Interview with Listening Club: ‘It hits you straight in the face, it’s sunshine, guitar pop, it’s perfect for summer’

Hull-based pop-rock band Listening Club are gearing up to release four more singles, the next of which will be ‘Word I Say’ in October.

The band comprises Rich Stephenson (vocals and guitar), Matt Davis (keys), Andy Smith (bass) and Rob Taylor (drums). Initially, Stephenson, who is also an audio book producer, played on his own. ‘Hornsea (just north-east of Hull) is my hometown, it’s on the coast. I played a festival there a few years ago, I poached a few players from a disco band (laughs) and took it from there. After a year, we said, let’s just be a band. I also play in a wedding band, Soul Patrol, with our drummer, Rob, and I stand in for our guitarist sometimes in a disco band!’ Their name is a reference to listening clubs in cafes, which have sprung up across the UK: ‘I went to a Bowie one for his album Aladdin Sane, his band was from Hull. Woody Woodmansey (Bowie’s drummer) is still here, he came along, it was very enthralling. The Rats, Bowie’s backing band, were led by Mick Ronson, he’s a big name in Hull. They became The Spiders from Mars.’

‘The whole set was big tunes, people haven’t been able to go to festivals for more than a year’

Last month, Listening Club released their single ‘Better off Alone’, which has an incredibly catchy guitar line: ‘It’d been knocking around a while,’ Stephenson said. ‘I created the spine of it on my guitar, I had the idea for the riff at the beginning. I always wanted to write a song with the chorus at the start. It’s hard to do, when it’s there, where else do you go?!,’ he laughed. ‘It’s a punky one, it’s the only song in which I have a guitar solo, it hits you straight in the face. It’s sunshine, guitar pop, it’s perfect for summer. This weekend, we played our first festival in two years (Tribfest in Driffield, East Yorkshire) and it was our penultimate song. The whole set was big tunes, people haven’t been able to go to festivals for more than a year. Bands do tribute music there. We headlined the acoustic tent but we went electric, haha!’

He grew up listening to his mum and dad’s massive record collection: ‘I remember dancing to Graceland in my dungarees when I was a kid. They had The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Lloyd Cole, Van Morrison. They took me to see Van Morrison for my eighteenth birthday but he was grumpy!’

Stephenson’s soul influences clearly seep into his songwriting: ‘The soul way of writing is so pure and simple,’ he enthused. ‘It’s lovely to play, it’s had an influence on how I write. I have a bank of ideas, sometimes I’ll go back to them and just add things in.’

I say that I like how different their songs can sound, moving from punky to Middle Eastern-infused with a touch of country. ‘It’s not conscious to make them sound different but I trained in broadcasting and I listen to a lot of new music so I think it just seeps in,’ he said.

‘I needed something driving with Russian-sounding guitars!’

He has had some fascinating commissions, including writing a track for a Bollywood movie: ‘I wrote ‘All I Ever Wanted’ for a Bollywood movie that was going to be set in Leeds around 10 years ago. A producer got in touch and said could I write a song for it? The song was about the story in the film. The film didn’t get made in the end but the song’s got a big Indian/Middle Eastern flavour and our drummer brings some country shuffle! The demo at the time was just me and the guitar.’ He’s also written music for the TV show ‘Skins’: ‘It was for the episode where they all go over to Russia,’ he said. ‘I needed something driving with Russian-sounding guitars! It makes you creative and write something different to what you normally would, I like that. I did another one for a competition, The Coffee Music Project. I thought a lot of people would write songs about a guy and a girl meeting in a coffee shop, so I thought I’d do something completely different. My song was called ‘Coffee Makes Me Do Things Twice As Fast’ and the song got faster as it went along (laughs)! When I performed it live, I jumped into the crowd! It’s got a line in it “Coffee makes me do things, that’s why I have mood swings”, it was funny, I took it in a different direction, I loved it.’

Next up is their single ‘Word I Say’ in October, with plans to release the next three singles after that at roughly six week intervals. ‘The song’s about an imaginary scenario when you’re with friends who don’t listen to you but you have a good time anyway. ‘Word I Say’ is in a very similar vein to ‘All I Ever Wanted’, it’s a bit more sunshine-filled and it’s got DADGAD tuning, it makes it sound Middle Eastern. ‘Kashmir’ by Led Zeppelin uses it.’ After that, they’ll release ‘Sleep’, which he describes as ‘more of a ballad’: ‘It’s our first song over four minutes, I always say they shouldn’t be more than three-and-a-half minutes but this one just creeps over. There’s a line in it ‘When I think of you, I dream of sleep’. It’s about that soporific feeling you get when you really love somebody. I dipped into my effects pedalboard. I’ve gone back to one I used as a teenager, a reverb pedal, you can hear the swell of the guitar.’ That track will be followed by their single ‘Looks Like Rain’: ‘We played it at the festival at the weekend, it was pouring, it was for all the people who were wet,’ he said ruefully.

Stephenson is a big fan of the Made In Hull music cruises organised by P&O Ferries, which leave from Hull and travel to Amsterdam and Rotterdam. I tell him that singer Ruth Scott from Late Night Marauders in Hull told me how brilliant they are: ‘Oh, they are!,’ he said. ‘Ruth was playing on the last one with us, I think there were about 20 bands. You want to try and be on the bill on the way over because on the way back, everyone’s a bit rough (laughs). One time, they put all four of us in one room but two of our band are loud snorers – I won’t out them, haha! – and we couldn’t sleep so the next time we asked if we could have two rooms and put the snorers in together.’

‘There are so many great bands in Hull’

He’s been compared to Elvis Costello and Weezer, which delights him: ‘Elvis Costello was New Wave at the time, wasn’t he?’ We chat for a while about how brilliant the music scene is in Hull and he waxes lyrical about the local bands he loves: ‘There are so many great bands in Hull. Low Hummer (a post-punk band), they’re great. So’s Pearl’s Cab Ride (a funk band), Matt, our keys player, sometimes plays with them. Their songs are quite euphoric. I love Spilt Milk here. Their song ‘Spillage’ is 45 seconds of joy. Glass Diamonds are really good, James Wood from Late Night Marauders is their frontman, they’re a bit less jazzy than Late Night Marauders. James also plays in a Queen tribute band as Freddie!’ Stephenson is also a huge fan of Hull four-piece guitar band, LIFE: ‘They’ve made waves in the last two years, they’re so good,’ he said. ‘Their drummer, Stu Baxter, is a big contributor to the scene, they’re a bit like The Fall.’

Stephenson describes the Hull music scene as very close-knit, something other musicians there have also told me: ‘I moved back here four or five years ago – I lived in London for a while – but I was always going back and forth to Hull gigging,’ he said. ‘That’s why I moved back. They’ve got some good venues like The Adelphi, everyone’s played there. The Sesh (A Tuesday night free live music event in Hull, formerly at The Polar Bear venue but now affiliated to Social on Humber Street, a venue showcasing comedy, music and art.) is a great free music night, it’s very supportive. Everyone supports each other here, we all know each other. I don’t know why the music scene is so good in Hull, is there something in the water?! Geographically, you don’t just pass through here, it’s not like Sheffield or Leeds – could that have something to do with it?’

If he could hear one of their songs on a TV show, he goes with a couple of options: ‘I suppose ‘Better Off Alone’ could be good starting off a feel-good, buddy movie. ‘Sleep’ is quite emotive, it almost has an orchestral feel, it would be good for the dénouement of a drama, for the reconciliation of two characters who have been apart. Watching films, it’s a way to get into writing a song. Not about the film, it just gets you thinking. A good drama takes you on an emotional journey, doesn’t it? I’m emotively challenged, it plays with your emotions, I like that.’

(Photo from left to right: Andy, Rich, Matt and Rob.)