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It's been
a while since the darlings of the rock underground have toured the UK
but here we are just weeks away from the festive season and it's like
Christmas has come early as we catch up with The Glitterati in their
home town of Leeds to find out what the band have been up to in recent
times and what their plans are for the future.
MM
- Hi guys, thanks for agreeing to chat with us today, how has the tour
being going so far?
Paul
-
It's been great. We didn't play the first night of the tour but
the other two nights have been great, we're just getting into our stride
right now. The crowds have been really good, although I don't
think they have a clue about any of our stuff. I think we're
winning a few over though and that's what we're aiming to do.
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MM
- Well it's been a while since you've done a proper tour.
Paul -
Yes. It's been too long. It's
got to have been over two years at least and it's been even
longer since we've been on the support slot. The last
support tour we did was ages ago so I kinda like it, it's a lot
less pressure when you're the support band. When you've
got your own tour you're always worrying about how many people
are going to turn up, but as support you're just going on there
trying to win a few people over.
Johnny
- It's bizarrely re-assuring that literally nobody in the
venue is here to see us. (laughs).
MM
- Well we know who you are! We've been coming to see you
for years!
Johnny - Thank you!
Paul
- Well we must make sure you're right at the front then.
You can catch the bottles if anyone throws then at us! (laughs).
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| Johnny
- It will be nice to see two people looking up at the stage and
not looking like a dog that's just been shown a card trick. |
MM
- OK, new album, I believe you might be working on a new album?
Paul -
Yes, well we've finished it now. We've just signed to a new label
(Global Music/DR2) and we've just released the new single this week
(Fight! Fight! Fight!). I think the plan is another single in
January and then the new album to be released in February (2010).
That's how we're planning it at the moment. We're all really excited
about that.
Baz - We have the new single out called 'Fight! Fight! Fight! at
the moment which you can download for free from our website. It's
very good, I'd say everyone should check it out. You can get it
off our MySpace page and off Global Music / Demolition 2's website.
MM - What kind of vibe does the new album have?
Paul - It sounds great, well to the
few people we've played it to and who have heard it. It's mostly
all new songs with a couple of older ones in the tracklisting, but
overall they're new songs. Feedback so far has been really great.
Johnny
- The general vibe of the new album is harder, faster, more
aggressive, better hooks and stronger melodies. I guess it's
everything we wanted to do on the first record turned up to 15.
(laughs).
MM - Well your first album had quite a few anthemic songs that you could
really get into and sing-along to.
Paul - I think we've still retained
that in our song-writing. It's still as hooky as before, if not
more hooky than the first album, but the overall sound is much bigger
and fatter than that on the first album. I think we've definitely got it
this time I think and we've got it just how we want it to sound.
We're really happy with it. Obviously the way we did it was we
didn't have a deal or anything and the two other guys had just left the
band, so there was just the three of us at the time. We just
started recording it and wanted a producer who would do a great job on
it. We just took it from there and the first label we sent it to
was Demolition and they wanted to sign us so here we are. We're
really happy about that.
MM - Well from personal experience Demolition as a label have always
come across as being very supportive of the bands they have on their
label. I've never heard a bad word said about them from anyone,
and that's quite rare these days.
Paul - I think it's great also to be on
a "rock" label because when we were on Atlantic they tried to
put themselves across as being a rock label but we found it very
different and ended up being one of the few rock bands they had on the
label at the time. It's just a relief to be on a label that truly
is a "rock" label this time. They know what to do with a
rock band and hopefully if we don't have a success then that will be
purely down to us and not their fault, which we kind of felt a little
bit with the first album because they weren't really sure what to do
with us.
MM - What have you guys got planned for after this tour then?
Paul - We're not 100% certain yet as
we're trying to get on another big support tour for in the New Year so
we're working on that at the moment. We're also working on the
next single and then the album release, so in between the next single
and the album we're looking to get out again on tour if we can.
Billy - We're used to playing with all these different styles of
bands so it could be anyone.
Johnny - I think the main thing is for us to tour to a wider
audience or to tour to new audiences. We're kind of conscious of
the fact that maybe some of the people that we picked up with the first
record, whilst we've not been so busy, or perhaps not so visible, that
some of those people may have lost interest in us or just forgotten
about us. We're looking to remind those people that we are still
out there and hopefully by doing support tours, we can pick up a few new
fans here and there as well.
Paul
- We have to kind of take it that we're starting all over again.
It's just been such a long time since the first album and although we
have managed to keep our foot in the door playing live, it's maybe not
been quite as much as we should have been so hopefully we can get out
and tour as much as we can now and capture a new fan base.
MM
- Last time we saw you was at Trashstock and that was really
exciting to see you guys play live again after so long.
I think the time before that was probably at The Purple Turtle
just before you were going to America.
Paul - Oh Yeh, I had to go to hospital after that gig. I
tore the muscle away from the bone in my chest and I thought I'd
broke my ribs, the pain was incredible. Then when it came
to loading the next day only two of us turned up so I had to
still do that even though I was in all this pain! (laughs).
I can laugh about it now but I wasn't at the time. That
was a wild night, the crowd were great.
The
American tour was great as well. I think that's what
finished the other two guys off on that tour. It was a
long tour and being away for such a long time I think just tired
us all out. I just think they came to the decision they
didn't want to do it anymore so we've got these two guys in the
band now (points to Baz and Gaff). Hopefully these two
guys will want to stick around. (laughs).
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MM
- After the albums released next year, have you got any festivals or
anything lined up?
Paul - Well the label have got a
very definite plan about what they want to do with us, but we're not at
liberty to tell you what it is just yet. We'd love to get out to
Europe and tour in some other countries and I'm sure some festivals will
be a big part of that. I'd love to be able to play Download or
Sonisphere back here in the UK, but doesn't everyone? (laughs).
We've got the Hard Rock Hell III Festival on this tour coming up in a
few weeks time, which will be great because there's legends such as
W.A.S.P., Doro, there's tons of great bands going to be playing there.
Johnny - I think to be honest with you we didn't really expect to
be playing anything so big on this scale this year. We wanted to
put something out to remind people we are still here and obviously this
tour is a really good opportunity for us to get out and get playing.
For us this is a bonus so next year we want more of the same things.
MM - It all happened so bizarrely
because one minute you were the total darlings of the scene and then
suddenly you seemed to just disappear.
Johnny - Yeh but I don't think it ever
felt like that to us. I've heard people say that and I don't think
we ever felt particularly cool or particularly like we were the
darlings.
MM - I don't mean you were a load of
luvvies ...
Johnny - No, I know you don't. The general consensus within
the band is that we are generally the underdogs.
Paul - I think when we first started out we had the really cool
press jump in because we had this underground vibe going on. We
worked hard at what we achieved and didn't get anything given on a plate
to us. But then as soon as we got plastered on the cover of NME it
wasn't really what we were about. If anything it made us work
harder and then we started to get noticed by the more conventional rock
press, but their interest in us as a band lasted for all of about 2
months before the next band came along. As time went on I think a
lot of the rock press thought we'd started out as this little indie band
on an indie label with indie support slots, but they were the only press
that spotted us when we were first starting out and picked up on us.
We weren't really an indie band as such, we've always been a rock band.
It was always the rock press that were interested in us in the longer
term and I'm glad it turned out that way. We've always seen
ourselves as a rock band and we all have rock influences which are
carried through in the music. That's where our hearts are.
MM - How did Gaff and Baz come to join the band, how did you connect
with them?
Paul - They were stalking the band
... (laughs). Baz joined a little bit before Gaff. He
started just as we were starting to record the new album, so he plays on
all the album tracks. We had just began to start the recordings
and had thought we'd need to do it as a 3 piece, we were concentrating
more on getting the new album done and thought we'd get the new bass
player and guitarist when the time came after the album was done.
We asked Baz if he wanted to do the bass parts as Johnny didn't really
want to have to do all the bass parts as well a the guitar parts on the
album and he's just kind of stuck around since then. (laughs).
Gaff was a little bit later on.
MM - Is there anything you'd like to say
to all the people out there who first of all don't know you, and then
anything to all the older fans who may have forgotten you're still
going?
Paul - I'd just say check us out,
I'm sure you'll like us. I think we've proved it before with all
the different bands we've toured with that it doesn't matter what type
of rock music you're normally into to, you'll probably like what you
hear when you listen to us. Just give us a listen and see if you
like us, I'm sure you will. Download the single, buy the album and
then get the t-shirt, that's the most important thing because that's how
we make our money. Tonight we're having to sell them at £20 a
time because the venue takes such a big cut.
Johnny - Yes please do buy a t-shirt because that means we can
eat! (laughs).
Paul - To our older fans, I think you'll really like the new
album. It's not exactly the same as the first album but if you
liked that then I'm sure you'll like this one too. I just hope
they are as pleased as we are to see us back our there on tour as we
are, because we've really missed it.
MM
- We'd like to thank the band for taking the time out of their pre-show
sound check to chat with us. I can wholeheartedly say that it has
been an absolute pleasure to chat with such down-to-earth guys and to
see a band we've held in high regard, back out on the UK touring circuit
once again. Here's to the new album and all that it brings with
it.
If
you want to hear that new single and find out more about the band then
go to www.myspace.com/theglitterati
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