Citing influences from My Bloody Valentine to Prince, and boasting a slick, anthemic sound and a pop sensibility, English indie quartet The 1975 seem well placed to repeat the crossover success of Bastille, a band they recently supported. With The 1975’s self-titled debut about to be released, what’s the mood in the camp like?
“It’s a bit of everything to be honest with you,” responds the band’s talkative and opinionated singer Matthew Healy. “I’ve always said in countless interviews that this record is the soundtrack to our formative years, and it’s really the cornerstone of any material that we’ve released thus far. If we’re talking the mood of it, the other day I held the physical copy of the album in my hand for the first time, and to hold something you’ve invested so much in emotionally and creatively, it’s a very humbling experience. But it’s also twinned with a lot of fear of the unexpected and fear of exposure.”
As mentioned previously, the album has serious crossover potential. Does Healy have big commercial hopes for it?
“We’re obsessed with pop music, and it is a poppy record, so that kind of opens us up to be embraced by the mainstream,” he replies. “I think a lot of people accept it because it has a natural, life affirming pop sensibility. I don’t know how it will go over, but I just like the idea of our themes and identity becoming part of pop culture, which is something I’ve been so obsessed with.”
Lyrically, the album explores different facets of modern urban life, and with the hit song ‘Sex’, Healy is certainly making clear his thematic concerns.
“I suppose so,” he considers. “It’s kind of defined by that situationist outlook and my obsession with the moment. It’s kind of like a portrait of modern life, I suppose. Lyrically, I suppose what I do is paint scenes, and then let people fill in the gaps with their own experiences, ‘cause people are really responsive to that kind of thing. I think we’ve come to be defined by the honesty of the lyrics, in a self-deprecating way. There’s a self-loathing, introspective quality to the words. Nobody knew who we were when I started writing them, so there was an emotional truth to them.”
The 1975 aren’t afraid of being upfront about their pop fixation, and indeed in one recent interview Healy put blue water between himself and the accepted indie playbook, citing Whitney Houston and – wait for it – Boyz II Men as being among his favoured listening. This obsession with naff pop has become a bit of an indie staple in recent years, with Friendly Fires, for example, bigging up N’Sync and saying. “Justin Timberlake means more to us than Morrissey”.
There’s a danger of straying into Nathan Barley territory with such pronouncements, and indeed it would almost be more of a novelty these days for an indie band to say they’re more influenced by guitar music than pop. Healy, however, has unfettered enthusiasm for glossy chart smashes.
“The thing I’ve always connected with is artists at their peak,” he explains. “Most of the ones that I idolised and grew up with were at their peak in the ’80s – Phil Collins, Peter Gabriel, Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, Paul Simon etc. That was a time when pop music wasn’t so encumbered by irony and cynicism. If you look at So by Peter Gabriel, it’s got Smash Hits all over it, but it’s also a really forward thinking piece of work. That time is perceived as a bygone era, but it’s still relevant – it’s when people got pop music right.”