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Author: Graham Finney
Date: 12th September 2003
Link: Planet Loud

Lostprophets went from being a bunch your average Welsh blokes forming a band to an almost household name on the worldwide rock circuit. Their debut album, Fake Sound Of Progress, by their own admission was only supposed to sell a few thousand copies. Nobody showed them the rulebook though and, by the end of the campaign, the band were headlining Brixton Academy and securing slots on the US Ozzfest. That’s not to mention enough cover stories to make most bands green with envy and an appearance on Top Of The Pops. Following an exhaustive campaign the band took a break to write and record the eagerly awaited follow-up and Planet Loud spoke to guitarist Mike Lewis as the band prepared for their return.

PL – So Mike, how are things with the band ?
Lostprophets – Hey …Things are awesome right now thanks, just starting to get back in the swing of things, we’re in the middle of rehearsing to get out and play some shows again finally…

PL – You must have been pretty gutted at having to cancel the recent shows. Could you clear up what the actual story was?
Lostprophets – You will not even believe…when I knew it was not possible for us to them I was so so gutted. Ok so this is how it went…we were scheduled to finish the record, mixed and everything, at the end of May originally, but you know how things take longer than planned..when we got to LA we wrote some new songs on top of the ones we took out with us, so everything just took longer than originally planned…there was no way we could have finished the record and been ready to play those shows, we saw the record as a priority so we chose to finish that.

PL – At the same time though you must be pretty pleased at having finished the album ?
Lostprophets – Yeah big time, we’ve been waiting to do a new record for so long, and sitting down and listening to it all finished made everything better…It would not have been possible to have put the record on hold for a month to come home, rehearse, and then play the shows. Eric (the producer) is in such demand that there was no way we could have done it. Also when you are in so deep, being creative and living and breathing the music, to take a month and then try and come back to that just wouldn’t have worked, I think we would have lost momentum and it would have felt dragged out.

PL – Go on, what’s it like.. tell us a bit about it ?
Lostprophets – Oh I hate this part….I’m so happy with it, I couldn’t have wished for this record to be any better, it’s everything we wanted it to be, and I think everything people will expect from us. It’s so diverse I can’t even explain, like when we were picking a single, it was hard because there isn’t one song on there that is typical of the rest of the record. and I hate to say it, cos everybody does, but the heavy shit is heavier than FSOP and the lighter stuff is lighter…cliché anyone?? But it’s true..

PL – What did you want to achieve with it ? Did you achieve that ?
Lostprophets - All we wanted to do with this record was write a record we could be proud of and write songs that we like, regardless of trends or anything else, just music that we were happy with. With FSOP we always kinda making excuses, we weren’t totally happy with it, there were songs on there we didn’t like, especially after playing them so much, we were always saying you wait till the next record, you wait. I definitely feel we did that with this album, I love it, I can listen to it from beginning to end, I love every song..and I’m proud of every single second of it.

PL – You had the guys from Good Charlotte in for one of the songs ? Any other guests on the album?
Lostprophets – Nah, just those guys…they were in town playing a show and we needed some gang style vocals for a track, Eric knew them from doing their record so they came down and helped us out. They are the nicest bunch of guys you could ever wish to meet.

PL- Some would say having GC on your album has done your image no good. Any response to that ?
Lostprophets – Yeah its ridiculous. I think they’re suffering a backlash right now because of their success, being called sell-outs or what have you, we’ve been there, granted they’re seeing it on a much larger scale, but the same thing happens to any band that actually gets some level of success. The whole ‘Oh my god, you’ve sold more than 10 records, you sold out!!’ thing is soo boring, change the fucking channel..

PL – Do you think your fans will be expecting Fake Sound Pt II ? Have you changed much musically ?
Lostprophets – I dunno, some will want that, others will expect us to progress from that, and I think that’s what this is, its a natural progression from that record. I think we’ve grown up…just become more accomplished songwriters. There are a couple of songs there that will have that FSOP vibe, but others that won’t. One thing that is the same is that we’re not sticking to one style…FSOP was a mixed bag and this one is even more so, we still have a wide range of influences in the band and we still draw from all of them…I mean I’ve read a lot of people saying that ‘Burn Burn’ is totally different, we’ve changed our style blah blah, but that’s 1 tune in an album of 13 songs, i know its hard but don’t judge the whole record on that song, that’s probably the song on the record that sounds most different to the rest..

PL – You spent a lot of time in LA, what was that like ?
Lostprophets – It was definitely one of the best experiences of my life. Just living in a different country, for 4 months and having the time of our lives, it was unbelievable and working on the album was the best part of it, Eric was amazing and just having the time to work and being in a different place was so inspiring to us, that’s how we ended up writing new songs when we got there, just a different environment and a new set of influences for us to draw from…

PL – Were you glad to get home?
Lostprophets – By the end, yes I was. When I’m away for a while I get homesick, miss my family and girlfriend, so after 4 months I was ready to see Ponty again. Ha Ha!

PL – You’ve been away from the UK for quite a long time, will you be spending a lot of time here or concentrating on the States again ?
Lostprophets – I don’t think we ever really concentrated solely on the US. We’ll be everywhere, we’ll be playing here a lot, the US a lot, we’ll be hitting up Japan again, getting to Australia for the first time..I wanna play everywhere!! But yeah its gonna be amazing to play the UK again, as cool as it is to play everywhere else, this is still our home, so its always the best playing here. playing small clubs here again is gonna be amazing too..back to TJ’s!!! I can’t wait!!

P – Your last UK show was Brixton Academy. How did it feel playing such a prestigious venue ?
Lostprophets – All I think about when I think of that venue is the Faith no More video, You Fat Bastards, so to walk out on that stage, where one of my favourite ever bands played was unbelievable…it was really hard for us to believe that we sold that place out….it still is!!

PL – No disrespect but that’s a hell of a show for such a relatively young band. Have you ever felt like things are going to fast for the band ?
Lostprophets – Yeah, we totally felt the same way, we couldn’t believe we were playing there. I think its hard for us to see it, from outside it looks like we’re a big band, but inside our little bubble, we’re the same 6 friends playing music, we don’t see it growing the same as people outside our little bubble but yeah many a time I’ve turned round to someone else in the band and been all “what the fuck is happening????” it can get pretty surreal sometimes especially when we thought our record would sell just a couple of thousand tops!

PL – One of the things you’ve always strived for and something I’ve always respected you for, is trying to keep complete control over the band. How hard is that to do now you are a such a high profile act ?
Lostprophets – It does get harder, we have more people working with us now, but we still feel its important to have that control. At the end of the day, this is our band and its too important to us to just hand over control to someone else. We still have control over everything, obviously taking input and advice from managers, but in some ways our manager has kinda become part of the band if you know what I mean, he’s part of our bubble haha …but that’s the was this band will always be…

PL – You’re one of the bigger bands in the UK rock scene now, is it hard to keep in touch with your roots in this small scene ?
Lostprophets – When you’re away on tour yes it is, I try and stay part of things via the internet, checking out new bands and stuff. When I’m home I try and get out to see as many bands as I can, and that way I feel like I’ve stayed part of the scene.

PL – There are a lot of good bands coming through now though, Funeral For A Friend etc, have you heard any good bands recently ?
Lostprophets - Yeah there’s bunch of bands in the UK I’m into at the moment..Hondo Maclean, Eden Maine (who we’re taking out on tour with us in October), a local band in pontypridd call Indifference…must be something in the water round these parts lately, south Wales defo has some killer bands right now!!

PL – What is the American view on the Brit scene ? Do they give a shit about the bands we rave about ?
Lostprophets – Some yes, some no….its funny to see how bands that are huge over here, like the Stereophonics are so small in the US….I think they give a shit about good bands.. so when good UK bands such as Funeral go over there, they seem to care…I think they are definitely waking up to British music again over there, it just takes a few more bands to knock down their doors.

PL – Going back to last year, you did the American Ozzfest, what was that like ?
Lostprophets – Again one of the best experiences of my life…some of it was horrible, like getting up some days and playing at 9.20 am, but we made so many amazing friends and had such a good time it totally cancelled that out. The crowds there were amazing, we never had a bad reaction, not saying it was amazing everyday, but we never got hassle like some bands did…I would definitely do it again.

PL- What are your plans for when the new album comes out ?
Lostprophets – Tour, tour, tour, tour, tour, tour, tour, tour, tour, tour, tour and on and on and on everywhere possible.

PL – Cheers for your time mate, good luck and I’ll leave the final words over to you..
Lostprophets - Just fuck what you’ve heard, come see us play, check out our new record when it comes out and listen to Anthrax!