The Targets (Interview)

Project Records is a label that we have been aware of for a while now. Recently, the Liverpool based music label has signed a band (Dirty Mermaids) who we featured in our very first issue of 4Q and who we will be touring around Europe with in May. More importantly the label seems to be doing pretty well in signing other great acts; one of which, ‘The Targets’ we had a chance to meet with recently.

“…Ah The Targets, that’s a good mod name.”

The statement can be somewhat taken out of context and indeed when meeting up with the band consisting of Jess Whitemore, 19, on drums and backing vocals, Sam Bell, 18, on bass and backing vocals and Conrad Ellis,18, on guitar and lead singer, you could say we were keen to pigeon hole The Targets into a ‘mod scene’.

[Laughs] “Well I suppose it does a little as when we started we were going through a bit of a mod phase, but we didn’t think, ah The Targets, that’s a good mod name… However at the time we were playing scooter rallies so the mod ideals kinda stuck.”

So would you call yourselves Mod Punk?

“No not at all. British music is a huge influence on us. Stalwarts like The Jam and The Beatles do provide strong inspirations for us. However we do take influences from modern bands like Oases. Hell, we use the Em7 Chord! And bands like Green Day, especially in or rhythm section. Id say we’re just a rock’n’roll band. I mean we’ve got the energy of punk. We speak like punks, we right like punks, but we don’t look like punks.”

Listening to their music you can clearly hear the 70’s punk influence and their debut 4 track EP, ‘These Grey Times’, is a testament to this revamped with hints of noughties bands such as The Courteeners and The Enemy slipping in at times. Definitely the backing tracks to anyone’s summer this year.

“One of our most energetic gigs to date was for the launch night of our debut EP”, the band tells 4Q. “It was at Korova in Liverpool and we gave 110% and got a great reaction from the packed out crowd. There are some pictures of the night on our website (www.thetargets.co.uk).”

The Targets have played a lot of live gigs including many great support acts too. Still being young this should pay off for them in strides over the coming years. With a solid fan base already established at both ends of the country and a record deal already in the bag what have been the ups and downs of playing live?

“…Some of our best gigs have been supporting ‘From The Jamm’ on tour. That was great. Oh and playing the Wickerman Festival on stage just before ‘The Beat’. That was great too… such a high light for us…”

There have not been very many down times for The Targets, just some memorable ‘rock’n’roll’ moments as the band recalls. Jess: “I forgot my cymbals at a gig in Rotherham; it cost me over £100 to get them dropped off in a Taxi.”
While Conrad and Sam have both been involved with breaking things, one being a microphone that; …”shot off the end and hit the ceiling at a gig in Knights Grange.” and the other being Sam’s head; “…we were playing a gig in ‘The cavern’ front room. I jumped up and twatted my head on the ceiling. All through the next song I felt like I had concussion.”

So if playing live is not a problem for The Targets what have been their biggest challenges?

“Putting up with each other!… (laughs)… Actually, I think it’s to write music that has commercial potential while not changing who we are and what we’re about. We want the fame and fortune but we don’t want to sell out to do this… After a lot of time and effort it seems to be paying off!

“Conrad writes the lyrics to the songs and comes up with the main idea, but then brings it down to the practice for us to jam out. We then put our own ideas in to the mix, and as we all do some of the singing we even have a creative input on the lyrics too…”

“We rehearse twice a week for 6-7 hours at a time. We generally run through the set and pull out a few older ones to refresh our memories and keep them tight. We also like to jam out new ideas and sometimes whole songs just get written spontaneously over the course of a couple of hours!”

With a proven record in playing live, a strong determination to writing and practising and some catchy 70’s mod punk – rock‘n’roll songs with a commercial appeal, what music can we expect in the future?

“We love playing all our songs, otherwise we wouldn’t be playing them, we’ve got a really strong set list of 12 songs, but the set list is always evolving. Dropping out a few to replace with newer songs to try out on the audience. We still like to play a bit of Buzzcocks now and again to a home crowd though. Our favourite song has got to be ‘Wake Up’, which will be our debut single… should be out in April.”

The Targets are planning a launch party for their debut single ‘Wake Up’ at The Masque in Liverpool on Saturday April 3rd. Along with other gigs such as the Water Rats in London on April 20th. We should expect to see them playing a gig in Manchester to support the single release sometime in April too, which will be listed on the website.

We are excited about this single and it will be the real test to see if all the hard work has paid off for them. The single release is something that 4Q is hoping to be involved in as well, so watch this space!

“…We’ve been going for 6 years now, and there are just too many people to thank. Parents, friends, family, they all know what they’ve done to help us and they know just how much we appreciate it. So thank you to everyone, you know who you are.”

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