vouette & Sorbée Saumur from Domaine Guiberteau, or something fun and appreciating the smell of Play-Doh ‘Saignée de Sorbée’ 30 Noble Rot 31 Noble Rot from Stéphane Bernaudeau. Fred Cossard is also making amazing wines in Burgundy. JG: I like lot of Spanish stuff, so maybe a white Priorat from Terroir al Limit. AD: If we’re talking about Spain, we can’t forget Els Jelipins – they make an amazing red and rosé. DK: When did you get into wine? AD: Around the time I started playing with James Murphy in LCD Soundsystem. We were introduced to it through our friend Justin Chearno, who is kind of like patient zero for natural wine in New York. Justin now works at James’s restaurant The Four Horsemen, and was among the first to bring natural wines into Brooklyn in the mid-2000s. He was very evangelical and influential on our little friendship group. JG: Justin’s interesting, because he comes from a punk background. AD: Yes, he was in punk bands for years and then fell in love with wine, and then convinced everyone else they should get into it, too. In those days, Frank Cornelissen was a big gateway wine for us, as was JP Robinot, but as time has gone on we have all moved away a little from the really ‘out there’ natural stuff. The wine philosophy at Noble Rot is very similar to The Four Horseman – it’s balanced, not making a virtue of being super weird. “I have a lot of respect for these elder DK: Is there’s something about natural wine culture that connects with people who are into punk? statesmen of rock like Neil Young and JG: Totally. People are like: “You have to listen Paul Weller, but sometimes it feels that to this, man. I’m going to sit you down.” AD: We did this cruise at Coachella festival in as people’s careers progress, they get Palm Springs a few years ago, and James and Justin did a wine tasting. They were describing it super into the details of the guitar they as going searching for tiny independent record labels. They were saying: “The grape is like the play and the type of amp they’re using. instrument, and the producer is like the artist. The cuvée is like the song.” It kinda works. You have to fight that.” DK: I see you’re playing Glastonbury festival Joe Goddard, Hot Chip this year. JG: It’s the highlight of our year, for sure. It’s always Opposite page: Al Doyle and Joe Goddard, great fun. One of the last times we went, I was DJing Hot Chip. Above: new album 32 Noble Rot 33 Noble Rot and played a Dimitri from Paris edit of Prince, Play-Doh and thinking it was amazing – and then which starts off with a live version of I Wanna Be the next day we were due to play at 4pm, and I woke Your Lover and sounds like an actual gig. You can up at 5pm. I looked at my phone and had that hear the crowd screaming, and Prince starting the moment of “this can’t be the actual time because tune-up on piano. My friend was in the toilet and that means that I’ve slept through our gig”. a really drunk guy was weeing next to him, who But that’s what I’d done. heard this track come on mid-wee and thought Prince was doing a surprise live show on the Park Al: When Joe called me after the show, I’ve never stage and ran down the hill with his trousers still heard anyone sound so haunted. “How did it down. [Laughs] go? What did you do?” [Laughs] “It was fine. It was fine.” DK: What’s the favourite gig that you’ve played? 2017 Suertes del Marqués ‘Vidonia’ AD: Hollywood Bowl was great. And the Other is poured … Stage at Glastonbury was a really big one. It was definitely the biggest crowd that we’ve ever played 100 per cent Listán Blanco on clay soils in the to, nearly 50,000 people. You couldn’t see the back Orotava Valley in Tenerife (See ‘Return to of the crowd. Sender’, p72) DK: Have you ever been too incapacitated to play? AD: I like this a lot. It’s got a bit of creaminess to it, and smells much more like the earth than it JG: I was just thinking about this the other day, does fruit. Talking about island wines, I really because I smelled some Play-Doh. We were like Occhipinti on Sicily and Gabrio Bini on booked at Lovebox Festival years ago, and the night Pantelleria, too. before we did a great show at Somerset House, and then had a party. After that, we went back to my Jean-Pierre Robinot ‘Lumière de Silex’ house, stayed up far too late – I remember smelling 2003 and 2004 are poured … We last drank 2004 Lumière de Silex (100 per cent Chenin Blanc) with Brian Eno in December 2014 for issue 7, who commented, “It’s completely mad and confirms my feeling that I am a thrill-seeker. It’s like Christmas wine with its aromas of fruitcake.” How will it fare four and a half years on? JG: This 2004 doesn’t really smell much like wine to me. It smells more like a spirit – Calvados! The 2003 has got a Manzanilla-like vibe to it. Very saline and buttery. AD: Both wines are still very fresh. I would drink the 2003 earlier in the evening, and the 2004 towards the end. It would be hard for anything to follow this! It’s interesting to see how different they look to each other, being just a year apart. I’ve been a fan of Robinot for a while now. Loire Valley whites probably make up 70 per cent of what I usually drink. Quite a lot of these guys are moving away from the more wild and crazy cuvées that they would make seven or eight years ago towards a more classical style. I had Patrick Sullivan [Austra- lian winemaker] staying with me recently, whose From top: 2017 Suertes de Marqués ‘Vidonia’, Jean-Pierre Robinot ‘Lumière de Silex’ 2003 and 2004 34 Noble Rot 35 Noble Rot wines I’ve liked for a long time. He used to make perfect musician – he does it without knowing the wines that tasted almost like cocktails, like rules, and breaking the rules. I’m kind of the same. “I hate enforced fun [in restaurants]. Negronis. He had one that was called ‘Haggis’ On the other hand, Al comes from a background that was super bitter, but it wasn’t so good with of playing in orchestras and can play pretty much It either happens or it doesn’t, and I don’t food. But the wines he produces now are much anything. But there’s a lot of respect for that kind closer to classic Beaujolais, Burgundies or of Neanderthal punk approach in the band. It’s not want someone hovering around telling whatever. There’s been a move to a more classic as if people put each other down for not knowing style with guys who have been around for a long the right chords.