How not to do a Scottish accent, fourth wave feminism and ‘Ate’ Chvrches

Can you teach me how to do a Scottish accent?”

It has always been a weird dream of mine to hang out with a bunch of Scots, for the simple reason that the Scottish accent is my favorite one. I remember reading Irvine Welsh’s Trainspotting out loud because it was written in Scottish dialect, so the only way ye would be able tae git whit was going aen was if you wair tae read it oot lood. Ken whit ah mean?

“Ehm, I think that’s what we’ve been doing this whole time,” Lauren says.

“If you don’t have it, you don’t have it.” Martin says.

“I think it’s in the vowels, really. Isn’t it?”  Iain asks.

“That and you have to watch a lot of Trainspotting,” Martin suggests. 

Now comes my moment.

“I deid wotch Trainspotteng, and I’ve even reid the book oot lood. So am I doen ae geid job?”

They all react. Violently. I can’t even make out what they’re trying to say. Martin says something about me being more Shrek than anything. Iain is trying to be nice about it. Lauren starts laughing, saying it sounds a bit like a Canadian person.

Real-life Scots laughing at my Scottish accent. Dream come true. What makes this moment even more surreal is that the Scots happen to be Chvrches, my current favorite band.

I show them a picture of myself with the three of them, and ask them if they remember when it happened. They all make guesses, and conclude that it must have been in April 2014 at the Glass House in Pomona; the night of a lunar eclipse.

But no. It was earlier than that; almost a year, actually. May 2013 at The Echo, during Chvrches’ first-ever US tour. It was at a venue just a tad bit smaller than 70s Bistro that fit 300 people. Their album “The Bones of What You Believe” would be coming out in six months still, and the band was a bit rough around the edges. Lauren wouldn’t talk between songs and looked awkwardly to the side while she sang, and technical problems abounded.

Since then they’ve played every major music festival, have become Radio One’s favorite band, gotten to the top 20 of both US and UK Album Charts and have even been featured in the “Music Now” section of The Rock N’ Roll hall of fame. Oh, and they’re the end credits music to some small movie called The Hunger Games: Mockingjay.

“We actually talk about this a lot,” Iain says. “We try not to focus on these things and instead on what’s directly in front of us. Because otherwise these things can kind of get into your head a little bit. So we try to deal with things on a day-to-day basis.”

“We didn’t ask to be this. We didn’t ask to be famous. And then all of a sudden you’re out there and people are telling you what you can and can’t do,” vocalist Lauren Mayberry adds.

Lauren Mayberry. The overnight sensation who didn’t want to become an overnight sensation. The word I’ve heard most used to describe her by fans during this tour is “elusive.” I’d replace that with “shy.” The minute she gets out of the airport she creeps into the van, and the minute the van gets to the hotel she glides straight to the elevator. She’s mastered the art of putting on her headphones and looking out the window, and is that person at a party who will always talk in hushed tones to her friends.

When Lauren does get worked up, it’s a tour de force. She makes faces, she does sound effects, she even recreates conversations jumping from one persona to the other. At one point they make fun of the questions they get asked the most during interviews and Lauren powers through the standard “Qhy Chvrches?” question in less than 10 seconds: “WellwereallylikethesoundofthewordandthoughtitwasaptbutrealizedsoonenoughthattherewerentanyURLsavailablesowejustchangedthewayitwasspelledbesideswequitelikethewayitlookswithav.”

It’s like a one-woman show. Pretty amazing.

We geek out about Fugazi and Sonic Youth, and shriek like teenage girls when the topic of Sleater-Kinney reuniting is brought up. She talks about feminism, and explains its four different waves and where Gloria Steinem and Riot Grrrl fit in, exactly. Lauren is a staunch feminist, and earlier this year she wrote a very affecting article about online misogyny, which garnered a lot of support from her peers including Grimes and Amanda Palmer.

“I think in the long term it’s been a really positive thing for us and it’s helped us connect with a lot of people in terms of just agreeing on the basic principle. Hopefully it takes you to a place of smarter discussion afterwards. It’s been really nice for us but for me especially it’s nice because I’ve always felt those things and I’ve never not said those things in the course of my work, but I think it’s nice just to know that that’s spread so widely that people can’t say they don’t know that about us now. It’s really nice when we do signings or shows and people say that they’ve read it and they agree with it. That for me is really powerful because a lot of the time when you’re in the receiving end of those things you do feel isolated and marginalized because that’s what they want you to feel, and I think if people have any kind of solidarity in that stuff it’s pretty great. I have a website, and we have a podcast where we talk about these things.”

“Cool. What’s the site called?”

“TYCI.”

“What does that stand for?”

“Tuck Your C*nt In.”

“WHAT?!”

Apparently “Tuck Your C*nt In “ is Scottish slang. It’s a sort of a female version of “man up” or “grow a pair.” On their homepage they simply define themselves as “A Collective Run by Women.” They have a blog, a zine and a podcast where they talk about gender issues, pop culture and creativity.

The ride from the airport to the hotel was, in retrospect, hilarious. Almost Spinal Tap-py even. Imagine eight adults spending 40 whole minutes trying to figure out how to work Globe prepaid cards. “It’s not working. I’m not getting a signal.” “What does your APN number say?” “What if you go here and press this?” “No, that’s an old loaded page.”

Anyway. Literally two minutes from the hotel one of the team finally figures it out. It’s Martin Doherty, who plays synths and sometimes sings for Chvrches.

“What’s the standard greeting in the Philippines?”
“Mabuhay? Or Kamusta.”

“What’s the difference?”

“Mabuhay is ‘live long.’ Kamusta is ‘How are you?’”
“Got it.”

A few minutes later I realize why he asked that question. The #chvrchesmanila hashtag goes crazy on Instagram and Twitter because of this:

Martin Doherty. Onstage he is the most energetic of the three. This is especially apparent during Under The Tide, when he goes into a Thom-Yorke-by-way-of-Michael-Jackson fit. I ask him how he does his awesome dance moves. He rests his head on his fists, looks up, and tells me with a straight face, “It comes from the heart and the soul. Then it comes out in my arms. It’s like Michael Jackson reincarnate, what do you want me to say?” He seems dead serious, almost pissed even, until he betrays everything with a slight smile. “I’m a genius,” he says, breaking into laughter.

Lauren makes the ‘jerk-off + explode’ hand gesture made famous by Mr. Chow in The Hangover. “A couple of fans that come a lot to the show actually made T-shirts with Dok (Martin) on it that said ‘Martin Doherty Academy of Dance. We are open for applications.’”

We bring up the topic of “Ate Chvrches,” the moniker many Pinoy fans have given Lauren.

“What does that mean?” Martin asks.

“It means ‘Big Sister Chvrches.’ Essentially it’s for people who are too lazy to Google ‘Chvrches lead vocalist.’ It’s a term of respect. Hence, you would be Kuya Chvrches, which means ‘Big Brother Chvrches.’

“So there’s big sister Chvrches and there’s big brother Chvrches. What’s grandpa Chvrches?”

“Lolo Chvrches.”

Iain is, to borrow a phrase from the UK, a delightful chap. Always smiling, he’s the most social one. He stayed after the press-con to shoot the shit with the press (who, I noticed, were all rabid fans who found a way into writing this one piece for their respective magazines) and boogied on the dance floor with all the fans during the DJ set.

In his Twitter account, he describes himself as a nerd. I believe him, because he tells me that he saw Star Wars Episode One: The Phantom Menace again a few months ago. No one watches The Phantom Menace again. The whole ride to the airport was a complete geekgasm for us; discussing his favorite zombie movie (“Dawn of the Dead, definitely”), favorite comic book (“I’d be hard-pressed not to agree with you on The Dark Knight Returns, though my favorite character is definitely the Silver Surfer”), watching Star Wars in Machete Order (look it up; it’s pretty much the best way to watch the series). We also discussed his thoughts on Lost (“I pretty much gave up after season 2”), The Walking Dead (“I think I’ve finally reached my zombie quota”), Dr. Who (“It’s brilliant. You have to watch it!), Cabin In The Woods (“I’ve had like seven arguments with people over this movie. I think it’s horrible”) and Black Mirror (“the creator, Charlie Brooker, is brilliant. Look for his other stuff!”).

One of the most admirable things about Chvrches is their dedication to their fans. They’re naturally a private bunch, and definitely do not like being the center of attention, but you can see them turn it on and go the distance for their fans. During the meet and greet, two hours into signing records and taking pictures with fans, we ask their manager Cara if we should rush things. “No, no. Tell them to take their time.” At the very tail end of the line is a tiny teenager who stops and breaks into tears before meeting the band. The band all stand up and comfort her, taking pictures with her. It’s a total awww moment.

“The Philippine fans are amazing,” Martin tells me the night before. “They dominate social media. At first they were all ‘Chvrches please come to the Philippines!’ and ‘The Philippines loves you please fly over!” but then after a few months it was ‘Why do you hate The Philippines?’ ‘Why aren’t you coming over? What did we ever do to you?’ We don’t hate you, we just haven’t had the opportunity to come yet!”

But they did come, and they destroyed.

They started their set with We Sink, though it was hard to tell which song it was because the crowd was so loud. Iain would later tell the Hong Kong website Madbuzz HK that playing Manila was “f*cking insane” and that he had to turn his monitor up to an almost deafening point because he couldn’t hear. Lauren’s learned some new moves as well since I saw them in Coachella last April — she uses her mic cable as a whip before holding it up to her mouth to sing, and she added a little shuffle to the signature Mayberry dance move during Tether.

They do 10 more songs; some crowd favorites like Gun and Recover, and much-sought-after new ones like Get Away from the Drive soundtrack. They finish the set off with the now-classic The Mother We Share, with the crowd sharing this magical moment of going “owoh-owoh-owoh-oh-oh” together. My partner in Vybe Aspen told them the night before to expect to hear a crowd of thousands sing along in perfect pitch. He was right.

This would have been a perfect end to a perfect night, and then I realized that they’re still doing a DJ set.

I remember coming in to Raven for the DJ set and seeing a bunch of scantily-clad “Hypers” dancing, waving their massive phallic glowsticks around. All the fans were far away and down below. Suddenly the discourse I’d had with Lauren about feminism the previous night flashed before my eyes.

“Oh. My. God.”

I run to the band area, where Iain is enjoying the night drinking champagne as Martin and Lauren spin upstairs.

“Iain. Are you guys okay with this?”
Iain laughs. “It’s fine with me but I don’t know about them!”

Sure enough Lauren has her arms crossed, her face crumpled up as she talks to Martin with displeasure. We run and get the people at the sidelines to come up and start dancing. Security starts freaking out but it’s too late — a veritable mob has formed on the dance floor. The “hypers” awkwardly step down, and Lauren’s face visibly brightens up. She asks Martin a question. He shrugs. She presses play, cueing Grimes’ Oblivion. Everyone goes nuts. She looks at Martin, beaming with pride (I’m thinking the question she asked is “You think these guys are familiar with Grimes?”) The set is a perfect combination of hip-hop, indie and punk classics, going from Blondie’s Hanging on the Telephone to Sleigh Bells’ Rill Rill to N.WA.’s Gangsta Gangsta to Taylor Swift’s Shake it Off. I type “MICHAEL JACKSON HAHA” on my phone and show it to Lauren. She squints to read it, smirks, and nods in approval, cueing in Black and White.  By the end of the night Churches’ whole entourage is up in the DJ booth, dancing the night away.

It’s punk. It’s pop. It’s genuine and saccharine, brilliant and familiar. It’s dangerous but harmless, ultimately powerful; the perfect amount of rebellion, like how one would intentionally spell “Churches” with a V.