Greeting Katy and Josh in the sunny courtyard of Camden’s Record Club provided a brilliant opener to my interview with the Essex pop-punks. Shaking hands with them, Katy commented on the firmness of my handshake, which led to a story being told…
The Punk Archive: So, we were just talking about handshakes before the interview…do you want to tell us a bit more about your handshake story?
Katy: Yeah, so we were discussing how I think it's gross when guys shake my hand and kiss it. This guy, in Bristol, when we played there on tour, he told me that I was a goddess and then kissed my feet!
The Punk Archive:…which you really enjoyed, obviously?
Katy: Well, we videoed it, and I was so glad we did…
Josh: It's a long video.
Katy: It's so funny.
Josh: It's a long video… I was standing there with the camera!
Katy: Get this though, the best part is that his wife was standing next to him the whole time!
The Punk Archive: His wife?!
Katy: Yeah, his wife. She was just laughing her head off while he was going "oh, you're so amazing", and then he just got on the floor and starts making out with my feet.
The Punk Archive: Just randomly after the gig?
Josh: Before, during, after… the whole thing!
The Punk Archive: He just followed your feet around?
Katy: (laughs) He did say all that kinda stuff before, during, and after, but I think the feet incident was just after the show.
The Punk Archive: It's got to be one of the weirdest things that’s ever happened at a show, surely…
Katy: Why kiss someone's feet AFTER a show? I'm not being funny, my feet stink anyway, but especially after a show…my feet were all sweaty and stuff! And he's got his face in them. Whatever!
The Punk Archive: Did you have to take your shoes off?
Katy: No, I didn't!
Soon after this, our chat turned to music, and to the main subject of the day…
The Punk Archive: So, Camden Rocks. Excited?
Katy: Yes, I am! We've never played it before, so it's a bit of a weird one for us, isn't it, because we're not to festivals which aren't…
The Punk Archive:…outside?
Katy: Yeah, in a contained site. Obviously this is just like normal Camden but with a festival going on. It's all a bit confusing, but I like it!
The Punk Archive: So, new EP The Hunted is out in a couple of days?
Katy: Yeah, Monday, 2nd June.
The Punk Archive: So how's that been going down? Have you been playing it live yet?
Katy: Yeah, so it's acoustic versions of songs from Captives, but then it’s got our new single on, Gone, so that’s a song that we've added to our set. It's funny, though, because Tom, our guitarist, he plays the piano as well, and he always gets so nervous when we play it, because he's so used to having a guitar in his hand, and now he's like "woah I've got to play piano, but I'm so used to doing that in my bedroom!"
Josh: It's good, though, he works really hard…
Katy: And it's cool, it sounds really good. I think it's a nice welcome break during the set.
Josh: Gives me a rest, anyway…
Katy: Yeah, you just get to sit there and go "this is cute!"
Josh: I have a bit of a stretch…
Katy: What do you even do?
Josh: I stretch. My arms get tired…
Katy: What, do you do lunges and stuff?
The Punk Archive: Yeah, like sports stretches?
Josh: (laughs) Oh yeah, like star jumps, sit-ups…
The Punk Archive: You should definitely do press-ups on stage…
Katy: To be fair, though, we do band work-outs, like we go to circuit training together on a Friday, and we're always in competition with each other. Whenever the push-ups come, I always fail miserably, but I beat Jack and Tom every time…
.JPG) |
| It's selfie season... (L-R Dan (Ed.), Katy, Josh) |
Katy: Yeah, but they're not real men, so… (laughs)
The Punk Archive: So what was the thinking behind the switch to acoustic for the EP?
Katy: We just thought it was fun, because when we originally write any song, we start off writing it acoustic, so we can get the harmony behind the songs, and really get the song to be actually a good song. We just thought the songs sounded so nice acoustic, because that's how we wrote them, so why don't we strip them back and release them like it?
The Punk Archive: It sounds like you have quite a complex songwriting process?
Josh: We all love the sound of acoustic stuff and it's not the typical acoustic. It's quite upbeat.
Katy: Yeah, it's got some ukulele in there…
Josh: Because the album's been out for a year now, it's nice to give people a different angle, you know?
The Punk Archive: You've got quite a few summer festivals coming up, haven't you? You're playing Sonisphere… and obviously Camden Rocks...
Josh: Yeah, we can't wait.
Katy: We've got smaller ones, too, like Butserfest and similar ones to that, so that'll be cool, but obviously Sonisphere is going to be epic…it should be so cool, and I'm just going to try and meet everybody backstage! Selfie!
The Punk Archive: It is SO selfie season! We'll get one after this interview…
Katy: I'm gonna see how many I can get. I always feel really embarrassed asking for them! We played a show at the One Hundred Club and Miley Cirus turned up…
Josh: (Shrugging) It's what we do…
The Punk Archive: You're attracting that kind of calibre of people aren't you…
Katy: She didn't have a CLUE who we were! It's because we were supporting American Hi-Fi, who are her backing band, so they've been on tour with her for a while. They played the O2, and then they played their own show. She came to check it out and it was so weird, everyone was like "Oh my God, you have to get a selfie with her!" I was like "It’s Miley Cirus", are you serious? Her security are INSANE, it's unbelievable.
The Punk Archive: They surround her…?
Katy: Yeah! And they are the tallest, widest guys I've ever seen… They were lovely, because I asked them whether I was allowed to have a picture…they were like "in the nicest possible way, piss off love"!
The Punk Archive: So how's work going on the third album?
Katy: It's quite heavy, and it's quite different, and quite experimental as far as we go. We're normally quite typical…
Josh: We're more willing to try different stuff now, and not really worry about what other people think. If we hear something and think it's cool, we use it. If not, we sack it off.
Katy: All our reviews in the past have been really nice but they've said we're not a ground-breaking band, and that's a completely fair comment, because we were never trying to be a ground-breaking band. We feel now though like we've done the typical and want to experiment with other stuff. Let's just have a laugh and write some stuff that we like!
The Punk Archive: Is it quite refreshing to do that?
Katy: Yeah, we're having so much fun! We do a demo and we're like "let's listen to it a hundred times, we love it!!"
The Punk Archive: So you guys are from Essex. The music scene there's pretty good, you've got some good young rock bands…?
Katy: Well… yeah, OK, the bands are wicked. The venues? Not so. There's loads of really talented bands coming out of Essex but just nowhere for them to play.
The Hunted is released 2nd June 2014
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