Pegasus Bridge

By Claire White

After reviewing the band’s EP, we were keen to find out more about Pegasus Bridge and when we heard they were set to support Not Advised, we were eager to get involved and caught up with the band before the Glasgow show for a chat!

If someone hasn’t listened to your album ‘While We’re Young’ which track would you recommend them to listen to?

Alex: I’d definitely say Yoko is the most commercial sounding song on the album, it’s quite reflective of where we were when we wrote that album. There’s definitely some mature moments and also some immature moments on the album, so it’s a nice middle ground on that record.

Callum: I would recommend Like Dog’s, it’s a little bit darker than the other things we’ve done on the album. Whereas everything is quite poppy on the album, this track is different and it’s really enjoyable to listen to.

What would you say is the bands ‘Unique Selling Point’?

Tom: We sound different to a lot of stuff that’s going on just now. We stay true to ourselves; we don’t try to sound like anyone or anything else.

Alex: The thing that really excites me about this group is how diverse our interests are musically. Callum and Tom really like the heavier side to the music, Ed’s really into his solo acoustic stuff and I like Damien Rice. I’m also into electronic, electronic-pop and it’s a mesh of those things together that brings out something a little bit different.

Callum: Somehow, it all seems to blend! Very strangely and we’ve no idea how!

Your songs contain very quirky lyrics (for example in Ribena), where do you gain your inspiration from?

Ed: We actually spend ages writing lyrics, we don’t really settle for anything until it’s right. We love that kind of quirkiness, because there are so many bands that have the generic lyrics…I Can’t really think of a good example right now…

Callum: ‘Baby’!

Ed: Yeah ‘Baby’, ‘Baby’ is a good example! I don’t think there is any artist who uses those two word’s in such a quick *concession?, but I’m sure we could find a few! We’re very critical of our lyrics and we make sure that they are absolutely perfect and that we have a specific theme to the song before we finish it, so they’ve all got to fit in with everything else and make sense for it to be a proper song; well that’s what makes a proper song in our opinion!

Alex: We’ve spent hours writing just single lines, you know when you’ve got the right one – it just feels right but it’s always worth it in the end!

Which of your tracks is your favourite to play live?

Ed: I think it’s different for everyone. Me and Cal particularly enjoy Like Dogs, it’s always a powerful one and it always goes down really well, particularly on this tour it’s gone down really well. I know ‘Ribena’ has been a great finisher in this set. It’s been a real fan-favourite because everyone knows the words, so everyone bounces to that one and the audience response is great. I could go all night really, Paris is a great sing-a-long track and the crowd always sing it back which is really nice and is a new thing for us really. Since releasing the record we haven’t really done a tour and then we came out as a support band for Not Advised and somehow everyone knows the words, which is a great surprise!

What’s been your favourite gig you’ve played so far?

Callum: I’m really looking forward to Glasgow, I went to uni here so I’ve got a couple of friends here tonight! It could go terribly, but I am looking forward to it nonetheless. We played Manchester yesterday and it was our ‘hometown’ gig; we’d never had a gig like it. We were touched by our fan base turning out, it was pretty much packed and really fantastic!

Alex: The Manchester date last night. The response there was nothing we’d seen before for a show that we’ve played, it was amazing. The energy was unbelievable. This tour has had some of the best show’s we’ve ever had. It’s been a great tour, we’re really thankful to those guys.

Ed: I think because we are almost like a ‘nomadic band’, we come from different parts of the country all of us and we’ve all lived in different parts of the country and in that respect, although we all live near Manchester, Manchester’s never really been a ‘hometown’ place for us. I think with Birmingham we’ve always had really popular gigs, even in the suburbs of Birmingham we’ve had really popular gigs, but for Manchester to be received so warmly then was an absolute delight and we were very happy about that.

And what’s been the best gig you’ve been to?

Alex: Quite an interesting fact; the first show we ever went to Callum, myself and Ed all went together when we knew each other at school which was when we were fourteen to see Papa Roach in Manchester!

Ed: supported by ‘The Murder Dolls’ and ‘Hell Is For Heroes’!

Alex: We were excited, it was a good gig!

If you were to do a collaboration with any artist or band, who would you choose and why?

Callum: Dead or alive?

Anything you want!

Alex: This is really weird, I had a dream where we played ’Paris’ and we had Pixie Lott singing on it, I know she’s really commercial but I’d love to collaborate with someone like Ellie Goulding as well, I think she’s phenomenal.

Ed: It’s a strange question, because you could easily just say your favourite artist but whether you’d collaborate well with them is another question. My favourite artist of all time is a guy called Damien Rice who is unbelievably incredible with melody and things like that and I think I could have a good conversation with him, but I don’t know whether we’d collaborate well with each other, it’s an interesting question.

What can we expect from Pegasus Bridge in 2011?

Tom: To keep playing, keep coming to see everyone. We’ve obviously got some new videos coming out soon with new singles and we will try and get on loads of festivals then hopefully a headline tour for ourselves for the end of the year!

And finally, do you really drink coffee and not just Ribena now?

Callum: Oh that! I want to state this right now, I am a tea drinker and I am sick of these allegations of coffee and Ribena thrown at me all the time! I drink tea and tea alone and that is the final nail on the coffin! [laughter] Thank you, this interview is over! [Laughter]

Alex: It is a metaphor for youth, it’s not to be taken too seriously!

Ed: Yeah, but I just want to say as well my grandmother has always fed us…can you feed Ribena?! [laughter] I don’t really know…I don’t know what the verb is?! Anyway! She’s weaned all of us on Ribena; all of my family since we were all very young and that’s why it was such a key thing in our song. You know, you do mature and you do start to drink hot drinks, although it must be said that Tom has never matured into drinking hot drinks!

Tom: I don’t even do hot drinks…[laughter]I don’t even do soup, anything hot! It just makes me feel ill and reminds me of vomit!

Eurgh!

Ed: So this song barely makes sense…

Callum: It’s technically a lie…we don’t drink coffee or ribena!

Ed: I do!

Pegasus Bridge are about to embark on a few dates in Scotland this week so if you are around make sure you catch them live as you won’t be disappointed! You can also read our full review of the band at the Glasgow date now!