When you’ve snagged a slot on the industry hype train, the pressure is sky high. How many acts shoved wide eyed and blinking onto the annual tip lists actually even get their albums out in the following twelve months? That’s not a problem Blossoms have had to deal with. Building foundations by playing to their strengths, they’ve hit all their marks over the last year. Today they release their self titled debut. We caught a quick chat with lead singer Tom Ogden to put it all into perspective.
Hello Tom, what have we interrupted?
I’m currently sat in a hotel room in Norway with Myles demoing keyboard ideas for a song I’ve wrote for our second album.
Your debut album’s out – how long have you been working on it?
We’ve technically been working on it since August 2014, as that’s when we recorded our debut single, however at the time we didn’t know it wasn’t going to be an album we were just content on releasing great singles. We built up singles for about a year until we got signed, then we recorded the rest of the album from September 2015-January 2016.
You teamed up with The Coral’s James Skelly for the release – have you known each other long? How did the collaboration come about?
We’ve known James since March 2014. He heard a demo version of our song Blow and he got in touch with us saying he’d like to produce it and release it with us. We did so and continued to work together on all the singles and the rest of the album.
What’s your favourite thing about the record?
I think the record has a timeless quality to it that a lot of our favourite records have. Also lyrically, it’s coming from an honest place so I think people will find themselves relating to it.
Do you think you’ve managed to achieve everything on the record that you intended?
Yeah we always said when we’d eventually make an album we wanted it to be an album full of singles and great pop moments, I think that we did that and more. We also wanted to sound current, you can have all your influences from throughout the years but ultimately it’s 2016. We want to sound as modern as we can.
Are there any other sides to the band you hope to explore on future releases?
I think as a band we’re constantly evolving, however it’s never a conscious thing. We’re a different band today than we were 2 years ago, whether that’s down to a breakthrough in songwriting or specific keyboard sounds, we’re always looking to better ourselves and to stay open minded. We definitely see ourselves as band that will grow and delve into different corners as we progress.
What do you think is most important for prospective new fans to know about Blossoms?
That this hasn’t happened overnight, we’ve done the toilet tours up and down the country and gathered a solid fanbase for the last 3 years. So having that experience makes all this more real to us, and we take nothing for granted. We want to be around for a long time, we’re a band they can believe in.
What have you got planned for the rest of the year?
Tour tour tour tour.