MANILA, Philippines - Last week, we were able to interview Andy Brown and Adam Pitts, the lead singer and drummer, of the UK band Lawson. Along with Andy and Adam, the band is also made up of Joel Peat (lead guitar) and Ryan Fletcher (bass guitar). Lawson was one of the bands whose catchy songs (like When She Was Mine, Taking Over Me and Standing In The Dark) hit the charts this year.
An upcoming band in 2012, Lawson is preparing to take the world by storm in 2013, and fans of the band can look forward to seeing the group in the Philippines in April next year as part of its plan to visit Southeast Asia.
Lawson’s debut album Chapman Square is now available in stores here.
Chapman Square recently came out in the Philippines, can you tell us the story behind naming your debut album Chapman Square?
Andy: We called our album Chapman Square because that’s where we first met as a band. We had our first practices, our first YouTube video-recordings, we wrote songs there. It’s a development, it’s like a housing development, it’s where I used to live. It’s where I lived, and it’s where we wrote all our songs together.
We are sure you love all the songs on your album, but what song are you personally most excited for people to hear?
Adam: One of my favorite tracks on the album is our latest single in the UK, which is called Standing In The Dark. But there’s also another song called Gone that I really, really love.
To people who have never heard your music, how would you describe your sound, and was it inspired by any artists?
Andy: We’re inspired by bands like Coldplay, Maroon 5 and U2. And the sound of the band is quite guitar-led, its meaningful, very emotional lyrics are all about real-life stories that happened in our lives — similar to bands like The Script. And it’s quite rock — rock music.
You said it’s very emotional, and a lot of the songs are about heartbreak, but what’s the overall message of the album?
Andy: I think the message of the album is just, is to… I don’t really know what the message is, actually! It’s more just about real-life stories, really. A lot of it I wrote about a girl that broke up with me, and I wrote quite a lot of songs about that. So hopefully people can relate to it, who are also going through the same things.
Yes, we definitely think it’s relatable, but since your songs are very personal, do you sometimes find it hard to put out there for everyone?
Andy: No, I think it’s good, because I think it’s a good way to represent your emotions in a song. I think pouring your heart out and pouring your emotions into a song makes the song so much better, and also you can hear the emotion in the song then, which makes it a lot more believable.
We think all the songs are really good quality on Chapman Square, and that isn’t really that easy to achieve. So what was the most difficult challenge you faced making the album?
Adam: There were no real challenges really making the album, because we were really excited to make it anyway because it was our first album. And we were really lucky we got to work with the perfect producer that we chose, a guy called John Shanks, and we got to make the album in LA. And it all went really smoothly. It was a really, really exciting experience. There were no challenges, were there?
Andy: Nope.
Adam: It was all just a great experience.
Andy: It was all great fun.
Adam: And we can’t wait to do it all over again, sometime next year to make album two.
Taking Over Me is the Lawson song taking over the Philippines’ charts at the moment.
Andy: That’s amazing! That’s brilliant.
So we would just like to ask you, in your opinion, why is that song so special?
Adam: I think it’s a happy song, it’s really upbeat, because a lot of the songs on the album are about falling out of love, but this one’s about falling in love. And I think you can’t help but put a smile on your face.
Andy: And actually everyone always remembers the (sings intro/bit of chorus) ‘ooooooh’ in it as well.
Learn To Love Again, the new single is a very strong song, and we love the beat. Is there anything you can tell us about the story behind it, what was the inspiration?
Andy: The inspiration behind Learn To Love Again was more that you can spend a lot of time away from someone, but if you can learn to love them again like you did at one point in life, then that will tell you that that person is special, and that person is the one. And that’s what the song is about, really. I actually wrote the song in Sweden. I went over to Sweden and I wrote the song over there. It’s very, very anthemic, very epic, big song, big guitars, a big crowd, chanty vocals.
Adam: When we do concerts and gigs, this is the song that kind of goes down best live. Everyone can jump around and join in the chanty vocals. Yeah, it’s just a great one live.
So since you just said you’ve been to Sweden, and you’ve been around a lot this past year going to different countries, and you play big shows now. What has been your best experience as a band?
Adam: I think the best experience of being in a band for me is definitely what you say, going all around the world and it’s doing the shows. We’ve done some amazing, big shows. We’ve played the O2 arena in London a couple of times, we’ve done Wembley Stadium, which was 90,000. And we’ve gone to places like Copenhagen, and Madrid in Spain and played before 20,000 people over there. So yeah, it’s definitely getting to travel the world and play concerts. We’re actually coming over to the Philippines in April (2013), so hopefully we’ll get to do a show when we’re over there, and meet all our fans from the Philippines. Because that’s our favorite thing to do, travel around the world and meet the people that like our music.
Andy: We can’t wait to meet everyone!