Ruffing it

Canadian band Born Ruffians thought getting a record deal would lead to a charmed, all-expenses-paid life. Now they know success comes slowly, through non-stop tours and "merch sales" - as well as their infectious indie-pop, they tell Jim Carroll

THE REALITY check came early in their career. Steve Hamelin remembers those halycon days when he and his fellow Born Ruffians were sorting out their heads, listening to Puff Daddy and dreaming their big dreams at the back of the class in their Ontario high school.

"When we started out, we thought you got signed to a label, got paid a salary and got sent around the world by them, all expenses paid, to play bigger and bigger shows," the drummer chuckles. "We really thought that was how it worked."

Such illusions had been shattered by the time Hamelin, Luke LaLonde and Mitch Derosier had decamped to Toronto to get their career going in earnest. Born Ruffians quickly discovered that things were a little different for new bands in the early years of the 21st century.

"As we got to know other bands," says Hamelin, "they put us right. I don't think any of us realised how hard it would be or that you have to hit the same city three or four times before you noticed an increase in your audience."

But those crowds are growing - once people get a taste of Born Ruffians, they want more. Their debut album, Red, Yellow & Blue,a set of exuberant and breezy songs that pull in all those classic indie directions, easily wins you over with its slapdash scoops of cocky charm and daft-as-a-brush giddiness. It's fantastic, bubbly pop music.

Born Ruffians were in Ireland recently, touring with fellow Canadians Caribou. They may look like kids, but these are road-tested Ruffians, a band who've done their growing up in front of audiences at home, across the US and now, in Europe.

Such non-stop touring doesn't come cheap.

"We do enough to get by," Hamelin admits, "but we lose money on touring when we come over to Europe. You have to accept that you'll lose money on the first couple of tours. As you go on, though, hopefully more and more people will come out to see you. Our last US tour was a co-headliner with Cadence Weapon, and the pay was a little better. You have to keep working at it until you can afford to do your own thing."

The new reality is that the real money comes from being on the road, making the end-of-night cash count at the merchandise stall especially important.

"How well we get by comes down to the amount of T-shirts and CDs we sell every night. But that's difficult because you really want to keep them reasonably priced. I mean, what's the point of having a CD for sale at a higher price at a show than in the local record shop? 'Merch' is the most important thing we have on the road because it buys us food and gas for the next day."

Of course, the band could go cap in hand to their label. But they know where that could lead in the longer run.

"A band is like a small business, and you're really in partnership with the label. The more money you get from the label at the start, the more money you owe back at the end. Even if the label threw loads of money at us - as support for this tour with Caribou, for example - you're only going to end up owing it back to them at some stage. If you can raise funds on your own through touring and T-shirt sales, it's much better."

Born Ruffians are signed to Warp, a label better known in the main for its eclectic electronic roster than indie acts.

"Warp weren't the very first label to come to us, but they were the first international label to get interested in us. We were talking to one label in Toronto, and then Warp came along and changed everything. The fact that they were interested made us realise that this could be a bigger thing than we expected.

"The other good thing about Warp is that it is 100 per cent independent, and they do their own thing. There are lots of labels who may not be called Sony or EMI, but they're backed by Sony or EMI."

Hamelin has some interesting observations to make about the state of play in Toronto's music scene. While many outsiders may feel that everything is rosy in the garden, Born Ruffians had different experiences with the local labels.

"Business-wise, Toronto can be very incestuous. For instance, Arts & Crafts was started by Broken Social Scene, and they've gone on to sign all the individual members of the band to record deals. So unless you have an in with Arts & Crafts through Broken Social Scene, it's very hard to get their attention. We had signed with Warp before they even asked to hear a demo."

Other Toronto labels are also shunning the new wave of bands. Hamelin puts this down to a generation gap.

"Most of those other acts are older and they all know each other," he says. "The generational thing is why you will see lots of younger Canadian bands looking abroad for a label. There just isn't a label in the city who are equipped or willing to put out records by these new bands and help them step up to the next level."

Red, Yellow & Blue is out now on Warp. For more, see  www.myspace.com/bornruffians