“Do I ever feel the need to breakout the shred? Absolutely. All the time”: Meet Lime Garden’s Leila Deeley – the UK guitarist refreshing indie-pop with a heavy-strung Jaguar and a $30 fuzz pedal
Lime Garden's pop sound is lush and heady but at the heart of it lies a secret shredder who got a taste for the instrument listening to Black Sabbath and the Doors. We'll let Deeley explain it...
(Image credit: Björn Buddenbohm)
UK-based Lime Garden mash up a unique mix of alternative, rock and electronic influences to create their own special sauce of indie-flavored pop with attitude.
Guitarist Leila Deeley’s lush sonic textures are the bedrock upon which the band’s sound is built – never showboating, always keenly aware that the song is king. They’ve just released their debut album, One More Thing, an effervescent concoction of instant pop classics.
What got you into playing?
“My parents are huge music fans, although they don’t play instruments themselves. I’d hear their music, which ranged from Black Sabbath – I loved Tony Iommi – and the Doors to indie music, and I absorbed it all.
“I started to play when I was seven on a scaled-down Strat copy. I had lessons when I was young, and I picked it up really quickly. My first serious guitar was a Gibson Les Paul, though I rarely play it now.
“I’ve been playing a Strat for about six years; the whammy bar became a huge part of our sound. Recently, I got a really beautiful Jaguar, which I put quite heavy strings on – .11 or .12 on the E – to thicken up my sound a little.
“We’ve been getting a lot of support from Fender; they helped me out by changing the bridge on the Jag for a Jazzmaster bridge, as it felt more secure for bending.”
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Lime Garden tracks like Pop Star and Mother are a million miles away from Black Sabbath. Do you ever feel the urge to break out the shred?
“Absolutely. All the time. [Laughs] I have long periods where I’ll spend a lot of time playing at home, working on technique, and that really fires me up as a player, but I suppose I do see myself as a songwriter. I really like playing slide guitar, though I still don’t feel quite ready to bring that to our live shows.”
You released 11 singles before the first album came out. Was that a deliberate game plan?
“We were nervous about the idea of making an album for a long time, as we’d never been in a studio for more than a couple of days. We spent two weeks recording the album, and it was really exciting; it was always our dream to make an album. We’d had most of the songs already written for a long time, so we knew them inside out.”
“I have a Roland Space Echo, which is on all the time for a slap-back effect, as is a TC Electronic Hall of Fame Reverb. I recently bought a Rat distortion pedal for super crunch when I need it. I also use an MXR overdrive and a Behringer Super Fuzz, which is my all-time favorite fuzz. It was really cheap, too – about $30. I run everything through a Fender Hot Rod Deluxe.”
Everyone in the band seems to have widely disparate influences. How does that work with songwriting?
“What we’ve been able to do is home in on where our various Venn diagrams intersect and use that as the core of what we do. We’ve played together for a few years and we’re all comfortable bringing in ideas. One of us might think something is rubbish, but someone else will often see the potential in it – from a different perspective.”
Mark is a freelance writer with particular expertise in the fields of ‘70s glam, punk, rockabilly and classic ‘50s rock and roll. He sings and plays guitar in his own musical project, Star Studded Sham, which has been described as sounding like the hits of T. Rex and Slade as played by Johnny Thunders. He had several indie hits with his band, Private Sector and has worked with a host of UK punk luminaries. Mark also presents themed radio shows for Generating Steam Heat. He has just completed his first novel, The Bulletproof Truth, and is currently working on the sequel.
