Save Your Breath are one of the freshest pop-punk hopefuls bursting out of the UK scene right now. Their debut full length, Vices, has received rave reviews and they’re just done a stint supporting New Found Glory on their recent UK tour. Kiki Vs Everyone caught up with vocalist Kris Richards and guitarist Tom Owen ahead of their Reading & Leeds Festival appearances to talk about apprehending merch thieves and bandanna suntans.
How has the New Found Glory tour been? How did it come about?
T: It was just amazing - A dream come true for all of us because they’re one of our favourite bands.
K: It was because we’re good friends with The Wonder Years, who’d heard they New Found Glory were coming over to the UK so I think Soupy from The Wonder Years spoke to one of the guys from New Found Glory - Steve I think it was - about us and put in a good word and they checked us out on Myspace or something.
T: I doubt it was Myspace.
K: Whatever...
T: No one uses Myspace anymore.
K: And put us forward for it and we got in it.
Have you got any feedback from NFG whist on the tour?
T: Yeah they were just really safe, they were hanging around all the time.
K: Yeah they were checking us out. They dig.
T: It was nice to meet people you’ve always admired their music and them still be really nice. It was a really nice experience and the shows’ve been awesome.
How have the reaction been from New Found Glory fans on this tour?
K: Quite weird. Normally you’d think there’d be a perfect crowd for us but it was quite a mature crowd - a bit older.
T: They make you work harder.
K: Yeah you have to work a lot harder to get the crowd moving. But it was great, I think they warmed to us.
T: By the end of each set I think we won people over and it went really well.
So you got some of your merch stolen when you were onstage?
T: Yes! We were in Sheffield and we were selling merch and there was a drunk guy there. He was just being a dickhead.
K: Our merch guy wasn’t at the show - he had to go back because he’s in another band. So when we played we didn’t have a merch guy or someone to watch our merch. So this guy must’ve taken it when we were onstage. They took the display stuff so they’re a bit stupid.
T: When we were doing the merch he was just being a drunk dickhead and being really annoying. He was like ‘Gimme a T-shirt! Gimme a T-shirt!” so we sold him one of our old T-shirts for a fiver to just get rid of him. Then after the show he came up to our van and he said ‘Can I come in your van?’ and we were like ‘no’. So he walked round the corner with a couple of his friends and pulled one of our shirts out of his hoodie. So we ran after him and I pulled the one he had out of his hands and asked him where’s the rest of our T-shirts? I pulled down his hoodie and he had like 4 of our T-shirts on under there! So we ripped them off him and he was just standing there naked pretty much apart from in his jeans and we just left him there in the street.
K: We took the ones he stole and the one he’d already bought as well.
Well done!
T: Well yeah, it wasn’t quite as polite as I'd explained it but we didn’t harm him but we both came quite close I think!
K: We verbally kicked his ass.
T: Yeah! We kicked his ass with words! He was just a dick, he’s not the type of person that normally goes to gigs i don’t think he was just a scummer.
So your first full length just come Vices just came out - how was that process for you?
T: It was a mad process, really. We didn’t have any money.
K: It was quite stressful up until - well even when we were in the studio as well. We were still writing songs as we were recording - like changing bits.
T: Yeah we just wanted it to be as good as it could be really. Before we went in we wrote about 20 songs and we were not happy until we had chosen the best 11. Then like Kris said, we were in the studio just making changes and making changes so it could be as good as it could be. But we didn’t have any money so that was a gamble. But we knew we needed to do something because we’d only done our EP 3 years before and Kris didn’t even sing on that. So yeah we went in, did the record and put the pre-orders up and hoped that people would buy it so we could afford to pay Romesh (Dodangoda - Long Wave Recording Studio) back basically. And they did and it worked out alright! It was exciting but it was a bit nerve-wracking.
Is there anything you would have done differently?
T: No.
K: I dunno, I don’t think so.
T: I’m just fucking glad we did it.
K: Yeah.
T: Because we needed to do it. We needed something new.
K: It was just so quick so it was a bit like “oh...” and you just had to do it. But if we had more money and more time...
T: Yeah we did the whole album in just over a week which is quite a short amount of time.
You have some guests on the album - (Sean Smith from The Blackout on Stay Young and Soupy from The Wonder Years on Loud & Clear).
K: Yeah, Sean came to the studio but he did his when we released Stay Young before we recorded the album.
T: But with Soupy it was quite cool actually, we did Loud & Clear in the studio and Kris did all his vocals and we knew we wanted Soupy to sing on one part so we sent him the song and he actually wrote the lyrics for his part. And he wrote the melody and come up with everything so it’s really cool. He added his touch to our song.
K: It was a bit of a gamble as well because he was like ‘ah I'm changing it by the way’ and he just did it and we didn’t even hear it until it was all mixed and it sounded great.
T: Yeah it sounded awesome.
Who would you like to have guest if you could choose anyone?
T: Joe McElderry? haha!
I’m sure he’s free, I doubt he’s busy!
K: I’d have Jordan.
T: Yeah Jordan from New Found Glory would be great. Maybe we could hopefully achieve that, I dunno what is stance is singing on other people’s records but that would be a dream come true.
It seems like the UK scene is taking off a bit, what do you think of British bands at the moment?
T: There’s loads and loads of great bands and there’s loads and loads of shit bands. There’s bound to be I think when there’s so many bands around. But I think the bands that are doing well at the moment are just absolutely amazing. There’s so many great bands. I think British music’s amazing and sometimes it gets overshadowed by the American scene.
Who would you recommend?
T: Loads. Obviously the new Kids in Glass Houses record came out. Cross Breaker - they’re like a hardcore band. More Than Life. Young Guns - they’re gonna have a new record coming out and they’re an absolutely brilliant band. Straight Lines. Tiger Please. It’s wicked because there’s so many new bands like ourselves that are coming up but we’re all doing different things. It’s wicked there’s so many good bands doing different genres of music.
You’re also playing Reading & Leeds. How do you prepare for a show that big?
T: Well, we play a warm up show in Andover. Go to (Tour Manager) Keegan’s house. Get up at half 7 and drive to Leeds!
K: I don’t think you really can prepare yourself for something like that.
T: You just gotta go with the flow I guess.
Is it the biggest show you’re going to have done?
K: I hope so!
T: It depends who turns up!
K: I dunno how it all works. This is our first festival. We’re not really sure what we’re expecting to be honest. But hopefully it will lead onto bigger things as well.
You’ve been to Reading as spectators though right? What’s your favourite memory from those times?
T: I got to see Jimmy Eat World twice in one day. They did the main stage in the afternoon and then they headlined the Lock Up Stage so that was pretty special.
K: I can’t remember much about it really! I burnt my head! I had a bet with my friend who would leave their bandanna on the longest and I won and I burnt my head because it was sunny! So I had a swollen head with a white band around it.
T: That’s the best story! That’s such a good story! Why haven’t you told me that before?!
What did you win?
K: Nothing! I won and that’s it!
T: Well at least you won! What an intense competition!
How do you choose songs for festivals like Reading & Leeds? Will they be a different set to your normal shows?
T: Not really, we’re just gonna play the same set that we did on the New Found Glory tour.
K: It’s quite hard to pick an actual set.
T: Yeah because everyone has a different opinion about what they want it to go like.
K: Yeah you can’t please everybody. We all wanted different things from the album to go on the set and then once we were happy with the set we still get people coming to you saying ‘why didn’t you play this?’.
T: You can’t please everyone unless you play for 3 days and play them all. Are you going to Reading? I’m so chuffed to be playing but I don’t think I'd go and camp anymore I’d be too tired! And miserable having to sleep in that tent. When I'm at home I'll go to our local pub in Newport and that’s it.
Have you been to any other festivals as spectators this year?
K: I went to Isle of Wight. It was alright.
T: The thing with that is without the camping it’d be alright.
It’d be alright if you had a camper van or an RV!
T: Yeah yeah! That’d be awesome!
Anything else you want to add?
T: We should say something. Let’s tell her some facts.
K: Adam chipped my phone earlier on. My new iPhone.
T: Adam did? How?
K: He was playing with the USB cable, throwing it on me and I had my phone there and the USB cable hit my phone and the screen cracked.
T: Really?! Get him to pay for it.
K: Yeah.
T: Did you know that crab-sticks do not contain any crab? That’s fact of the day!
Check out some songs from their Reading Festival set here.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment