NEWS STAGECOACH
all the world’s a s ta g e ( c o a c h )
“ T h e a l b u m ’ s a b i t o f a p l o t t e d h i s t o r y. ”
“I
t’s like a massive climbing frame!” exclaims frontman Luke Barham. “You can climb on everything; everything’s got a ladder on it. You can go right up in the crow’s nest. Me and [drummer] Matt would be working up there on lyrics and it was so peaceful.” Believe it or not, we’re quizzing Stagecoach on what it was like to record their debut album, and their studio really sounds like a lot of fun. “We had barbecues on the top deck, went sunbathing...” Alright Luke, that’s enough. No doubt you’re wondering where on earth they set up camp to lay down their long-awaited full-length. Well, dispell your thoughts of exotic locations and Mediterranean climates; Stagecoach spent last September holed up in Lightship95 Studios: Rory Attwell’s boat, docked on the 14 thisisfakediy.co.uk
Thames. “Going to Rory was quite a big decision with making this record,” explains Nick Tanner, one half of the band’s founding members. “The songs on this album are quite different from our last EPs; it felt like it needed a slightly different approach.” Having begun as a more folky outlet for Tanner and Barham, the latter explains that the band has since developed into much more. “We worked out recently that it’s been nearly ten years since we started. It started off being quite delicate, acoustic-influenced, countryinfluenced music. Once we had the bass and drums, we added in the distorted guitars and we’re now a rock band. It feels kinda strange that it’s taken this long to get to an album. “I think everything had been moving forward in terms of the band growing
up until 2011. When it all started to slow down, we realised that, ‘Shit, we’ve had these singles, but there’s no album ready to go’. At that point, we stopped touring and we took a year to write fifteen or sixteen tracks.” The result is ‘Say Hi To The Band’; an eleven-track journey through their career so far. “It’s a bit of a plotted history,” clarifies Tanner. “You can definitely trace back to ten years ago, because you can feel a few of the country roots in places. It’s got this lineage to it; it feels like it’s the end of a fucking massive gestation.” “It’s still got a nucleus of pop songs though,” bassist John Harrington reassures us. “It’s got three or four classic Stagecoach songs.” Phew! Stagecoach’s debut album ‘Say Hi To The Band’ will be released on 13th May via Alcopop! Records.