Beauty School - 2000 Trees Interview

I've just discovered um What's the Story of Morning Glory by er by Oasis, so I tried to rip Oasis off and I wrote this song. And ironically the song was called Centre of Attention, so and that like speaks, singer of the band. Yeah yeah. Guys, to get us started, please say your band name and say each of your names just for the camera and we'll we'll go from there. Uh we are Beauty School and I am Joe the singer. er I am Gran, I play guitar and do backing vocals. er Andy, play bass. Jordan, played guitar. Charlie, I played drums, and we are at 2000 Trees Festival, guys, I can make this happen, you guys are a Les band, right, Yorkshire at least. Um, what's a favourite song on the set that you're playing on the set at the moment? Oh, I think there's gonna be varied answers. Mine today was Cowboy Milk. Quality name, was that 2nd to last, 2nd to last, it just felt, yeah, he just, the energy was up and uh, I'd gotten over the point of the set where I thought I was gonna pass out, so yeah, yeah, that was it for me. Mine is Seeds for the Roses, uh it's, it's quite a new addition to the set, recently, probably one of my favourite ones off the album as well, so, as well as being one to play live that I really enjoy, I like listening to it. Absolutely. Uh I think for me. Day of Iva, cos it's er it's upbeat, it's a proper banger, chorus is catchy, um and I really love I I love the transition that it goes into, into when I'm feeling down as well, so yeah. I'm gonna say the same because my guitar worked then. That always helps. Yeah, Seeds was good, enjoyed that. Yeah, yeah. 2 BPM just. And where do we find you guys? Are you doing a big festival run this summer, or what's happening at the moment for the band? So we, we released our second album from now on, uh, last October, and then we did some touring around that, uh, we did our first full headline tour in February, which was amazing. Uh, and then we just had, yeah, we did, uh, it's, we're not doing a huge festival run this summer, but we did slam dunk festival, uh, we've done this and we're doing Burn It Down, um, at the start of September, and, uh I love Burn It Down, Torquay, right? Yeah, well, we've never been, so I'm so excited to go to Torquay. Yeah, can't wait. Yeah, we've never been that far south. Um, yeah, so, er, and other than that we're just, well, we'll see, we'll see if something comes in in the, in the autumn, but. Writing music I guess, yeah, and what's the process of that, you know, there, there's a lot of members in the band, are you guys getting together in a room and making a sound, or how, how do your songs generally come about? It, it's a big mix, it's a big mix, normally it starts with these two, and then the rest of us kind of dip in and out I think. Yeah, but it's gotta start with the foundation which is, I think, I think it's because. I generally like have a lot of the ideas and Grant is like, he's the really technically like er gifted on like every instrument and er and on logic and actually putting the stuff like in the box as well, so, you know, we'll we'll write. An idea and then we'll kind of think what we think Charlie would like to play it and like, he'll draw it in on Midi and things one of my new nicknames is Grand GBT isn't it, Grand Grand Grand GPT yeah. Because it's like you just, literally there will be times where I'll go, I want it to sound like this and I'll be like, yeah I'm gonna do something and I'll go, oh yeah, I'm gonna just pick up the guitar and like just play it like it's crazy. It's a gift and a curse, yes, it is. And did you develop that, how did you go about cultivating that, because that takes a lot of work. Um, I, I've, I've mostly learned, uh, so I've been playing since I was 14, I'm 33 now, so nearly 20 years. And I, I, I know, uh, I, er, I've mostly learned by ear, so I, I guess having that kind of background lends itself to just hearing ideas and being able to. It's the essential bit, right, it's the link between what you're hearing and then making that sound right, it's got to go through a, it's uh I call it a musical memory as well. Like you'll you'll sing something and make a crazy noise where we want something like that. You'll go, I remember doing something or hearing something like that before, here's one way to make, there's always different ways you can make the same sound, but um were there any real gateway, songs that you learnt or any gateway times in your life when that really became, you know, production, guitar playing, fleshing out full songs, or was there a batch of songs or one song when you guys started to sound like you? You know, you weren't sounding like your heroes anymore, you, you started to sound like a band. I, I think, I think we've really, um, I think matured is a word I'd use for the latest album, um, and a lot of people have said the same thing about like comparison between the first and the second album that the sound has matured, and I think we really have like come into our own sound with it. Um, I don't know if you have more to add to that. It might be one of the hardest things to like knuckle down what you, what is your sound, right? Yeah, I think it always comes from the fact of like that first one you can tell that like it's a younger album, the next one kind of does definitely move on from it, but it's just a case of like, you came in full time. Yeah and then it was a case of like putting every. What's the word, every um element, every spoon in the drawer, no, maybe, yeah, and then you know, it, you know, it turns into a good soup. I think one of the things that was, we were the first time we did it, the with with the first album Happiness, we wrote the songs and we were happy with the songs because we were just happy that we'd written these songs together. That's the name of the album came from, we, we didn't have a record label, there wasn't any pressure on us to achieve anything greater than the sum of the, the, the parts of what the album actually was, yeah, but then with the second record, it was like, We discovered what writing a second record is like in a sense of that, we wrote these songs that we were happy with, but then we really were like, let's scrutinise these songs, let's see like, like what we can get out of them, let's sort of like, but in some and that means that we, that process was for better and for worse because we ended up killing some songs because of that, and do you know what I mean, so, um, yeah, so I think that's kind of where the. Definitely where we started to feel like this is our like thing now, absolutely. And what about with lyric writing, how are you, like, are you stockpiling ideas, what, how did you discover that this was something that you were able to do, you know, it's such a, I find it particularly difficult, I can find any tune from listening to it and find it on guitar, lyrics don't come as easy. Um, I don't know, I, I've, I think I've just always done it, like, like. The first time I ever wrote a song, I was. Like 8 years old I was, I was in a uh like a talent show in year 48 years old, yeah, 88 years old and I'd just discovered um What's the Story of Morning Glory by uh by Oasis, so I tried to rip Oasis off and I wrote this song, and ironically the song was called Centre of Attention, so, and that like speaks, singer of the band, yeah, yeah, and uh, and so that was the first time I wrote, I don't know, I've just always wrote lyrics and then I just like, I feel like, you know, again it's like the centre of my. Like, now there are certain type, like I don't like things to be like too on the nose or something like that, but like, usually for me my, Lyrics are secondary to the, to the melody, I will have a melody idea first and then I will see how I can shape the things that I wanna say into the melody rather than the other way round cos the melody, I used to do it the other way around but. That the melody's more important than the lyrics in a in a way, you know, I want the message to be correct, but the song has to be. Good. There's gotta be a hook in there, you need a chorus, right, yeah, exactly, yeah, yeah, it is melody, melody can hook people in, but it's when I, it's when I learn the lyrics of er many of my favourite bands now, when I first learned the lyrics, that's when they became my favourite band or they became my new obsession sort of thing. Oh, that's really exciting. Is the one bit of gear that you guys couldn't live without that that defines your band's sound, even if it's the cheapest guitar pedals, just something, your, your phone to record the idea, anything at all. What comes to mind when I ask that? I've got one. Ga. Yeah, yeah, go on, well, I, I'll say that in ear rack, yeah, yeah, because I think we've become a lot more of a tight live band since um and also you're in control suddenly, right? Yes, absolutely, yeah, so we're eradicating all the like shitty monitors and bleeding ears after gigs, so as well, yeah, consistency is a massive part of it. Yeah, he's not, I'm sort of, but I just like an amp, but the convenience and the reliability of going digital, and the inner ears, and it helps, especially the fact we've got 3 singers. Can't argue, like, I can get past my hangups about it, like just going straight up like it helps these guys, I can have a good time, it's fine. Yeah, I think, but I'm still just getting used to it, I think, sorry Joe. Definitely the, the in ear right, well just the inner ears in general, cos like I. Toured for, I mean we only got there in ears last year, was it, like end of last year like was our first tour with In ears, and I didn't realise how, I I'm I'm here, I'm here like going on all these tours and thinking why am I losing my voice like three nights in, and just I did not realise how hard I was singing, uh because I was having to rely on, The monitor reaching wherever I was to sort of and uh it's massively helped me in that sense, yeah. I can't argue with that. That's good to hear, it's obviously like a lot of like guitar focus, but the EA the for any drummers like the Yamaha EAD is probably the best thing you could, if you had like 500 pounds spare to just be like, I need something for the rig. You've been on it for a while haven't you? Yeah, yeah, it was like the first thing that I probably bought that was like. Really, really bad show with the monitor where it was just popping constantly, you can't hear anything, and then it was like right I'm gonna buy this, bought it and yeah, even at practise because, It's one thing at a show where you couldn't, you could not have it and you'd have your drums fed into your ears, but in the practise room like we have like a studio sounding drum kit, because of that module every time and we can record and like that was the thing about that as well that shocks me is that there's one. The, the, sorry, I, I know, I don't know if we can like speak so highly on Yamaha or whatever, I don't know if you've got like a sponsor or something that way, that way, but Yamaha and Darcy, but this, this, um, this thing, what's it called again? EAD, the, the EAD like. Thing that it's just one mic that sits on top of the kit, but it sounds, it's a stereo mic, stereo the mix sounds awesome, like just from that one thing like, and it's cool you do do videos with it and stuff, it's like allowed us to do like other content and like little things, which is quite cool. I remember when we were in uni and we learned about what's it, the John Glenn's technique Glenn John's technique with the one mic on the. Yeah, on the kit. It's like that, but like, and it's got loads, it's got like 100 different kit, you can just like fuck about with all the kits on it and there's like crazy fucking delay and like so every now and again to practise I'll just put like an electronic kit and just like like it's fun, no that's really good and that must have, you, you must have felt that impact with you like getting tight to being able to hear each other. Everything steps up a level then, isn't it, and that's what you're wanting moving forward. Speaking of moving forward, what else have you got coming up this year, what, what? Feel free to promote anything you like, you guys doing stuff? Tell us about it. We've got uh Burn It Down, the beginning of September, I think it. What is it like the I can't remember the dates, but it's like, oh wait, 3rd, where, where, we're on the 3rd. That's the one, it's wildlife. I think it's a Thursday. We're, we're playing the Thursday, Wachovia headlining. And then we'll be there on the Thursday. Thursday, are you coming down? Yeah, we'll be there. They be headlining people as it is, er, Love rail are there as well. Um, then the next day I think, I think we'll probably have to come back cos it's Charlie's wedding as well that weekend. Well I think like doing the festival with like what drug church stickte guns and speed as well is like kind of hilarious for our band, which is cool as hell. And also Torquay, I think we're doing, we are doing a show in Southampton on the way down as well. We are, yeah, we're doing a, I think it doesn't, it'll be announced on Tuesday, but it's gonna be just a 100 cap venue on the way down, so we're excited for that. And then I think towards the back end of the year we're looking to do something to kind of round off the sort of. The, the, the second album like cycle, so just yeah, there'll be shows won't there? There'll be shows there'll be shows, and then and then yeah we're just writing some new stuff in the minute. Excellent, well I'm looking forward to hearing it, I'm looking forward to seeing you in Torquay, uh thank you so much for talking with us today thank you so much Andy. No, not at all, I appreciate it man.