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 12 May 2008 13:58 BST

The Metros: We wouldn't want to be anything else

Sunday, 06 Apr 2008 15:30
The Metros: "It's just so rock and roll"
South London likely lads the Metros are everything a young band should be – lively, fun and simply loving every moment of making music for a living.

inthenews.co.uk's Lee Davis grabbed the chance to shoot the breeze with Metros bassist Charlie Elliott.

With a touch of Madness, a dash of the Libertines and a healthy peppering of Ian Dury and the Blockheads, the Metros' music is like getting verbals from a bunch of loud kids on a school trip to the seaside, but in a good way.

There's a definite cocky yet charming warmth emanating through their dynamic brand of indie-punk as evidenced on their latest single Education Pt 2.

This is the music you can hear through the hubbub of buses and cars passing pubs with faded facades on a rainswept Peckham street in March, or yelling for your attention in a Camberwell café over the sound of sausages sizzling on a greasy griddle.

The band is made up of guitarists Jak Payne and Joe Simpson, vocalist Saul Adamczeski, drummer Freddi Hyde-Thompson and bassist Charlie Elliott. All the band are in their late teens or thereabouts.

Charlie picks up the story: "Jak and Saul started playing together when they were about 11 or 12.

"Freddi lived at the end of Jak's garden, his house backed onto the end of Jak's garden. Me and Freddi went to school together, and we started messing around, we never took it seriously.

"But as a band, we were able to get into local pubs underage. We've been together as a band for about two years."

Charlie describes the Metros' sound as energy-filled fairground punk and the band is working on their debut album, which should be out in late August or early September.

One of the band's biggest influences is that of Ian Dury and the Blockheads, and the Metros are actually working with Ian Dury's son Baxter.

"It's pretty embarrassing, really. He said what sort of sound do we want on a song and we’d say ‘like your dad’, or Elvis Costello, Stiff Records, British punk stuff. It’s been working really well, actually,” said Charlie.

The Metros have also been on tour and Charlie said: "It's gone really well. We've been up and down the country, had dates in Scotland, in Wales."

The tour concluded with an in-store show in Great Yarmouth and one at Pure Groove Records in north London, followed by a much-needed day off.

However, the tour was not without its fair share of memorable moments as Charlie said: "One of our £3,000 Gibson guitars, the neck had snapped and it was a three-hour drive up to Great Yarmouth, and we did the show with only one guitar. I hope they weren't too disappointed.

"I got beaten up by a kebab shop owner in Manchester but I don't remember anything. I thought it was the girl I'd met that night so when I rang her up she said it was a kebab shop owner.

"And there's been a couple of days when we couldn't find members of the band after gigs, so we'd be driving around parts of Leeds and Birmingham picking them up from random people's houses.

"In Hull, some female fans asked us to sign their breasts. We had a really good gig in Hull at the Adelphi, it was mad!

"There were a lot of young kids there, it was sold out. It was a tiny venue, they told us they could fit in about 320 people but I reckon it was 200, we had sweat dripping off the ceiling."

The bassist said how the music industry is going through a transition at the moment, with CD sales falling off and a resurgence of bands playing live, essentially a return to the days of punk's 'do-it-yourself' ethos.

Commenting on current music, Charlie said: "There's not a lot of stuff out at the moment but I like the Mystery Jets. We've played with them, they're friends of ours.

"And we've been touring with a band called Billy The Kid, I really like them. I like that A-Punk song from Vampire Weekend."

The Metros hail from south London but have their sights set on performing far and wide.

Said Charlie: "We're going to play the Summersonic festival in Japan where you play two dates. One in Osaka, one in Tokyo and you get to take the bullet train.

"We played a snowboarding festival in Austria last year that was amazing, and we're doing it again this year."

Closer to home, the band is pencilled in to perform at several UK festivals as Charlie said: "I think we're playing Leeds and Reading, and the Great Escape in Brighton.

"We;re also playing a really small festival in Kent called Lounge on the Farm. It's really good, man. We'll bring a small part of south London to Kent."

The Metros’ current single Education Pt 2 has been selling steadily and the forthcoming debut album may be the key to touring the US and Europe.

As Charlie said: "If the first album goes really well then hopefully we'll be touring America or Europe. If not, we'll be flipping burgers at McDonald's in Peckham!"

The band is signed to small but ambitious label 1965 Records, for whom Charlie has nothing but praise.

"They've really looked after us. They let us finish school first. It's quite exciting, man. I wouldn't want to be anything else.

"I suppose, like with most kids, if you said 'do you want to be in a band?' most would say yes. It's just so rock and roll,' he said.

The Metros, between them, Gallows and the Maccabees, British indie-punk is in safe hands.

Lee DavisEnd of story


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