INTERVIEW: The Sherlocks

UK-based indie pop band The Sherlocks made a stop at the Middle East in Cambridge this November. WTBU DJ Kiran Galani spoke to members (and pairs of brothers) Kiaran and Brandon Crook and Josh and Andy Davidson ahead of their show about new music, their dream show, and what’s yet to come.

Kiran Galani: This is your first stop on the USA tour, how’s it been different from the UK and Europe?

Kiaran Crook: It’s very polite.

Brandon Crook: Oh, like big. Everything’s big! Standard burger size is half a pound in the UK, but it’s a quarter pound in America.

Josh Davidson: Yeah and them drinks you get, you know, in fast food joints, it’s 3 times as big as the UK. You get like a bucket of coke!

Kiaran Crook: Everything is just bigger, including personalities.

KG: A lot of the songs on the album were singles before you released them on the album. How has the process behind releasing them been different when they’re part of the album?

KC: Well all the singles that we put out, we said from the beginning we wanted them on the album, so that made up like two-thirds of the album pretty much. I don’t know, as it got closer, it was pretty obvious what we wanted on the album. We recorded 15 songs, and we all picked the same songs as the 12 we wanted on the album, so it worked out!

KG: Your song “Live for the Moment,” after which your debut album has been named, was released originally as a single about three years ago, but the original song had a very different sound from the new one. Was this because of changes in production or because you’ve changed as artists?

KC: Both. Probably production more because it was cast as a demo originally. We did like 3 songs in one day back then. So now that we had the resources, we beefed it up a bit.

KG: Are there any artists that you would say have influenced your music?

KC: Not an artist but Gavin Monaghan, he’s a producer and he’s influenced a lot of our music.

KG: In your recent Billboard interview, you talked about how the band was heavily influenced by “guitar music” and that was very important to you, could you elaborate a bit on that?

KC: What Billboard thing?

BC: You did it!

KC: Really, what was it?

BC: An interview, it just came out! It’s just because we’re a guitar band, we’re just trying to keep to it. A lot of bands are using keyboards and synths and stuff, but we’re trying to keep it classic.

KG: Your debut album just charted at number 6 on the UK albums chart, how does that feel?

KC: Feels awesome!

Andy Davidson: It’s a massive achievement!

JD: When we found out we were about to go on stage for the biggest gig we’ve ever done, a festival called Leeds Festival in the UK with over 20,000 people attending, we just found out that we charted, so that made it special—extra-special because it was my birthday!

KG: So, what’s next? I hear you’ve written down a lot of the second album. Do you plan on releasing that anytime soon?

KC: I have no idea to be honest. I don’t know if it’ll be next year or the year after. I still have a couple more songs to write; it’s not quite an album yet, but it’s well on its way. And we’ll have to see what the label wants to do and when they want to put it out.

AD: Do a few more Live for the Moment tours, yeah, it’s a classic album. It’ll be a shame not to tour it a few more times around the world.

JD: Rock it!

KC: Yeah, there’s still more stuff we want to do with this album.

BC: Tour it for nine years then we’ll do a 10-year anniversary straight after! JD: Yeah, keep doing that—ride the wheels off it!

KG: Well, that’s what Guns N’ Roses did, so it might work out!

Everyone: Yeah we all know what happened to them! They were massive. Some more rock. Some more guns. Retired millionaires.

KG: When you guys are making music, what’s more important, music or lyrics?

KC: I don’t know to be honest. It’s probably more important to sound good than the lyrics really! If you think about all these songs that are just singing about gibberish, they’re all hits. If you have beautiful words but don’t have good melody or music, it’s just poetry after all, ain’t it?

KG: What would you all say your favorite song to perform live would be? And why?

AD: “Nobody Knows,” probably because it’s a new track. We’ve been playing the old ones for like four years now.

JD: I’d probably say “Motions” because it’s a bit different. It lets you change the tone a bit

KC: I’d probably say same as Andy, “Nobody Knows.” And at the end of the song we do a little rock off, it’s great.

BC: Will you be there? It’s pumpin’!

KG: What would you say your dream performance venue would be?

AD: Wembley.

JD: Yeah Wembley Stadium.

KC: Madison Square Garden

BC: I reckon Wembley as well.

KG: Do you have any hobbies that aren’t musically oriented?

AD: Drinking beer!

BC: We all love drinking beer.

KC: Well, some of us play badminton. We play snooker as well.

BC: [Talking about Josh] He loves eating.

AD: Doesn’t everybody?

KG: Yeah, food is love.

AD: We have all these food challenges.

KC: We once asked to eat five donuts in five minutes. It was great.

BC: He did it also. It’s harder than it sounds.

JD: Yeah these are UK donuts as well. They don’t have the hole in the middle, and they’re filled with jam. It was like, the first donut took only about 30 seconds and then the last one took a minute and a half.

AD: It was great.

KG: Anything else you’d like to add before we conclude?

KC: We’d just like to say thank you to the US and Canadian fans for coming out and supporting us on this tour!