Catfish & The Bottlemen interview: ‘Ewan McGregor is on our guest list’

One of the hottest young bands to emerge on the alternative rock scene through the first half of this year have been the surging indie-pop and memorably-named new band Catfish & The Bottlemen.

A string of singles including Fallout, Kathleen and Cocoon have seen the Llandudno-founded four-piece championed by tastemakers including Radio 1’s Zane Lowe, 6 Music’s Steve Lamacq and a-listed by Radio 1.

The acclaim has set everything up nicely ahead of this week’s release of their debut album The Balcony, produced by Arctic Monkeys helmsman Jim Abbiss. 

So you are on tour now, running right through this autumn. How is it going?

"It’s amazing. It’s sold out - and we’ve just got the dates through for the next tour and which is absolutely huge too. It’s insane how big it’s going to be, just off this first album.

"Ever since we were kids, it wasn’t about selling lots of albums and t-shirts and winning awards, it was about selling out arenas and seeing people and feeling people in person. So to sell out all of the tours and venues before our album is even out, it really excites us. It makes us think there are a lot of people who genuinely, genuinely care."

Watching you at this summer’s Latitude Festival, you appear to be immensely grateful to your fans. You really appreciate people coming to see you, don’t you?

"It genuinely blows me away. We played Leeds Festival and I came off straight after, started being sick and I was shaking for about 3 days. I was so so proud. It’s because we came from nothing, we came from nowhere, we had no money thrown as us. We worked for seven years. We got rejected by every magazine in the country and were told we weren’t good enough."

"I was talking with the lads about it the other night and was saying, 'Christ, we must have been delusional. Everyone around the country was telling us we were garbage and we refused to take it.' And now it just feels insane. When so many people turn up to watch us at festivals like Latitude and Leeds, I can’t physically express how much that means. I try to get it across that it means the world to us."

Despite all of that, the last couple of years must have been crazy – you’re now courted by Steve Lamacq and Zane Lowe, you’ve been a-listed by Radio 1…

"It’s overwhelming more than unbelievable. It feels insane that that many people are talking us. I think people believe us and they can see in our eyes and our faces that it’s true."

You say that your lyrics are the most important thing to you. Why are they so important?

"I think it’s important that you speak to people. Music should be a positive, uplifting thing, you should be able to drag people out of s**t situations and put them in good ones. That’s what it used to do for me, when I was a kid - if I was down, I used to put music on and it would pick me up. I’ve not heard a band in ages that I understand what their songs are about. I don’t know what they are singing about.

"Our single Cocoon is about people trying to tell you you’re not good enough at something and you can’t get somewhere. That song is for anybody who has gone through a bit of a shit time or needs lifting up. I wrote that on a balcony in NY thinking and I want this to be a song that makes people think, nobody can tell me I can’t be someone or do something."

I have to ask you about Kathleen too – and especially the lyric video, which features a lot of Ewan McGregor. What is that all about?

"It’s really weird because he has just been messaging me 10 minutes ago, saying he is going to pre-order the album. I just love him. When I used to come off tour I would sit with my girlfriend and watch his films. I just think he’s a dead genuine, normal funny bloke. The label asked us to make a lyric video and I was thinking I just want to make something that makes people laugh. So I just compiled a load of clips of him dancing around and smiling and stuff."

And now he’s been in touch?

"Yeah. He was tweeting us and said he was dead flattered and posted the video to all his fans and he’s coming to see us in New York and wants to be put on the guest list. So I’ve literally put him down as Obi “Plus-One” Kenobi. [laughs]"

You’re on record saying your lyrics are what drives you – how do you work?

"I kind of write everything, have everything as I want it and take it into the lads. So I draw it and they take up the brushes and they paint it. I go in and say, 'this is how I like this and this is how I like this', and they make it sound huge. They’re the reason we sound so big and so tight."

What are your influences – who are you listening to at the moment?

"I’m a big fan of the Streets, I have been since I was 11. I listen to them daily. I’ve not liked a new band in ages. I like the National’s new album a lot. But the Streets I listen to every single day. Whenever I put them on I want to write a new song. Whenever I’m not listening to them, I’m writing our own songs."

And I have to ask about your name. You are named after a busker you saw outside a café in Australia when you were a kid, aren’t you – Catfish the Bottleman? Has he come after you yet and said you’ve nicked his name?

"No, not at all. People have been over there told him, do you know there’s this band in England who have named themselves after you. And he has been like, yes I know, I’m buzzing. He is dead chuffed. He was one of my first experiences of music, so it was kind of a homage to say, thank you, from when I was a kid. So when we go to play in Australia we’re going to try and get him to support us."

Catfish & The Bottlemen's new album The Balcony is out now through Communion/Island Records.