Love Is All Around: The Feeling

The press release is a fantastic thing; a window into a band, the past present and future are all covered on one sheet of A4. So it’s not very often that a press release makes you feel physically very angry. The Feelings however reads like a Darkness style joke, only you feel they aren’t joking. It starts ‘Hey, Hey we’re The Feeling! The Feeling are the new Gods of cool M.O.R.’ and it only gets worse from there. Five twentysomethings from Sussex and London, they have come to make easy listening hip. It's time to get out your Guilty Pleasures and rejoice! The Feeling are rehabilitating soft-rock.

"We're soft rock archaeologists," says their drummer, Paul Stewart. "It's more about not being self conscious," adds bassist and backing vocalist Richard Jones. "Don't fear the cheese," offers singer-guitarist Dan Gillespie. So forgive Gigwise for being a little bit worried about this interview, we are only just getting over Test Icicles untimely departure. This could make us lose our faith in music, and if Pete Doherty has taught us one thing, it is that that is a bad thing. The band arrive to the interview an hour later than schedule after an appearance on Top of the Pops overran (it’s as good a reason as
any).

Unless you have been living under a rock or on Mars you will have heard The Feelings debut single ‘Sewn’. The song is all over radio play lists and MTV like a rash, and the band are quickly establishing themselves as the coffee table generations new favourite band. Last time the band played in Liverpool they claim they were watched by four people. Tonight’s show has sold over four hundred tickets, not bad for a band releasing their debut single on a cold Monday night and indicative of the bands rapid ascent into the nations consciousness.

The Feeling are self declared “un-cool people” and list amongst their influences Supertramp, ELO and 10cc. When asked whether they have any more contemporary influences lead singer Dan Gillespie says “Yeah, bands from the eighties!” Drummer Paul Stewart however defends the bands cheesy roots by saying “We don’t know what our influences are until we have finished the music, then people come up to us and say well this sounds like this. If you are too aware of your influences it becomes derivative.”

The band are, dare we say it, slightly older than a lot of the bands around at the moment and have had a number of jobs in the past from session musicians to a resident covers band in a French Ski resort. “None of us were really happy doing anything else” says keyboard player Ciaran, “I tried to get a job in Tesco’s and they wouldn’t have me so I did this instead." It is all well and good declaring yourself to be a “guilty pleasure” but do the band worry that in a business that is heavily style based, that their lack of street credibility could cost them record sales? “We are predicting that a lot of people will not listen and not give us a chance, but we don’t care,” says Dan. He then continues, “That’s always going to happen, we won’t be aggressive enough for some people, or angsty enough, but we make music for people that are like us.”