Good evening Lincoln, it’s good to have you here. How are you doing?Hey, Cara! Thank you for letting me come on the show. It's wonderful to be here. I'm great, how are you?
I'm great thank you, Summer is upon us, what's not to love. But you’re still very much a newcomer to the music industry, what do you make of the whole circus so far?It's a bit mad, isn't it? Haha. It's pretty much what I expected and then some. I knew that a lot of hard work was going to be involved, lots of travelling and many sleepless nights. My dad warned me and gave me all of those talks for many, many years before all of this happened. I was somewhat prepared. Uh, I don't think any sort of conversation or musician bootcamp could really prepare you for it though. It really is a whole other world. I love getting to know all of these talented, dedicated people who love the work we do. Back home, there weren't many people around who had the same visions as me. I've met some awesome, mind-blowing people out here...I've met some not so nice people too, but you don't focus on them, haha. It's just all-go, all the time. It's not real life. I'm slowly getting used to it though!
It seems like you had instant success and some people may not be aware of how you found your way into the industry. Was there any years of struggle, or did you find success as quick and easy as it seems?Back home in Liverpool in good old Britain, I was signed to like three different local and independent labels from the ages of 12 to around 16. I was known for playing at local events and that was back when it was just me and my guitar. I had some original music but it was mainly reworked covers I did back then. With school work and with the labels being terribly financed, there was always something getting in the way and causing deals to fall through. I posted covers on YouTube for a while but they only got a few hundred views after months of being online. That was until I posted a cover of Pantomime by Valentina Hart. For some reason, that one reached like 2,000 by the end of the first week, whereas before the highest amount of views was something like 650 and that was on a nine month old video. It just kept growing and one day I received a very official looking email from someone at Permanent Reminder. At first we thought it was a fake so my dad, bless him, replied straight away and got onto the phone number provided and was trying to call it out as a scam. Turned out to be legit though and they wanted to meet with me. They even paid for the flights and accommodation because we aren't exactly the richest family. It all seemed to good to be true. I couldn't get a stable deal back in my home city for years and then America suddenly came knocking on my door without warning. We were out there for about a week, meeting with people and my dad was being overly protective of me as usual, wanting to go over everything twice over with a fine tooth comb. Eventually, I had signed with them and the rest is history. I can totally see why people thought I just came out of nowhere though but I was signed in early 2015 and was tucked away for the best part of a year before Bang The Drum came out.
You released your debut single “Bang the Drum” which peaked at number one, can you tell us a little about that song?That was one of the first songs I had written for the project and the first one I had ever written with someone else. Before that, it was just me and my guitar. It all sounded very...samey, acoustic pop. Christopher Hudson, from The Stat Nerds, was hired by the label to work with me. He's a pop writing genius! He showed me new ways of approaching songwriting and he told me something which I'll never forget; "Learn the rules of pop music and then break them." I took that with me to every songwriting session after that. The track tells the story of my dislike for a fellow male love rival and his horrible, disrespectful ways towards others and the women he dates...well, uses. The actual term "Bang The Drum" has both a literal and figurative meaning. Banging the drum refers to an alarm call sent out by my nemesis which brings everyone flocking to him. He says "jump" and they ask "how high?" every time he "bangs the drum". There's also a line in the song which refers to the guy as a one-man band, so he literally does bang a drum and that's another thing that attracts people towards him. We thought that the title was catchy and that we could do many things with it. In the production stages we obviously had to include a drum in there and we wanted it to pack a punch, lyrically and just using my vocals. We strayed away from dance breakdowns and instrumental segments. It's just like a big, non-stop sing-along and it worked!
And how did you celebrate the news that it went to the top of the charts?Haha...well, I didn't really get to celebrate too much as I had a very busy day but the producers of the song, Christopher Hudson who co-wrote it with me, some people from my label and a few friends who were in the video all had a surprised gathering for me. I was called into the Permanent Reminder headquarters, thinking I was in trouble and when I got there, everyone was cheering for me. Felt like it was a surprise birthday party! We had soda and cake. It was a nice little gathering. I'm not too big on parties, mainly because I'm underage too...but this one was lovely. The cake was amazing. I can still taste it! Chocolaty!
How about your future, can we expect more singles in the coming months?Yeah, I have a new single coming out next week, Light Me Up. We shot the video for that in New York and it was a total blast. I can't say too much about who's in it or the plot of the video just yet. Like Bang The Drum, it's like a little story but this one isn't as over the top or as extensive. What I can say though is that it's set in the 80's and it was amazing exploring the fashions back then and styling certain areas of the iconic city to look how it did back then. I felt like I was in a feel-good, 80's family movie. Even the song fits in with that. It sounds like something you'd hear at the end credits of an uplifting movie from your childhood.
And a debut album would surely be coming soon?Yes, my first album is called Sorry To Interrupt and it will be in stores towards the end of the month. It feels weird saying that I have my very own album. It's always been a dream of mine. I've been working on the album for like a year and a half now. It's not totally finished until it's on the shelves. I'm always tweaking stuff, haha! I really can't wait for people to hear it. There's a lot more to me than Bang The Drum, which is obviously the song that people know me for. I love 80's pop music and that's a sound heavily incorporated throughout the record. '...Drum' was one of the most commercial, poppy sounding tracks we did so it'll be interesting to see how people take to the rest of the album which sounds a little rawer.
What’s your take on the state of the music industry right now?I think that it's really competitive out there and it's not so much the artists themselves, it's the people on social media constantly pitting artists against each other and it brings a lot of unnecessary hate and tension to the table. When a fandom isn't allowed to like another artist in case it threatens their favourite's sales...that to me is just silly. There's a lot of unneeded rivalry out there. Music, to me, is all about expressing yourself through art and having fun with it. A lot of people turn it into a game of who can get the most followers, who can get so many views in so many hours, who can shade and drag each other...which, I still don't really know what that means, haha! A lot of people compare me to Kato and Austin Nimmo and don't like me because I'm a male of a similar age. I think that's so silly. There's so much wonderful music out there to enjoy and potentially change your life. Don't limit yourself to a specific handful of people. Love music for the music, not for the awards it wins. Oh and the streaming rules in the charts sucks too, haha!
So if you can map out the next year of your life, how would it look?Well we have the next single coming up, which I spoke about earlier. The promo for that should fill up the rest of this month . We then have the album coming and from then on, it's going to be non-stop. It's been busy up until that point but I know the workload is going to double when the record comes out. I want to do album signings in different places around the world. I'd love to meet all the people who buy my music and support my dreams. Another way of doing that is a tour. I just came off of Alec Cole's tour, where I supported him in Europe. That was a great experience and really prepared me for my own tour, which is something the label and my team are looking into at the moment! Hopefully this time, I won't get a bottle of wee thrown at me like I did on the first night of Alec's. That was...an experience, haha! Uh, there's also going to be a lot more singles from the album. I really want to go like six or seven singles deep and really bring the record to life.
Collaborations are a pretty big selling point in the industry, can we expect to see any collaborations in the near future and who would you love to work with most?Well I have one that's been announced. A new DJ, Khalil Ferreira asked me to be the vocalist on one of his tracks. That song will appear on his album and as a bonus track on mine too. That's about it for now but if anyone approached me to work with them, I'd be more than happy to give it a go! I'd really love to work with Chantal Hayes, even though uh....I heard that she doesn't really like me...hehe. I still love her work though and I own her album. I love her sound. I think it'd be an honour to also work with many of the young male artists who inspired me and showed me that it's possible to do this, like; Weekend, Austin Nimmo and Kato. Also, getting on a song with Jennifer Armstrong would be amazing. I love her!
Alright, quick questions time. Are you ready?I certainly hope I am!
So you haven’t been around for too long, but what’s the weirdest situation you’ve been part of in the music industry?It was probably shooting my first ever music video. We brought in a lot of famous faces and more or less everyone my team approached had accepted to take part. Because it was my first video, I didn't think they would be sold on the idea as nobody knew who I was. You can imagine how surreal and nerve-racking it was for me. First videos are scary enough but when walk onto the set and see Dustyn Blue, one of my idols, and Aaron Styles who is like the hottest thing in Hollywood right now...you really have to pinch yourself. It was weird purely for the fact that the day before it, I was practically unknown, just living my regular life and then the next day I was the lead in this big production with all these insanely talented and famous faces supporting me. Crazy.
If you could form a supergroup with anybody, who would you like to be in the group?I'd like it to be some of the people from the Bang The Drum squad. Anaísz, Aaron and Dustyn have become great friends of mine and they're all super talented. A lot of fans see us as a package anyway so I think it would be well received. Oh and Eilidh too. She was in the video as well. She's super talented and would definitely make a great addition.
If you could choose anybody from the music world to date, who would be your person of choice?I don't have like one specific person in mind. I'm not really looking to date right now, I have to remain focused on my work and don't want to force myself into anything. It will happen naturally and when it does, it will be a wonderful thing. I'd like to be with someone who supports my work and helps me to become a better person and I'd be the same - vice versa. I couldn't be with anyone who just wants to date me because I'm selling records and to be photographed. I'd like to be with someone who's really passionate about the industry that we're in and we could work together to become the best we can be.
Fuck, Marry, Kill. Andrea, Isabel, Miami. Explain yourself?Oh nooooooo! This game is so mean. I couldn't kill anyone...and I could uh...do that other thing without marrying them first! Haha. Eh, well I guess since it's just a game....eh, I couldn't really do any of them to Andrea because she's Payton's girlfriend and Payton is my friend. This is super hard. Also, my brother loves Miami...and I'm a big Isabel fan. Gosh! Probably marry Andrea but not do any of the marriage stuff with her. I'd do the naughty thing with Miami. My brother, Leo, would be mad because he's married to her in his head but if I killed her, he would be really upset. I'd rather make myself sad than make him go through it so I'd have to kill Izzy. Sorry!!
