Gloria Cycles - youlikewelike

GLORIA CYCLES: DO YOU FANCY IT?

Wondrous Brighton band Gloria Cycles came about after Kenny McCracken (vocals/guitar) met Jules Ward (guitar) on a Brighton University photography course. Both were in different bands at the time, but after these fizzled out, McCracken looked at Ward and uttered the heartfelt plea, "D'you fancy it, darling?" Jen Dalby (bass), who was working in a pub in the Kemptown area of Brighton followed, and then Jack Hannan (bass) came on board, through mutual friends at another drinking hole; and together the tunesome foursome set out to make beautiful music together.

Two years have passed since then and Gloria Cycles are now signed to A&G Records with an album already in the can. Despite the label being keen to bide its time before assaulting the music buying public, the band grew impatient and decided to throw caution to the wind and self-release debut single Vegas (which is adorned with distinctive artwork by BRAG's Sam Chivers).

"This single was just about us being impatient," explains McCracken. "I think we're in a fortuitous position having a record company behind us. If it was just us on our own, then I don't know how confident we'd feel about doing it. We also realised when we came to record the album that we hadn't gigged it enough. You need to do that to really find what works and what doesn't. This single is our first baby step into the industry but there are bigger steps to come."

Drenched in harmonies and jangling guitars, Vegas bristles with the same infectious, widescreen energy as Scottish bands Franz Ferdinand and Glasvegas, and which helped it enter the Top 30 of Radio One's indie chart.

With A&G onboard, the group have since followed up Vegas with No Zeros, which continues the theme of chugging indie rhythms matched with wild rock touches, though McCracken is the first to admit that each member's musical influences are "miles apart". He claims to be a "bit of a slut" when it comes to genres, with a record collection that is both "tiny" and "shit". Despite this, it is McCracken's musical brain that generates Gloria Cycles' songs.

"I often wake in the morning and look at my computer screen and say 'what the fuck is Wankbag or Cockpocket? This is surreal'. Then I get a vague recollection of doing the songs and look at the five empty bottles of wine and ashtray full of cigarettes," he says with a smile.

"One song came about after I was inspired on a date with a woman who looked at me like I was a serial killer. I thought; 'if you're a serial killer, what do you do on your night off? How do you persuade a bird that you're not going to kill her?' So we called it Serial Killers Night Off."

"I like the way Kenny writes because I know he would never write about love stories or stuff like that," adds Dalby. "It's always proper topics and he is quite original with his lyrics, but quite strange as well."

The band recently had the chance to perform in front of 25,000 people at the Taubertal Festival in Rothenberg, Germany, after beating 160 other bands in the Emergenza Worldwide Competition. This was largely aided by the healthy support the group mustered from Brighton (mostly from the local drinking crowd) but also due to a commanding, energetic and maturing live act.

"We had to work on the live show as we had such different songs that sometimes it would be a bit like a bad soufflé, in that it would sink in the middle. But I think that we've got over that," remarks McCracken. "We just try to sound like ourselves. If you think about what other big bands you sound like then you are pretty much fucked. You've just gotta do what you like."

Quite.

No Zeros is out now on A&G Records.

words: Andrew Laughlin

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