The Cinematics

Having persuaded The Cinematics manager, who disturbingly resembles the Incredible Hulk, to let me steal away their miniscule lead singer from the Night and Day Cafe in the heart of Manchester's trendy Northern Quarter, where better to conduct an interview than a Weatherspoons pub, amongst a sea of old men and their pints of John Smiths?

In retrospect, plenty of places, but Scot is so excitable, bubbly and enthusiastic that any worries of making a good impression, or showing him the local sights on his whistle stop tour of the country, are pushed to the back of my mind, I'm loving this bar! What fantastic, weird people!� he giggles, looking round at the assorted chavs, under age girls and old couples.

The Cinematics are supporting NME darlings, The Editors, on tour. After one slight faux pas (Me: 'Hi, Scot isn't it? I loved your set, I don't suppose I could grab a quick interview?� The drummer from The Editors: 'Sure, but I've not played yet, and I'm not the singer in The Cinematics'), we set about debating the meteoric success of their slightly more famous tour buddies. 'It's weird, this whole famous IN five minutes thing that's going on at the moment, but I guess some bands deserve it.'

'This whole debut album culture is bizarre-major labels aren't looking for great bands with long term appeal; they're going out and looking for anyone who's got one good song and a good haircut. They'll sign 20 bands with one decent song and just hope one of them make it-the rest can just fuck off.'

'The Editors totally deserve all the hype and publicity. I was so excited when I got told we were touring with them.'

The Cinematics themselves have had their fair share of both luck and sheer hard graft along the way, 'Some people are like, 'you don't seem to have worked, boy!� But I fuckin' bet you I have!' Formed two years ago in Glasgow. Scot, Ross, Ramsey and Adam were all acquaintances from a small town in the Scottish Highlands ('Think The Wicker Man and you're not far wrong') Scott and drummer Ross had been friends and been in bands together for years, but the others were a few years older, 'I knew them from seeing them in the corridor at school, but it was kind of an unwritten rule that you didn't talk to the big kids, and for someone my size, they were really big kids!'

They met again after Scott dropped out of uni in Glasgow ('There was none of that Franz Ferdinand art school stuff for me-I went to study economics to please my Dad. I lasted three months and just hung around drinking too much and busking') Ramsey and Adam recognised Scott when they saw him in a street in Glasgow and they got chatting, 'It turned out they were at the music college, so we decided to get a band together, simple as that.'

Scott�s busking came to his rescue again when, two months later, in a twist of fate worthy of a fairytale, he was approached by their now manager who asked if he had a band and invited him to pop by his office and play some material. �He liked us and said he wanted to be our manager. I was like �yeah! Err�what does a manager do?!� And the answer? �They boss you around! And they�re sometimes good for a drink if you�re skint��

The Cinematics� story is one repeated throughout Glasweigan indie folklaw, and surely a testament to the vibrancy, independence and intimacy of the scene up there. �Bands are really supportive of each other in Glasgow; there�s a great atmosphere. It�s helped by the fact that there are so many great venues there-there are gigs on every night and there�s always a great turn out. The audience are always absolutely steaming and well up for it. It can be quite a shock when you leave Glasgow-other audiences can be harder work-often you�re faced with this crowd who just stare back at you, whereas up there they�re just crazy.�

Debut single �Chase�, an uplifiting, dramatic end of the world type affair, is released on 26th September. With a catchy chorus to die for and Mansun-esque moodiness, the band�s first album is due to be released next year. �We�ve got a few songs recorded for it, but we�re at that awkward stage of deciding which songs to put on it. We�ve been demo-ing in London and Glasgow-we recorded eight songs in four days. It was mad!�

�I suppose �Chase� stand out a bit-I don�t want all our songs to sound �like us�, but there�s a universal theme running through all of our stuff, either lyrically or sound-wise. The album will probably sound a lot more like our live sound than �Chase� does-stripped back, a bit dark, a bit happy. I hate moany moany bands; if you�re going to whine about something, I think it�s good to give a kind of resolution to your songs. Y�know, have a whine but then understand that it�s not that bad��

Despite his tiny frame, on stage Scott has a definite air of David Byrne about him, as he swaggers and appears lost in the music and words he�s breathing out, juttering across the stage. Typically modest, when I mention this, he comments �ahh, well�he�s originally from Glasgae, so, y�know��

And with that, the conversation moves back on to the new bands causing a storm in today�s music press, �I think culture in general is really disposable-not just music and the media, but everything. It�s like the battle of who could care less, y�know? You get it in school�where people just want to be different. The amount of people I meet at parties and stuff who talk your ear off about bands you�ve never heard of. They only like them because no one else has heard of them-they skip from band to band. These days there�s always got to be something new; something new to do, to buy, to listen to, to look at, to be�sometimes things are just good and should stay that way.�

On this subject, as with everything we chat about, Scott�s got an amazing energy and liveliness, waving his arms around as he describes things, changing his voice when impersonating people, and even jumping on his chair at one point to show me just how huge his manager is. He�s clearly loving his time on the road, and can�t get enough of telling me about his adventures, �I fucking love [touring]-it�s great. It�s another world.� Even as we were walking from the venue to the pub, he launched into an anecdote of his experience earlier in the day when, in McDonalds in Manchester City Centre, an old man followed him around, harassing him. �It was bizarre-and I�m from Glasgow!�

�So many strange things have happened in the past few days-we�ve had a few great gigs, and the other night we�d had a storming gig in Edinburgh and I was so drunk! We left and were going down the motorway at about 1am back to Glasgow when we saw this car that must�ve missed its turn-off but thought �ahh, fuck it� and tried to make it anyway. It span around and landed on its roof. We were right behind it so we stopped and I was screaming �call an ambulance!� I jumped out of the car and ran over to their car. It was still rocking, and I pulled open the door and it was so surreal-there was this really strange, deliriously happy music blearing out, in the middle of this empty, dark motorway. Such a weird night�it was the third car crash I�ve witnessed in my life��

And with that, his attention shifts to the group of old men sitting next to us, �They�re great! They look so bored though-I want to buy them some dominoes�anyway, do you wanna get some more cigarettes and vodka? C�mon!� and off he skips, describing the other car crashes he�s witnessed, interspersed with drunken tour tales, as one of the old men we�re leaving behind sips his bitter and tuts, with a mixed look of envy and admiration in his eye�