The Clockworks

Look up. Look around you. What do you see? A row of commuters, lost in their phones. People in pubs looking at small screens, sat under bigger screens. We were sold the possibility of infinite connection, but all it really did was pull us further apart. Because in the modern world, there’s no more alluring temptress than technology and she’s rarely, truly on your side.When Galway-born, London-based alternative quartet The Clockworks wrapped up touring for their debut album, 2023’s ‘Exit Strategy’, they concluded a game-changing period of their lives that was buoyed by a greater sense of community than ever. That record had cemented the importance of their move to the capital. Not only had it led to them working with Bernard Butler on the album, but it had also set off a domino chain of pinch-me events that saw them tick off support tours with some of their heroes. In 2022, they were taken on the road in the US by Pixies; last year, they wrapped up a string of dateswith Johnny Marr. The latter was so enraptured by the band that he would wander around the venue corridors, loudly singing their songs. “We were playing with these people who are the reason we play music. It makes you feel like you've realised somethingthat you always wanted to do as a musician: forming bands, making albums, being able to shake the hands of people who’ve meant so much to you and tell them that,” recallsTom Freeman. It was a monumental time for The Clockworks -completed by James McGregor, Sean Connelly, and Damian Greaney -but when they stepped back into the writing room, they soon had the instinct to turn their focus elsewhere. The new material that swiftly began pouring out of McGregor was rooted in a very clear and distinct world that looked outside of their creative bubble and saw a society wrestling with an increasing isolation born from shiny new toys and bright lights.The framework of ‘The Entertainment’ came intuitively and fast. “We had this really strong identity for the album from the start,” explains McGregor, “which meant that we could then spend so much time on the details. It’s like if you have all the beats of the film, then you can tell the actors to go and improv between them.” The Clockworks are calling their second record not so much a concept album as -cleverly -“a work of friction”. “Friction is the best word because the whole album seems to be filled with push and pull, black and white,” continues Freeman. “There's such a conflict and contrast between everything. Even just recording the music, we did it all separately and then put it back together.”In stark contrast to their debut, which had been laid down with Butler in a flurry of activity, running on snap decisions with no time to look back, ‘The Entertainment’ was produced by Sean Connelly, recorded over a period of monthsand using almost meta techniques to mirror the jarring conceits inside. “We had the idea to record in a way that was in keeping with what the album is talking about, and to try and do itin isolation completely. We wanted creatively to turn in and see what we could do without anyone looking at it,as a trust fall exercise for the four of us,” explains McGregor. Not only would the band eschew any outside voices, they would also