Tonight, The Magic Numbers - who met at school in London and live here still - play a sold out show at Wilton's Music Hall. Built in the 1850s, and tucked away down an inconspicuous alleyway in the East End, Wilton's is the oldest and grandest music hall in the world. We caught up with Angela Gannon from the band to find out what they've been up to.
At the end of last year you embarked on a UK tour. How did it go?
It was great! We wanted it to be like when we first started touring, playing small intimate venues. Whenever we have done a one off club show over the last couple of years it has always been so much fun and a bit raucous with everyone singing along, so when the idea came up to do a small club tour we were really excited! Our eardrums took a little bit of a battering but it was well worth it and after being tucked away in the studio for a while it was just what we needed.
Any highlights?
It's quite hard to say which were the highlights as all the shows were quite different from place to place, for instance the show in Manchester was really rowdy which was great and then the next day in Preston, it was the opposite. They were really quiet and attentive. I'd have to say though, that both of the Scottish dates were really good as always along with Cardiff and Leeds.
As well as your old songs you were showcasing new material. How did the new songs go down?
I think they went down really well. We tried to make sure we played quite a lot of the new album every night as well as the old songs but it seemed like people were really quite excited to hear the new stuff and they seemed pretty happy to hear that we had actually finished the new record!
Tonight, you're playing at Wilton's. It's an amazing venue. Are you approaching it differently to a normal gig?
Kind of. There will be a couple of surprises. It will be really great to play there, as we will get to play some of the songs that we can't really play at normal shows.
Does it actually have a sound system?
It doesn't, it's a bit of a blank canvas at the moment, but a blank canvas with a lot of character!
The thing that strikes us about your gigs (apart from the music of course), which is quite refreshing, is the eclectic make up of your audience. Why do you think that is?
I'm not quite sure, but I think it's because our songs don't really fall into a specific box so I guess our fans don't either. It's quite mad sometimes seeing such an array of people in the crowd.
The tour was the first live performances you'd done for a while. What have you been up to for the last year or so?
We had little bit of time off after we finished touring Those The Brokes, (their second album) as we all agreed it was time to try and maybe get back to the real world for a bit and try and construct a life after 3 years on the road! But sooner or later we were back in the studio again doing the only thing we know how, and since then we have been working on the new record.
So, a new album is out later this year. Can we expect any surprises?
I think so. Looking back over the last 2 records I think this one is very different. The approach to this record was a completely new way of working for us. The way we put the last 2 records together was essentially rehearse the songs till they were really tight and record them. This time every song had so many different possibilities and we were open to all of them.
What does 2010 hold for The Magic Numbers?
The new album should be out around April and then hopefully a lot of touring!
For more information on The Magic Numbers visit: www.themagicnumbers.net or check out our previous coverage of the band.
Interview by Jonnie Fielding.
