Tab Interview: The Heartbreaks

THE HEARTBREAKS: one of them is officially the fastest Under-21 Whippy pourer in the West. The North West, that is.

Cambridge Carl Barat Fez fish and chips morcambe mr whippy support band Tabatha Leggett the heartbreaks

Chances are you won’t have heard of The Heartbreaks. Truth is, before last week, I hadn’t either. But, they’re currently supporting Carl Barat on his tour (which is pretty cool) and they played in Cambridge at the weekend. And they’re all quite hot. In an indie band kind of way.

The band consists of Matthew Whitehouse (vocals, rhythm guitar), Joseph Kondras (drums), Ryan Wallace (lead guitar, backing vocals) and Chris Deakin (bass guitar, backing vocals). The boys met and formed in Morcambe, Lancashire in 2009.

Morcambe was voted the third worst place to live in the UK in a recent poll. ‘True fact,’ Joseph says, ‘But I disagree. At first, Morcambe can be very, very depressing and quite tragic because you can see remnants of what it used to be. But, at the same time, it’s home. It’s not that bad!’

‘I love Morcambe. I loved living there,’ Ryan adds. And then he didn’t speak again for the rest of the interview.

So, what is it like to always be the support act, and never the main attraction? ‘Touring with Carl has been amazing; he’s really nice. Really amiable,’ Joseph says.

‘We also supported The View on a one-off kind of gig recently. It’s always strange playing early and playing to a crowd who maybe aren’t fully aware of you,’ Matthew adds, ‘It’s not hard, it’s just different.’

‘I relish it; there’s less pressure,’ Chris says.

‘No,’ Joseph disagrees: ‘there’s more pressure. If you’re the support act, you’ve got to win people over. It makes you work a little bit harder and stops you being complacent.’

Thus far, I can’t tell if The Heartbreaks are really hard working, or just a bit too cool for school. They certainly look too cool for school. Matthew, in particular, has a really distinct look. He looks quite young, and when he sings, appears possessed. But, he’s also oddly attractive. There are a lot of points in the interview where I can’t tell if the boys are being serious, or joking. For example, Chris told me that the highest point of their career was when they met Nikki Grahame last week.

‘She’s really tiny,’ Ryan says. Oh wait, he DID speak again.

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These boys have an odd image. They’re very mod. And according to the media, they love The Smiths and are intelligent as well as talented. But the boys are quick to dispel these myths. ‘I’ve never even heard a Smith’s song,’ Joseph tells me. ‘And we’re not boorish wankers in Parkas, like the media make us out to be. We don’t just sit inside reading books all day.’

‘We’re lads, but we’re well-read ones,’ Chris says. I picked up on this.

‘Well-read?’ I ask.

Our mums brought us up proper. INNIT,’ Chris replies. Again, I can’t tell if they’re joking or not.

Matt clarifies: ‘We CAN read and we DO have feelings, but there’s more to life than books.’

Sensing that the boys aren’t keen to talk about literature, I ask them what direction their music is heading in. ‘We don’t have a plan,’ Chris says, ‘We’re constantly listening to new things, and the songs we’re writing now are very different to the stuff we were writing a year ago. I’m sure they’ll be very different in another year’s time. It’s very much a natural progression.’

The last time The Heartbreaks came to Cambridge, they went to Fez. ‘I was baffled by it,’ Matt says.

‘I loved it.’ Joseph adds.

‘Mmm…Lots of beautiful women,’ says Chris.

But not every city the band has played in has proved to be so popular. ‘We got an actively hostile crowd in Bristol,’ Joseph explains, ‘Actually, it was worse than hostile. The crowd seemed confused by it all. It was a rubbish venue. Really badly organised. They didn’t get it; they weren’t ready for us.’

Matt adds: ‘It was like in Back to the Future when Marty McFly does the guitar solo. If anyone from Bristol is reading this, then prove us wrong.’

The Heartbreaks talents are, by no means, limited to music. ‘If I wasn’t in this band, I’d be working in a fish and chip shop. I ate fish and chips every day as a child,’ Matt says.

I was a fucking brilliant bingo caller. I was really good at it,’ Joseph adds.

‘I actually worked in an ice cream van for two years,’ Matt explains. ‘I was the fastest Under-21 Mr Whippy pourer in the North West. The championships were in Norwich. My trophy is in the van.’ COOL. But true?

All in all: despite their best efforts to be a cool, a group of really ‘nice’ guys. They played a good gig, the audience seemed to enjoy it, and it turns out a drunk Ryan is a lot more chatty than a sober Ryan. ‘Hi Tabatha,’ he shouts me over after the gig.

‘How did you feel the gig went?’ I ask.

It were BOOMING,’ he replies. ‘No, don’t write that!’ he squeals.

We chatted (they enjoyed Carl Barat’s new stuff, especially So Long My Lover) and then I left them, drinking Lambrini in their van.