2010 has seen Scouting For Girls' second album "Everybody Wants To Be On TV" enter the UK charts at No.2, preceded by their No.1 single.
Now with three arena dates lined up for this Spring, the band prepare to play their biggest gigs yet. We catch up with bassist Greg Churchouse about his philanthropy, auto-tune and his ambitions to read the Shipping Forecast.
- Is gigging your favourite aspect of being in the band?
Definitely, personally it’s my number one. Walking out on stage and seeing lots of happy faces, the screams and cheers and people singing along. It’s just really nice to see people having such a good time.
- When you started the band, did you know the exact audience you were going to get?
We had no idea, our audience started off very little and then got even smaller for a while and then suddenly went huge when we got signed so it is very weird.
It always messes with our record labels heads when you look at the demographic and come to our shows, you have your teenagers at the front screaming away and as the crowd goes back, people start getting older so you have your mid-twenties and your mid-thirties and then you’ve got the parents standing at the back near the bar going 'oh you know what, these are actually alright.'
- Why do you think it is that your music transcends those age groups?
I think it’s just the universality of the songs and the upbeatness of them. It’s hard to pin down the actual reasons but I think we just manage to put a smile on people’s faces.
- A lot of bands write new material whilst on tour, do you do it yourselves or do you focus on the touring?
A little bit of both, we’ve got our own studio space where we do most of the writing which is really nice and relaxed and you can just sit there and make as much noise as you want. When you’re on tour, it’s all about making sure the show is right and enjoying a few beers afterwards.
- The band has been noted for the charity work you’ve done, is that something you consider important?
Yeah, being in the very privileged position we are, being able to do our dream jobs and enjoying that, it’s really nice to be able to give back and do some charity work - especially for the charity we are ambassadors for, Wellchild, they do absolutely amazing work with sick kiddies and a lot of research and development.
It’s nice to be able to sit down with a few beers and say 'Right, what stupid thing can we do to raise money now?'
- Everybody wants to be on TV sees a lot more layering of instruments, was it a natural progression from the last album or was it a conscious decision to challenge yourselves?
When we did the first album, we pretty much replicated the demos we had in the studio, just using better instruments and better drums, and we had a very clear idea that we wanted to change things with the second album so the songs are a lot more stripped back and we did make the conscious decision to try some new stuff and advance from the first album.
- Was it an ironic use of the auto tune on Little Miss Naughty?
It’s not actually autotune it’s just an effect and I don’t think there’s anything that wrong with it really. I wish I could say it was ironic but we’re not that clever.
We just enjoyed playing around with effects on this album and that one was fun because it meant that live I got to play with a new peddle, which I’ve broken now. But no, it wasn't ironic... dammit.
- You have previously said that you prefer bass as it has 'two less strings', can you play guitar?
Yeah, before we were Scouting for Girls and we were in another band and I was actually lead guitarist.
I do much prefer playing bass though, it’s more about the sound and the rhythm of it with the bass and when I was playing guitar I was always big riff heavy so it just seemed like a natural progression. I’m a much better bassist than I was a guitarist.
- What direction to you see SFG going in?
We’re a pop band but we’re also a band who plays all their own instruments and writes all their own songs so I would imagine that as we get, we’ll get probably slightly more band like.
We don’t have any lofty ambitions other than to be able to keep playing music for as long as we possibly can.
- Do you have any ambitions outside of the band?
Not really at the moment, but when the career maybe does go a bit potluck, I wouldn’t mind going into radio myself.
I’ve always wanted to present the Shipping Forecast on Radio Two, that would be awesome.
SFG play 8 April - Wembley Arena, 9 April - Manchester MEN Arena and 10 April - Birmingham O2 Academy.
FemaleFirst Antonia Charlesworth
Tagged in Scouting For Girls