We heard that there was a new exhibition documenting Aubrey Beardsley and his contemporaries over at the Dulwich Picture Gallery. An enthused James Read went down with punk delicacies The Violets.

Having a well-publicised edge of tragedy in your life isn’t essential to making good art, but it certainly helps with the notoriety. If the London Lite was around at the end of the nineteenth century, I’m pretty sure they would have been documenting tuberculosis-victim Aubrey Beardsley’s spectacularly furious career. Being well-aware of the fatality of his condition, he raced to complete as much work as possible before dying at 25 from the consumption. Much cooler than smack, as celebrity deaths go.

Of similar youthful exuberance were the brothers Detmold, who were exhibited at the Royal Academy at 13, and later commissioned to illustrate Kipling’s The Jungle Book, before one of them (Maurice) gassed himself on chloroform, also at the tender age of 25.

I don’t want to gush too much, but I’m so genuinely enraptured by the almost unbelievable detail and evident artisan skill in the work displayed, that I find it tricky remembering to actually ask The Violets many questions. I know I should get a grip. I mean, it’s just some century-old ink illustrations and watercolours. It’s nowhere near as edgy as lights flicking on and off in empty rooms.

Having given the exhibition the once, twice and thrice-over, I pull myself the fuck together, remember it’s just art, and get down to the business of having a chat with the band. The Violets have been around for about three years now, and released an album in November. They are currently touring to promote this. They just got back from a tour in Germany, which they tell me went rather well. One Hamburg fan was so enthused that he ran home and drew a cartoon documenting his experience. So they’ll be going back there soon.

Trying their best to look moody in the face of a raucous gaggle of school kids on a gallery trip

Their musical style has changed greatly over the time they’ve been together, Joe (guitarist) tells me. They started out a lot more “loose, brash and simple”, with a lot more distorted guitar and shouting. Basically they weren’t half as good at playing together. Kind of makes sense that you’d get better over time though, or I guess they’d have split up… They’ve recently expanded their instrument repertoire with a bassist and a bit of synth action, which I am told came together particularly well in the studio while recording their latest album The Lost Pages.

DP: “But Joe, can all this music and art really change the world?”

J: “Broadly and fundamentally, no. It does for intellectual people, and fans. Our fans might be inspired to look into some of our references, but I don’t think we’re going to change their political views or anything.”

DP: “How has music changed your life?”

J: “It informs everything I’ve done really – in not wanting to participate in the normal, real world.”

Lead singer, Alexis, tells me a similar story of escapism – she was raised on a diet of thriller flicks, and says that “film probably saved my life”. We asked the ex-art student to give us her views on a small selection of the work here, so here’s what she thought:

Aubrey Beardsley, The Battle of the Beaux and the Belles, illustration for The Rape of the Lock, 1896, courtesy of Uni of Birmingham

“When I was a child I was always making cards and posters for people. The line drawings on them mostly depicted women who were usually suspended in what seems now a dream-like limbo somewhere between the gutter of nowhere and the kingdom beyond the palace gates. Beardsley's illustration takes me back to this time of innocence and wonder, and probes me to ask myself what these early drawings represented.”

Edward Detmold, Alice in Wonderland with Peter the Lizard

“Joe says that this picture looks like a Clinton greetings card. I've never liked hamsters and gerbils myself!”

Edmund Dulac, Madame s'est pique le doigt, 1907

“This picture makes me laugh. The refined gentleman at the rear is alright, but it's the tranny in the foreground that makes this panto! It shouts 'chaos' and 'the ridiculous.’ It's funny in someway - it’s not Edmund Dulac's most sensual illustration. His work is superb, especially his collection for the Arabian Nights.”

Edmund Dulac, We are Such Stuff as Dreams are Made on [from the Tempest], 1908, courtesy of Jeremy and Eski Thomas

“This image is my favourite of them all. When I stood next to it in the gallery a mother asked her toddler what she saw. The child answered, “somebody's dream.” Of course, a child should know. It's a surreal haze set against a lapis lazuli sky...”

The Age of Enchantment will be running at Dulwich Picture Gallery until 17 Feb. Find out more at www.dulwichpicturegallery.org.uk

To find out more about The Violets, please visit www.theviolets.co.uk or their last.fm