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On the surface, Cub Scouting has nowt to do with music, lest you include late night jamborees in front of the blazing camp fire; the scout master enjoying the jovial cadence of his sing along efforts that little bit too much - it’s when they close their eyes for the ‘Hallelujah’ bit that’ll really get you. In the last three months something has gone AWOL in the forestry community and scouting has suddenly become the day’s catch; Scouting For Girls, I Was A Cub Scout and even Boy Scout Recordings have all pitched their tents on this salubrious soundscape. The Cub Scouters of the equation, the not so gruesome twosome of Todd Marriott and Will Bowerman, have been involved in a lethargic game of hide and seek for the past couple of months, amid various festival appearances, for the means of producing an album due for release early next year. With the album recently wrapped, and in between internet surfing and tee vee watching, drummer Will Bowerman had time for a quick catch up with Gigwise before the gun sounds for their hasty tour departure.
The I Was a Cub Scout moniker came from an old scouting certificate of Todd Marriott’s. A year ago the band first dipped their flippers into the vast ocean that is the British music industry, there were no thunder thieves in the form of Scouting for Girls; Will does not exert bitterness, instead choosing the carefully selected put down: “Our music is really different. They make repetitive songs for the radio and the charts; it’s what needed for that sort of thing, but not for us”. I Was a Cub Scout, of course, have not been without criticism for their namesake, ostracised in both The Times and London Lite for its awfulness. On the bright side, it’s at least meant that publications left, right and centre have been hailing them underage boys with talent well in advance of their years. But can we really count them alongside baby faced musicians such as Lo Fi Culture scene, Cajun Dance Party and Bombay Bicycle Club? Well since Will is twenty years old and Todd eighteen, the days of writing them off into bouncy ball parks are long gone. “We don’t mind if people still want to think of us as seventeen year old boys; it would be great if we’re still doing this when we’re twenty five and they’re saying the same thing.”
In the short time lapse since their serendipitous plummet onto the music scene, the boys have been lucky enough to warrant radio play and decent reviews. It wasn’t always that way; both Todd and Will were in two separate bands before the convergence. A few short weeks later, they found themselves offered a show and met their manager, Peter White; from there on out, they have been passed from hand to hand, unwrapped layer by layer by; a fact that cumulated in an exclusive Maida Vale session for Radio 1. “Once you’ve done one of those sessions you feel like a real band…although it all happened in the space of the summer holidays (last year’s) it did seem gradual at the time but, looking back, it actually wasn’t.”
The boys have built a reputation based upon their two man ‘do all’ approach to musicality; Todd often leaps across the stage to keep check on both synthesisers and rogue instruments. Do they ever think of bringing in the Calvary to lessen the strain? “We’re too far in now as two people to expand. I’ve never been a fan of extended line ups; I always feel a bit cheated when I go see bands and they’ve got session musicians.” With the reliance on synthesisers, do they not feel they’re tempting fate in the fuck up states? “The thing with synthesisers is that they’re never out of time nor do they play the wrong notes; unfortunately the same cannot be said of us! I doubt we’ll expand but we may well do some collaboration in the future.”
The new album is finished and Will’s giddy with the outcome: “We’re really happy with it... there are about nine new songs and we’ve included a couple we’ve put out before like ‘Pink Squares’ and ‘Our Smallest Adventures’ ” The boys teamed up with producer Hugh Padham, who has worked with artists as diverse as Kate Bush and McFly but Will admits that he was more excited about working with Genesis’s producer than for the ‘McFly Factor’: “We picked Hugh because we wanted our record to sound epic”. Celebrity cameos are also a go go; Sam from Youth Movies makes a horn/trumpet appearance; and both Sarah from One Toy Soldier and the cast of the punk rock outfit that is Tonight is Goodbye provide sporadic backing vocals.
The name of the album is now decided, going with a lyric absolved from inclusion on the final product, ‘I want you to know there is hope’. “We were talking about everything that had been going on for the last couple of months and everything that was happening in the next few months and the word, that we felt summed up how we felt, was hope.” The boys have boasted a decent following, which is perhaps surprising since both members hail from the wilderness that is Nottinghamshire. “You kind of take it for granted that you have 200 people at each of your shows. We’re quite happy to stay away from the London hipster scene. It is flattering that there is so much attention on us. People are saying that we’re a really cool band. Of course there are others who probably hate us but we’re probably always going to get that.”
They are an unlikely duo to find inspiration in pop punk but it appears to be the case. “Todd and I are both fans of Jimmy Eat World! The day before New Years’ Eve, we’re doing a Blink 182 cover set for one of our friend’s birthdays. Tonight is Goodbye are going to do New Found Glory and Dividing the Line are playing Less than Jake’s songs.” Kill the Arcade are also rumoured to be moonlighting as Brand New. On the pop punk obsession, apparently Hayley Williams checked Will out at Download, “I didn’t see it unfortunately! I do really like Paramore though… Riot has some really good pop songs on it.” Have the boys ever gone fanboyish on meeting any of their pop punk idols? “Walter Schreifels (from Rival Schools) was playing a gig with us; half way through our set he was singing along to our songs and put his thumbs up - that was cool. Todd got star struck once when he met someone he thought was Brand New but wasn’t. That was funny.”
For the foreseeable future, I Was a Cub Scout will be supporting ¡Forward Russia! and Minus the Bear. The eagerly anticipated album is scheduled for release in early 2008.
