Becky Davis caught up with Francesqa whilst on their headline tour with Tiger Please to discuss their upcoming E.P and the World Cup amongst other things…

Hi, please tell me who you are and what you play?

Warren: I’m Warren and I play drums.

Ben: I’m Ben, I play bass.

Ashley: I’m Ashley, I sing.

Joe: I’m Joe, I play guitar.

So your debut EP is being released on 19th July called ‘We Lived’, what’s the theme behind it?

Ashley: Life, love, deceit. Just any personal experience I’ve ever had.

Ben: It is just basically about his life.

Ashley: We Lived is basically just every experience that I’ve had about the past 10 years and just had the chance to write about it. It’s about growing up I think, finding yourself, maturing that kind of thing.

Do you write all the lyrics?

Ashley: I do indeed.

How long did it take to write and record?

Joe: A total of about 2 weeks in terms of recording days.

Ben: Really? With all the vocals as well?

Joe: Yeah about 2 weeks.

Ben: It felt longer than that.

Joe: It spanned over about 3 months, because we did some in Dec and some in Feb.

Ben: We basically got all the music done in a week and then the vocals for another month, spread over days and evenings.

Not that long then?

Ashley: No it was alright, worked fast.

Ben: Its only 5 songs so…

Other than the new single Ghosts what other songs are on your EP?

Ashley: Ghosts is gonna be the first track on there. Crooked Little Sun, Hopeful, Years and the title track We Lived. Five little gems.

Where did you shoot the video for Ghosts and what was it like?

Ashley: We filmed it in Manchester, at 4 in the morning.

Ben: We had to wake up at 3 in the morning and we went to bed at like half 1, it’s terrible. We drove to a mill and just rocked out on a wet floor.

Ashley: It was one of the most fun days ever.

Joe: There were some really good people working on the video so it was made really easy.

Ben: It was so long and tiring but it was good.

Ashley: The catering made up for that.

Joe: They made us bacon sandwiches so that was good.

Warren: We had to not look at the camera as well, that’s hard. The camera swoops in on your face and you just wanna follow it.

Ashley: I was alright, I could do whatever I wanted. I was allowed to look, give a cheeky glance…

Have you been watching the World Cup?

Ben: Until now, yes. I think Warren’s the person who should answer the question about football and the World Cup.

Warren: We watched the first half today and there were a few tears.

Ben: We all watched the England game and we lost. All of us shouted except for Ashley who’s gotta sing. Warren was hitting a metal pole and then he punched Tom in the face in pure adrenaline, he wasn’t even angry.

Warren: Sorry Tom, I didn’t mean to.

Who do you think will win?

Warren: I’d say Spain.

Ben: I want Uruguay to win though.

Joe: It would be good for Germany to win, only to say that we got knocked out by the winners.

Warren: After today, my allegiance is with Spain.

If you were a crayon what colour would you be and why?

Joe: Red, because it’s my favourite colour, the colour of blood.

Ashley: I’d prefer to be an invisible one so that I would have a counterpart somewhere else to reveal my message.

Ben: I was just gonna go purple, because it’s a better black and it’s really visible on the paper.

Warren: I’d say blue because my personality is as deep as an ocean [laughs]. I was thinking that one up just as you guys were giving stupid answers.

What tour would you like to re-live if you got the chance?

Ashley: I think this one.

Ben: They’ve all been very fun. The upcoming Young Guns one maybe? I’m excited, it’s got Deaf Havana on it as well. It’s gonna be great.

Ashley: I’d say this one so far has been the most significant for us. It’s the first headline tour we’ve done and we’ve been surprised every night by the turn out, kids have gone nuts for it, we’ve had people follow us on most of the dates.

Ben: I think it’s great to go on tour with a band who are amazing like Tiger Please.

Ashley: They’re pretty much the Kings of Leon of Wales.

Jelly or ice cream?

Ashley: Ice cream.

Joe: It’s hot at the moment so ice-cream.

Ben: I can honestly say neither singularly, together is soo good. Raspberry jelly and ice cream!

What would you be called if you were a super hero?

Ashley: I know what Warren would be called.

Warren: Do it for me.

Ashley: Warren would be called the shadow… for no reason.

Warren: Shall we use our laser quest names?

Ben: Mine was iron man, I’d be iron man.

Ashley: I’d be Mr. Crunk, I’d take down criminals with the power if my rap.

Joe: I just thought of bucktooth the flying donkey, I don’t know why.

Ben: Yours was actually kind of a superhero, Gandalf is kind of a superhero.

Joe: Yeah Gandalf.

Ashley: It’s Tom! Tom, what would your superhero name be?

Tom: The dominator…

Ashley: We all played laser quest the other day and we all had superior names.

Ben: Do you know what, we rolled into laser quest and we went into the briefing bit and it pretty much shot down all my dreams of what it was gonna be like. They were like: “there will be no running, no hiding, no crouching”.

Ashley: It was us and Tiger Please. We had six members on our team because we have a driver, they had 5 because they didn’t have a driver and because of this they let this one guy in who called himself briefcase.

Ben: Bear in mind he played six times already that day.

Ashley: They put him on the Tiger Please team and he was literally ‘le professional’ when it came to laser quest, he destroyed everyone.

Warren: Stealth man.

Ben: He was pretty much the Rambo of laser quest but a geek. He was wearing all black and he got like a kill score of like 2000 points and we all got about 30, he was insane! Joe was on the verge of tears. I was so angry.

Ashley: The supervisor guy was saying “no running, no ducking” and Joe’s going “you’ve let this crazy guy in! He’s taken down everyone”. We looked at the score sheets and Tiger Please beat us by about 20,000 points.

Joe: But we beat them at mini golf so…

Ashley: We did, we did, we beat them at golf. Anyway, we gave you the longest answer ever for that question, I’m sorry. We went to a leisure park and it was the best day of our lives.

Katy Perry or Lady GaGa?

(All answer at the same time) Katy Perry!

Ashley: No questions asked.

Ben: We love Katy Perry straight up but Tom would say Lady GaGa.

Best and worst things about touring?

Warren: The best thing is everything, the whole travelling to new places, seeing new places, playing shows and meeting people.

Ashley: The best thing is pretty much everything about it, getting away from normal life, going on the road hanging out with your friends and playing music you love. The worst thing is constantly needing to shower all the time. Unless you get a decent place to stay.

Ben: I argue the worst thing is that you have a suitcase and backpack or whatever but there’s nowhere to put your dirty clothes or wet clothes or wet towel, you just have to put it back in with the clean clothes so you never have clean clothes.

Joe: This might sound lame but the worst thing is that it has to end, you can’t just keep going. You have to stop and go home and go back to your normal life.

Where do you hope to be in three years time?

Warren: Tescos… [laughs]

Ashley: As long as we’re still doing this I think we’ll be happy enough.

Ben: I’d like to have an album under our belt.

Ashley: We don’t ask to be massively famous or have loads of money, we just wanna do what we do and do it comfortably. As long as I can raise a son and call him Quasimodo I’ll be happy.

Listen to more fom Francesqa at Myspace