Music Features

It's been a very good year for The Runners.

The Hertford band have played a live session on Steve LeMaq's Radio One show and recently won the NME Red Stripe Music Award competition, which got them a place at London’s Lovebox festival on 22 July, where they will appear alongside The Blood Arm, The Maccabees, The Pigeon Detectives and Mumm-ra on the Barfly stage.

Then, this week (16 July 2007) they released their debut single 'Get In Line'.

Described as being "Like ... The Kooks without the stage school", they seem to be going from strength to strength. And to add to that - they are jolly nice chaps!

Always in search of a local success story, Katy Lewis went to meet them.

The Runners are:

Gus Cox: vocals, guitar, keys
Clive Romanowski: guitar, vocals
James Thomson: bass, vocals
Clint Henderson: drums, vocals

Describe your style of music?

Gus: Energetic, Indie pop kind of thing which lets everybody get up and have a dance and jump around. It's exciting and energetic!

The Runners

What would you say your musical influences are?

Gus: Anything and everything really, we all like different music and it's all come together. We all like so many different bands, so you can never really answer that question! I like my retro stuff - The Beatles and The Kinks.

Clive: We're a bit weird really, we all grew up listening to different stuff so it's a bit of a madness that we found ourselves in the same band, but it seems to work!

So how did you all get together?

Gus: I was living in Liverpool for a while and got involved with the music up there then moved back to Hertford. I knew Jim from school, I used to be in a 60s covers band with him, and he knew Clive and I got to know Clint through people at work and we all got together and started jamming.

So you start jamming and you get some gigs?

Clive: We were pretty lucky really because in Hertford where we are at the moment there's a little venue which is really great at accepting local bands that are on their way up, they are really good at giving people a chance so we were well supported and got a few gigs to start with. That's the Marquee Club - it's a cracking little venue.

What's the music scene like in general in Hertford?

Gus: They've opened up the Corn Exchange now which used to be open years and years ago so there's two {venues) but since the Marquee's been open so many bands have come out of the woodwork and it's quite a good little scene now in Hertford.

What always confuses me is how people get their music out there - single, download, self-signing? What's your current situation?

Jim? Clive: I think it's probably easier to get your music out there than it ever has been. You've got MySpace and there's so much recording stuff you can do at home so it's actually not that expensive to get stuff out there. We just kind of landed on our feet a bit really. We were offered a gig out in Austria which we took up and it turned out that they guy who owned the club also owned a label and was really excited about us going to play there and we ended up getting a single deal with those guys.

This was a great opportunity for us because one thing that you don't get when you're recording and releasing your own stuff is a kind of network of other people to help you out, to contact other people in the industry and create a bit of a buzz. So we've been quite fortunate in that respect.

Your new single is out on 16th July - how would you describe it?

Gus: Get in Line is pretty energetic and jumpy with a sing-a-long chorus. It's just a catchy tune, writing about our day to day lives, getting up, sorting ourselves out and "Getting in Line!"

It seems that the successes that you've had show that you need to get out there and play gigs. There's no point in staying in your garage is there? Sorry that's a stereotype isn't it?!

Clint: I played in a garage for many years! I think it's where a lot of people do start

Gus: Yes there's no substitute for going out. You never know who's going to be at a gig. You can play the most random quiet little venue somewhere that you just think sucks and there'll be someone in the audience who knows somebody and there'll be all these links and you meet loads of people - it's cracking.

So is that your advice?

Gus: Yes - get out there. We've played gigs miles away to like four people and it's so gutting to play and then a couple of days later we'll get a call from some big press agent or something like that who happened to be at that gig. You're so surprised who's at these gigs. You've got to take the rough with the smooth, you can do the big gigs but you've just got to gig as much as possible really.

Tell me about the Red Stripe Music Awards where you picked up an award?

Gus: We managed to win it yes! We basically got a call to say do you want to play the local area round at The Horn in St Albans. But to tell you the truth we didn't know it was a competition until we got there, but we managed to win that. The next gig was the Scala and we went down and had a laugh and enjoyed it. The crowd seemed to love it and we won it and we've got quite a few good things from that really.

Clive: We were lucky - we all wanted to play the Scala anyway, it had been a venue on our list of cool venues to play so the fact that the final was at the Scala was enough for us. We were just dead chuffed to be there and winning it was a bit of a bonus really!

So winning these sorts of competitions does lead to all sorts of other things then?

Clive: It just raises your profile a bit because there's inherently a little bit of press coverage with it and your name just gets out there a little bit more and more people hear about you through it, so in that respect it's really handy.

Gus: We got a big article in Music Week, an industry magazine, so it was on the desk of all the top industry people so that's quite promising for us.

What about your gigs because you're quite energetic as a band aren't you? Have you got a memorable gig?

Clint: Lots - every gig has its own special quality, there can be good things and there can be bad things.

Clive: South Mymms Primary School was a highlight for me?

Clint: Yes - sitting in the car, hiding from the rain for a few hours - it does get you down a little bit. It was my old primary school actually and the guys did me a favour by helping me to support my old school, which they were very chuffed about. But it's funny playing to kids of about six or seven asking us to sign stuff. They were demanding! It was a family day and the people really enjoying it were the kids at the front, they were really into it and watching them have a good time was quite cool for us.

In general what's your fan base like?

Clint: Nice. We love them all. It's mixed, I wouldn't say predominantly anything. I've seen kids from six or seven to Jim's parents who probably turn up to more gigs that we even turn up to ourselves! It's really mixed, we're lucky, we're kind of blessed with the touch that we're not offensive to anyone so that bodes you well I think.

Have you got any obsessive fans - has anyone done anything weird?

Clive: I wouldn't say obsessive but we've got some lovely fans who have done some paintings!

So you're inspiring people to art with your music?

Clint: Some of the stuff we've been sent is on canvas and we've got them hanging in our studio.

Gus: It's quite touching that people have taken the time to draw pictures of us so it's nice. 

So what's the ultimate ambition of the band then?

Gus: Just to enjoy it really. We've got various album offers on the table so we want to get an album out there and hope people like it. So it's just getting out there and enjoying it really and seeing how far it takes us.

We've got no goals really because we're touched that we here now so we'll just see where it goes basically.

Clint: To travel as much as possible around the world would be absolutely wonderful and if we're lucky enough to be able to do that doing what we do, then we'll be laughing ... I'd love to go to Japan and I'd also like to go to America and Canada

You say casually that you've got a couple of album deals on the table - how do you decide?

Gus: I think it's early days for us at the moment. We've got our single out at the moment under Weekender records, an Indie label, they're lovely guys, dead helpful to us but there's so much out there we just don't know. It's early days, we don't want to make any big decisions at the moment. We'll see how our single goes, we've got a two single deal with them, and we've got another single out later in the year so we'll see what happens really.

The Runners two track single featuring "Get in Line" and "Familiar Faces" was released on 16th July 2007 on Weekender records and is available via download and on limited edition 7" vinyl.