I interviewed Swim Deep for shout4music. Here's the outcome.

Swim Deep, a five-piece from Birmingham, are in the running to be one off the much talked about buzz bands of the year. With their compelling single 'King City' (which includes the infamous “pretending Jenny-Lee Lindberg is my girlfriend” lyric) and now 'Honey' the only way for this midlands based band is a sharp ascendancy towards the masses ear drums. We chat to Zach about their current tour with Spector and why they love Tame Impala so much.

You're going on tour with Spector later on this month, are there any particular venues you're looking forward to playing?

All of them, we've played a few shows with them over the last few months and they've been some of the best crowds we've played too, there just so up for it. They just love sunshine popstars.

Who's your favourite band right now? Why?

Tame Impala, the way they write music, the way they record music, there pop/ RnB melodies just absolutely blow our minds.

How did Swim Deep come about?

Austin and Higgy met whilst working in Morrisons. Ozzy asked Higgy if he wanted to get the hell out of this place and write music, higgy said yes, then I (Zachary) and Cavan met those guys on the dance floor in Birmingham.

Do you think - given the current music scene - that Birmingham could be/is the new 'Madchester'? If not, do you think it ever will be?

I think it already is tbh, there's just so much coming out of Birmingham at the minute, and every one seems to be loving it.

You guys seem to be really into California. What is it about California that makes you so attracted to it?

The sun, the babes, the beaches, everything to do with California attracts us and makes us want to live there.

Where do you see Swim Deep in 5 years?

On a beach in California surrounded by babes, drinking sangria.

Name 5 albums you'd take on a desert island...

Tame Impala - Lonerism

Pond - Beard, Wives , Denim

Talking Heads - Stop Making Sense

Elton John - Rocket Man

Michael Jackson - Bad

Tell me about the first gig you ever went to, who was it, when and what you thought of it.

My first ever gig was an NME tour when i was about 13, Lethal Bizzle played and it was huge, it was in Birmingham. i remember just jumping around like a fool shouting 'POW'.

I can't tell you how excited I am about this being published and the fact I got the chance to interview them in the first place! The interview was over email so it wasn't entirely exciting but it's better than nothing! 

Day three at NME (poet and I didn't know it)

Today was so busy compared to the rest of the week. We started, as usual with the mail, now...we were told that we would be getting more and more mail as the week went on. However, as the week has gone on so far it's become increasingly less, which I'm fine with but I thought as the new issue went out today there would be more mail today, guess I was wrong.
   After we had finished the mail we finished transcribing the interviews, Tom Howard came up to us in the morning asking us how we were doing and how we were finding it all, which was really nice. When the editors give you a task, they really are considerate towards you and understand that it's difficult. We said to Tom that we'd try and have them done by lunch time, however the interview was longer than I though, it ended up being around 40 minutes in length. If you've never transcribed an interview before, let me tell you...it's difficult. You have to listen to things several times before you really come to grips with what they're saying. We tried to get them finished by lunch time however we ran over by an hour and didn't get them finished until two. I had literally just finished my transcription when Jenny Stevens, the deputy news editor approached us, asking if we could transcribe an interview for her. I explained that I would love to do it as I really enjoy doing it, but I would have to start after lunch. She was really surprised that we had left lunch so late to finish some work. I guess she was impressed because she ushered us off to lunch. When I came back she gave me the Dictaphone she had, it wasn't hers it was Dan Stubbs' the news editor. She asked me too look through the files until I could find her interview, I thought this would be a pretty simple task however it deemed near-on impossible to find her interview, in the end I had to take it back to her and Dan seemed to find it so fast. I was so embarrassed, it made me look like such a fool and technophobe but I guess they didn't mind because it's not my fault I'd never seen a Dictaphone in real life before. I only got a third of the way through the interview before it was time to go home. I felt bad but I knew I'd be in the office all night if I'd carried on. I said to Jenny that I didn't mind going home and transcribing the rest for her, she said that it was okay. I guess she was working to a deadline because I got an email from her a couple of hours later saying that her deadline had been extended and could finish it tomorrow morning if I wanted to, of course I obliged. I felt that I couldn't leave it half done. So I guess that's what my job for tomorrow will be, I'm also hoping to do my single review tomorrow as well. I'll probably do the Disclosure track and the Swim Deep track. Karen gave us a list to choose from today, I thought these two would be okay because I'm a fan of both the bands. I haven't really written any bad reviews yet, so I didn't want NME to see my first bad review. The editors will be going through them with us on Friday, I think.

Jeeeeez, I knew I'd forget about posting on here, I'm so sorry! The last time I posted here I had just seen The Drums. Since then it's been my birthday. I've been clubbing a few times, I'm still really undecided about it. I'm not sure if this is the same for everyone else but I think after a few times of you going it sort of loses it's "spark" or whatever. I still have fun, I love the people that I go out clubbing with they're all a right laugh but I just, I don't know. I think mostly it's all these girls that go out in their really tight, skinny dresses. It genuinely makes me ill, it makes me upset that they feel they have to dress like that to get attention. I don't even bother, I just go out in my jeans and a nice top. Maybe a dress with some black tights, but then again I don't go out to get laid. To put it bluntly.
  I saw The Maccabees again in Brighton 2 days after my birthday which was amazing, they put on a really great show. I was really disappointed because the beautiful and amazing La Shark had supported them on every other date of their tour but not the Brighton show so I still haven't had a chance to see them. I just have my fingers crossed that they'll be playing Reading Festival.
   Also at Shout4Music my editor is giving the chance to interview bands aswell now, which for me is such a great opportunity. I just hope I can actually get some done. He's going to try and sort out an interview with Howler when they play in Reading on the 14th of May. If that happens I'll be over the moon, truly. I love that band and would love to know more about them considering Jordan is only a year older than me, it fascinates me that people who are only a year older than me are already doing world tours!
  Last Monday (16/4/12) I saw Bombay Bicycle Club with Lucy Rose and Lianna La Havas supporting, the whole show was so beautiful. Both of the supports were amazing, I'm so glad Lucy Rose got to support, I know she's practically in Bombay but the fact she got to support really boosts her career as a solo artist and I love that, I'm still debating whether to go see her in Reading in a few weeks though, I'd really love to but I need to save the money.
   Yesterday is what I really want to get on to here. So I know for a fact I want to do journalism when I'm older (although I'm pretty much old enough), I'm not really a fan of political journalism, I mean I don't mind politics but it does get boring. Anyway back to the point yesterday Ed Miliband (leader of the Labour party) came to my college, so firstly not only did I get a chance to film him (weird but more exciting than you think) I also got the chance to sit in on his briefing and Q+A session, I had my questions ready. Until I got told I had the chance to interview him 1 on 1!! I was so excited. Usually this would take a journalist a very long time to build up to something as important as this but my first ever interview and it was with the leader of the opposition! Sadly, because I was the last of the "press" (yes, I was called press for the day. And yes, that did excite me so much I peed a little) to go in there, I only had time for 2 questions. I had some really challenging questions planned but I felt like I should ask more appropriate questions to what he had been talking about earlier on in the day. So I asked him if he would consider introducing more BTEC and NVQ qualifications into sixth forms because society feels that sixth forms lack BTEC options meaning that the people that don't have the confidence or don't feel comfortable moving to college have to do A-Levels that they don't really want to do. My second question was regarding trade unions, for those who don't know the Labour party are basically funded by these trade unions and I think that members, MPs especially have forgotten that. So I asked Ed what he would do if trade unions refused to pay their political funds because they feel that the labour party have turned their back on them. He was so thrown off by this question, he was obviously not expecting it at all. Which was good for me. Luckily the person I was with was aloud to film the short interview with Ed so as soon as I convert it and edit it down I'll put it straight up here for you all to ssee his answers.
  The only other interesting thing happening is I'm starting driving lessons tomorrow, I'm excited but nervous so watch out anyone on the roads in and around Reading.
   One last thing, I finished the video for Electric Sugar Children. Considering, I think it's actually turned out okay. Share away my friends!