The Futureheads Interview

There is a lot to be said for The Futureheads…
Hayley Adkins and Ross Millard (guitar and backing vocals)

Hello?

Hi is that Ross?
It certainly is!

How’s it going?
Yeah good thanks, I’m just getting off the bus. Just arrived in Aberdeen for the first gig of our tour! Record is out on Monday!

I love the accent! You are all from Sunderland right? How is it up there? Are you still living there now?
Yeah well, I live in Newcastle, two of the band members still live in Sunderland and the other in Glasgow now….We still consider ourselves to be a band from Sunderland though cause that’s where we are originally from.

You’ve decided to go it alone on the label front. So, what pushed you in that direction?
I think it’s because the time is right for that sort of stuff you know. The music industry is a bit of a shambles at the moment. No one really knows what’s going and we didn’t want to release another record in that kind of environment. I think we thought we would be safer if we did our own thing. Stick our heads above the sand on our own rather than rely on a label, or business that is run by a bunch of capitalists and don’t really know anything about the industry or music.

Now you’re here, do you feel like a completely new band?
Yeah we do totally. It feels like we are starting from the beginning again because we have started our own record label. We are much fresher than we were after our last record came out. We are revitalised, we have found our hunger again you know and the inspiration to want to keep making music. We lost that a bit last time but now we are back!

What’s different now? Have you changed your sound at all?
I think the sound has changed from the last record in the sense that this album is much more of a party sound with big rifts and it’s kinda fast paced. It’s all about rocking the house this time around! The last record was a bit down and humble and we don’t want to make another record that like that. We are going for more madness! More of the sunshine!

Do you feel that you have changed as individuals over the last year?
For sure. I mean we didn’t know what we were going to do with the label and we didn’t know how we were going to put our music out there. Everything has fallen in to place now and the questions have been answered. We have always been a 4 piece band but we are all very different and have very different personalities but what’s special is we all feel the same about the music we want to make. It seems like the only interest we have in common which is quite weird you know!

Who is the most nerdy then?
(Laughs) well I think that’s probably me! I have the glasses for it I suppose!
But you know, I mean I guess everyone in a band all have their own quirks but I feel like we have become more of a gang because we are so different and it gives us a bit of life blood. We would probably suffer if we were all a bit to samey. Opposites attract and all that! (laughs)

Have you taken part time jobs in the last year you’ve been writing and recording?
(Laughs) No! We haven’t. We have been lucky enough to not have to take part time jobs at McDonalds! I used to work at Marks and Spencer when I was at university though! One of the band members was a brick layer before he joined the band! Last year when we were writing and recording we were also touring in Europe so we were still busy boys.

Going forward, will you take other artists under your new label? Anyone in particular you have in mind already?
I don’t think we will you know. The point that we are trying to prove is that you can do it yourself so I don’t think we would. We encourage other bands to do similar; you know the label we have managed to get ourselves off. A record label is a means to an end and you have to have a label umbrella to release your record under and that’s ours but it’s just going to be for us. I think a lot of bands will start to do the same thing over the next year or so.

You split from your former record label 679 in late 2006, are you still in contact with them?
No! I mean there are no bad feelings, we didn’t sell any records and they run out of money! It was like a bad relationship with a good divorce!

Can you tell me any gossip?
Well our drummer is sporting a plastic thumb at the moment he had to have one fitted because he’s cut his finger badly and it’s a real shame because you can tell he just wants to just go for it but he cant! I really hope he is going to be OK tonight!

Oh and….

Who eats shit because they’re stupid and shallow?
(Laughs) Well I Guess that has to be none other than 679 right?!