I recently chatted to Charlie, Alex and Dan from Fightstar before their gig in Portsmouth, to talk about orchestras, eating pancakes, and their similarities to Iron Man. Oh and new album ‘Be Human’ too...

Rock pulse: Hey Guys. Are you glad to be out of the studio and on the road again?

Charlie (Simpson, vocals/guitar) : Yeah, it’s always good to be on the road, ‘cos you get to see the fans, and the fans get to come down and enjoy the music, yeah this tour’s probably been the best tour we’ve ever done.
Alex (Westaway Guitar/Vocals): We’d rather be in the studio though.. to be honest. (all laugh)

Rock pulse: The new album incorporates many orchestral elements, how did it feel recording those in addition to the normal aspects of recording?

Charlie: Probably the best part of the whole thing; we got to work with a sixty piece orchestra, and let me tell you, that when you’re in that studio with sixty string players…, you feel like Iron Man.
Dan (Haigh, Bass): Ambitious is the word.

Rock pulse: You recently signed to Search and destroy, how has that been working out?

Charlie: Yeah it’s a joint venture between us and them because we pay for the record so we own the record, and then we licence it to them, and they’re obviously our management company, so it works pretty well. It’s pretty much close, in the family now, no one’s coming in to spoil our broth.

Rock Pulse: The new album seems to be getting a good reception, how does that feel?

Charlie: Yeah it’s good man, I mean it’s always nice to get the good reviews, I mean we don’t do it for the good reviews, but it’s always nice to get them, and when people are appreciating your music. Y’know we spend a lot of time and effort on these albums, we really think about what we’re doing, it’s a very timely process.
Dan: Most satisfying record to date, because we did it off our own back, we paid for it, we co-produced it, we put our money where our mouth was in terms of production, and it was the most ambitious design of a record that we’ve ever had. With the least resources we tried to do the hardest thing possible, and that we got through, to get the kind of players that we did on the record, and integrate rock and orchestral elements, which is technically difficult to achieve and takes a lot of planning, to get this far and have it be a top twenty album in the face of all that adversity is ultimately the most satisfying thing.
Charlie: It’s definitely the best thing we’ve ever done (laughs.)
Dan: Yeah, we quite like the new record.

Rock Pulse: Yeah, because it was recorded on such a limited budget but came out sounding really polished, how did you manage that?

Charlie: That’s a testament to Carl Bown who produced it, he’s the guitarist in Laruso, and that’s largely down to him, he’s just a hard worker. He would go till three in the morning, and then get up at eight, while we’re still in bed. He’d be out doing stuff, and we’d be eating pancakes. He worked hard man. Dan: we co-produced it too, so some credit goes to us (all laugh.) We’re really creative people so the process of writing a song is just as interesting as writing a song is, when we were working with Colin Richardson and Matt Wallace who produced our previous two albums, it was all about watching what they were doing, making notes y’know, and saying ok, maybe we can try and do it ourselves.

Rock pulse: The lyrical themes on Be Human seem on the whole, positive. Where did you draw from to create the lyrics?

Charlie: I think a sense of unity, I think trying to tell people that if we group together, it’s better than being torn apart. It was definitely a change of perception on our behalf, instead of pointing the finger of blame, and putting a negative slant to people, it’s thinking to yourselves to be positive; it’s the whole thing of if you have nothing positive to say then don’t say anything at all.

Rock Pulse: What other British bands are you into at the moment?

Charlie: Well, the Xcerts who are playing tonight, they’re really good and have a new album out, really good melodies, and a band called Bon Iver, who’s got an album called Forever Ago that’s really good. Laruso obviously, my two brothers are in Prego and Brigade, they’re good, so they’re worth checking out.

Rock pulse: The new album seems more melodic and experimental than the previous albums, was this a conscious decision or a natural progression?

Charlie: I guess it was conscious, it was conscious in the fact that like Dan says it was a grander design, it was a bit crazy and was always going to make it a more complex record, but I think in general we’ve just matured as writers, so a lot of it is natural.

Rock Pulse: I see that you’ve got a lot of festival appearances lined up, how do you feel about them compared to say, club gigs like this?

Charlie: They’re a totally different kind of monster, at club shows you’re playing to a converted audience, dedicated people, and then at a festival there’s a chance to get your music out to some new people who you might not have played to before. I think you take the festivals as more of a challenge, rather than just going out there to play to your fans, it keeps you on your toes.

Rock Pulse: Can you see yourselves touring the new album for a while yet, or are you itching to get back in the studio?

Charlie: At least another year. I mean we’re going to Europe with this, probably smack America for a bit. It’s going to be a worldwide thing this time around. Before we played in England and then didn’t really do anything else, which kinda sucked. Obviously this time we own the record.

Rock Pulse: Finally, can you see Fightstar going on indefinitely, or do you think it has a certain shelf life?

Charlie: Always indefinite man. I mean, it’s the kind of band that we can drop for a couple of years, and then come back and carry on with. We all have a common goal which is to make music that we love and that’s it y’know. We can carry on our career even if we stop at certain points to try something else like filmmaking or whatever, and we know that we can come back and pick up the chalice.

Rock Pulse: Thanks very much.