The Adelaides

So we are up at the Cornbury Festival and we get the chance to chat with two of fresh-air country rock outfit The Adelaides. Did we have to get asked twice?…

JLTT: (Laughs) I thought there were three of you?

Adelaides: (Laughs) There are! We’re missing one at the moment.

JLTT: I’m talking to Paris and…?

Adelaides: Paris and Alicia.

JLTT: Did you enjoy your performance just then?

Paris: Loved it. We weren’t expecting a big crowd at all so to have that many people so early on was good wasn’t it?

JLTT: It’s a nice stage and a nice sound. Where are you ladies from?

Alicia: All near Birmingham. Just outskirts really and dotted about.

JLLT: One of my best friends lives in Selly Oak!

A: Oh ok. We know it

JLTT: Where are you from?

Paris: Near Solihull.

JLTT: And the other lady is…

Alicia: From Sutton Coldfield. I’m from Wolverhampton.

JLTT: Ok. Your band sound tight.

Adelaides: Thank you.

JLTT: Just a quick request. Do me a few bars of ‘Single Ladies’

Alicia: Oh God…

JLTT: When you mentioned Beyoncé I thought you were going to do that!

(They sing a few bars of the Beyoncé hit)

JLTT: Thank you excellent! We love it when people do requests. Tell us about the song ‘Leave’.

Alicia: Well this one was written by a guy called Marcus Hummon who is from Nashville. He has written for The Dixie Chicks, Rascal Flatts and has had some really big hits with them. We met him back in October (2017) and it was first gig ever as a band. So it was quite nerve-racking for us anyway.

JLTT: That is a big fish.

Adelaides: Yeah. A talent, indeed

JLTT: We were with Eric Paslay last week.

Adelaides: You’re joking!!

JLTT: What a nice man. If you meet him you’ll like him as well. Obviously that’s inspirational if you dig this genre of music.

Alicia: Of course. So he (Marcus) just came up to us and we got talking a bit more and he gave us his email. Then he sent us the song ‘Leave’ and we knew straight away that we loved it. It is very harmony-based which is great because we are very harmony-based so we just said let’s give it go!

JLTT: I mean there are acts around that you could play as support or in and around the same bill as thinking of The Shires and the Ward Thomas ladies who we know well. There is something about your harmonies… there was an album that Dolly Parton made years ago with Linda Ronstandt and Emmylou Harris.

Paris: Yeah. The trio album.

JLTT: Yes it was you’re dead right. I shut my eyes and there is an occasional hint of that. I wondered if you knew the record?

Paris: I haven’t actually heard it, I’ve only heard of it.

JLTT: It is recommended as you are heading in that direction.

Paris: Lovely compliment.

Alicia: Thank you. We love Dolly Parton as you can probably tell!

JLTT: Quite a good idea to do the Beyoncé song and ‘Jolene’. Were you singing on the tour bus and that came out of nowhere or what?

Alicia: We just wanted to bring something different to be honest. We knew we wanted to do a cover so something people would know and we came up Beyonce/Dixie Chicks song.

Paris: Normally you only have time for one cover in your set. When you love so many songs you can’t choose!

Alicia: So we picked those two songs and put them together.

JLTT: (Laughs) You don’t have to tell me that! I run two bands and I have everyone suggesting songs because it makes a democracy. You’ve been doing some festivals including Ramblin Man Fair. How was that for you?

Alicia: That was great! We’ve been really fortunate this year actually.

Paris: We didn’t know what to expect from that because it is a hardcore rock festival so we were a bit scared!

JLTT: So you have also opened for Catherine McGrath who is also a discovery of ours and Megan McKenna. When you go out and you are playing to an audience who may not be aware of you how do you approach it? Do you have a plan at all?

Alicia: Not really. We kind of just be ourselves and hope people like it.

Paris: You can’t really prepare. You just have to believe in yourself and hope they believe in you to.

JLTT: I love playing to strangers because it is no good you being good last night and it proves whether you have any impact. You are doing the right thing by chatting to your audience because they could be anywhere else, especially at a festival.

Alicia: Exactly.

JLTT: Recording. Are you doing any?

Alicia: Yes we are demoing at the moment. All of the tracks that we’ve got – we’ve probably got an album’s worth of recorded songs. But they are all demos at the moment as we are just trying to pinpoint our sound of how we want people to hear us. (Turns to Paris) It’s going well isn’t it?

Paris: Yeah we are on the right track.

JLTT: There’s a danger in country rock/pop acts that a producer covers them in synthesisers to fill up the sound because that’s what radio wants. Kate Bush would’ve never made it would she?

(Laughs)

JLTT: So are you gonna put your foot down and insist on your sound coming through?

Alicia: Of course.

Paris: We are all quite strong-opinionated aren’t we?

(Laughs) Alicia: Yeah we are!

Paris: Whenever we are in the studio and it comes to a point in the studio with something we don’t’ like we’ll always say, won’t we?

Alicia: Yeah. He might put a strange sound effect and we’re like “Get rid!”

JLTT: The underrated element is percussion.

Alicia: Oh yeah.

JLTT: So many great records and radio loved records like ‘Baker Street’. I mean the congas on there! Everyone goes on about the saxophone… Now here is our favourite question when we are trying to cause trouble : When were you right and your colleague was wrong? We did this to Dan and Shay and got a great answer!

Alicia: Probably a song choice but Abi isn’t here actually. But this is an interesting one with our set that we’ve been playing at festivals. So we like to end on a high really but the band and Abi were very much “We want to end on ‘Whiskey and The Dirt’ which is not a slow song but a mellow song. It is brilliant and big sound. But we wanted to end on a song that is upbeat and people can clap along too. And we were right! (Laughs)

JLTT: Thank you so much.

Adelaides: Thank you. Great to meet you.

Pete Sargeant