Interview – You Me At Six

February 16th, 2010 by RBR

Ruled By Rock met up with You Me At Six to talk about slave labour, cheese on toast, Zac Farro’s bum, baby wipes and Warped Tour.

Words: Sophie Egboh and Talie Pemberton

Let’s start off by asking how you came up with the name You Me At Six?

Matt Barnes: The dreaded question!

Josh Franceschi: Why couldn’t we have just called our band Tuesday or something? Then I can be like “It’s named after a day of the week!”
No, basically me and Max were making night arrangements and it’s just an abbreviation of what we were doing. We didn’t have a name, we had a gig coming up and I thought that it was a good idea to use it as a name but it wasn’t…

Matt: I agreed stupidly.

Josh: Yeah, no one stopped the madness! We just went with it.

Your latest release reached number 5 in the UK charts, is mainstream recognition something you were expecting or aiming for when starting the band?

Josh: When we started the band, no.

Matt: We were aiming to have a laugh and just play a few songs, jam out really. It was literally made by just mates just jamming out in like, a bedroom.

Josh: I just wanted to go to a house party that wasn’t in Kingston, so I thought, start a band.

Matt: Be in a band, might get invited.

Josh: Might get to go on tour and do stuff. No, I think when you start a band you don’t really have many expectations, but I think the thing with our band is because we achieved some of the goals we wanted to achieve, we had to set ourselves new goals. So, one of those new goals was for on our second album. We got the top twenty on ‘Take Off Your Colours’ so we were like okay… can we get a top ten on the next one? Then we found out we got top five so now it’s like next time we need number one!
I think that’s a good way of doing it, to always try and improve on your last success.

You’ve recorded both albums at the Outhouse Studios in Reading, do you feel like you’ll be recording future albums there?

Both: Fuck yeah!

Josh: I want to.

Matt: 100% I recon because we know them really well, they’re two of our best mates to be honest, John Mitchell and Matt O’ Grady. We went with them because it’s just so chilled, I don’t wanna go into a studio with some guy that’s like “No, no play this way”. They’re just like “Yeah! Do it this way, that bit sounds cool”.
We work so well basically.

Josh: I basically wanna do everything we did last time, exactly the same. Like I want to rent the same flat, I wanna live that close to all the food!

Matt: Same parties.

Josh: I want to go to the same clubs, on the same nights of the week.

RBR: Massive de ja vu though!

Josh: Yeah but it’s so good though! I went to Reading a few weeks ago and I was just like “I miss this place” because we did so much there. We lived there for about two months so you’re going to start feeling some kind of love.

Do you find touring with bands such as Paramore and Fall Out Boy gives you a sense of direction? Or does it feel daunting the directing that you’re headed?

Matt: Well Fall Out Boy broke up so…

Josh: I can’t really say much in regards to Fall Out Boy because I feel like we came from two different situations. Whereas with Paramore, I kind of feel like we’re from the same place. They’re young people and started the band for the same reasons we did and have just got so massive…
I think a band like Paramore have given us a sense of direction in the sense of we want to experience and achieve the similar things that they have one day. I think every band, when they get to where we are, start thinking if they could do arenas and stuff like that.
Once you’ve done it, there’s no way to really describe walking on stage and people singing along to your songs. But then again you can’t generate the same atmosphere in smaller venues which are just as good. They really are just two different ends of the scale.
There’s stuff that Paramore and Fall Out Boy have done that we realised we wanted to do as well.

How was the December tour with Paramore?

Josh: Sick. It was really good!

Matt: It was pretty intense.

Josh: Yeah it was pretty nuts if I’m honest, there were some days like in Europe, which I hate touring not because of the place but because whenever we’ve been there it’s been cloudy and raining. So I just assume it’s miserable all the time.

Matt: It’s confusing too. Like you’ll wake up one day in Germany and next minute you’re in Sweden and it’s like “Where am I?”.

Josh: We also hadn’t toured the UK properly since the March before that, so almost a year and we had just done two months in America opening up a five band bill tour and we were kind of at the point where were like “I don’t think anyone really cares about our band anymore…”
But then we came off the Paramore tour and it gave us hope and re-instigated a kick up the arse that we’re really lucky. That’s what the Paramore tour did for me.

What was the craziest experience on the tour?

Matt: Seeing Zac’s arse.

Josh: Yeah! Ok. This is an amazing story.
So we’re about to go on at Wembley and we were having a talk in our dressing room. Zac just comes in like “Alright guys. I’ve got something serious to say to you.” and takes us all into the toilet. We’re all like “Okay…”.
Then he goes “Alright guys, turn around.” So we turned back around and he’s just standing there mooning at us! Pulls his trousers back up and goes “We’re done.”

Matt: Yeah that was weird.

Josh: It was funny. I think when we played Manchester MEN it was like, 18,000 or 15,000 people… I remember looking out and thinking “This… Is… Retarded…”

Matt: Yeah it was retarded.

Josh: Retarded. And they had communal showers. How can an arena have communal showers.

Matt: Yeah. That was an interesting shower.

Josh: I was just like “Fuck this. Baby wipes. I’m not getting my willy out.”

RBR: No public displays of affection!

Josh: I don’t feel the need! Like Max, if he has a shower, he will invite me in for the shower. It’s ridiculous.

Matt: Not in a gay way.

Josh: I share a room with him when we go and tour America and stuff. If we get back after a show and he wants to shower and I want to poo or visa versa, he’s just like “Well I’m gonna take a shit/shower.” but I just want to go in and have ten minutes on my own!
He’s like “Alright.”
Then what I do, is I’ll go in, close the door and he’ll unlock the door from the other side, come in and do it anyway!
He has no boundaries that kid.

Matt: No standards either.

The lineup for your upcoming UK tour is really strong, how did you know that you wanted Forever The Sickest Kids and We The Kings to support you?

Josh: We made friends with them on Warped Tour.

Matt: We got on really well with Caleb of Forever The Sickest Kids and We The Kings, we had already made friends with. It was just a case of saying to your mates, “Do you want to come and tour with us?” as apposed to going through agents. It’s a much nicer way to do it like that.

Josh: It’s actually funny, because Forever The Sickest Kids’ manager was on Warped Tour with us. We went to the band directly and said “Hey, do you want to do the tour?” and their manager was like “No, no, you can’t do it. It’s too much money to do all those kinds of stuff.”
I remember in front of their manager going, “Fuck your manager! If you wanna do our tour, do our tour.”
All the band were like “Yeah! Alright! We’re doing the tour Tommy! You can’t tell us what to do!”
I was like, “Game on baby! Come on!” Love it. I love it when you put a manager in their place. You work for me!

Matt: Learn your place!

Josh: Learn your role! Foodchain.

During your sets, you always finish with The Rumour, is there a track on Hold Me Down that is going to replace that on this tour?

Josh: We’re not even playing The Rumour on the next tour.

RBR: It’s not on the set at all?

Josh: No we’re not playing it at all. The thing is, we got to the point where on the AP tour right, we finished the set on Finders Keepers. Every night we’d come off and be like, “It doesn’t feel like the set is finished…” because we were so used to finishing every set we’d ever done with The Rumour.
So then on the Paramore tour, we didn’t even have enough time to play the songs we wanted to play. So we tried to get away with playing Finders Keepers and then the ending of The Rumour, but then no one got what we were doing!
So we’ve got to the point where we don’t know what we can do.

RBR: Do you think your fans will be disappointed though? On Myspace, you sent out “What’s your favourite song and why?” Lot’s of people chose The Rumour…

Josh: Yeah… Might be… Well then they might have to call for an encore… Actually! That could work! Go off and then they go “Oh I want another song!” and then we go “Hey okay, we can play The Rumour!”
That works, put that in writing. There we go.

Are you looking forward to Warped Tour 2010?

Matt: No.

Josh: Yes and no. I think it’s one of the best experiences…

Matt: It’s  a lot of fun. It’s like a massive party and at the same time, some of the most amazing shows you can play as a band. But then again, you’re away from home for two months, it’s boiling hot, you’re in a dirty bus, you wake up hungover everyday…

Josh: The thing with the bus is that for a week it’s fine. Then what happens is everyone starts being careless, everyone starts throwing their shit everywhere, you go to the toilet and someone’s suitcase is in the toilet or something stupid.
Our bus always starts off really tidy, we all plan to have our own space, then the next thing you know for example, I went to my bunk on the last day of tour with Paramore, and all of Chris’ stuff is in my bunk. I was like “Oh. Okay brilliant. That’s great. Well now this isn’t going to work is it?”. I literally just threw it like “See ya later.”

Matt: You do have alot of bags though. For some reason Josh has like four bags.

Josh: Okay. I know that’s a bad thing but the problem is that I have this little medicine bag that my mum makes me take which is full of vitamins…

Matt: Ugh that’s so gay…

Josh: Yeah it’s gay but I need to stay in mildly good condition if I’m gonna be able to sing!
I’ve got my laptop bag. Then I’ve got my bag which has a change of clothes in for if during the day I’m in the venue and I wanna get changed without taking my suitcase.. and then the last bag is usually for a pair of shoes.
If you watch me walk in the morning or after a show, you’ll see me walking with like 6 bags. It looks like I’ve been shopping!
But as Matt says, Warped Tour is amazing because I just love the parties.

Matt: Yeah we’ve made some good friends, that’s how we met Forever The Sickest Kids and We The Kings.

Josh: Then there’s  some days for us, cause no one knows who we are in America, it’s like the biggest hustle ever. You have to kind of, get up in the morning, start writing on posters, before you even brush your teeth you’re already doing stuff for your band. It’s insane.

RBR: Is that quite humbling compared to over here where you’ve got You Me At Six mania?

Josh: Yeah. It’s like being in two different bands. That’s kind of one thing that I resent about the situation with our band, it’s that we’ve done so well in the UK, it’s amazing. I would much rather be at one level because at least then we’d have some sort of stability.
For us, we can do Brixton Academy in the UK, then divide that by ten and that’s what we can do in Paris. Then divide that by another ten and that’s what we can probably do in New York!
It’s very humbling. We did Warped last year, then came back and the first shows we done were Reading and Leeds. If you imagine going from a summer full of car parks playing to 200 people and then going to play to 14,000…

Matt: Yeah

Josh: It also just depends on the place. The first day in Chicago we played to 600 kids easily and it was just like “Oh Warped Tours gonna be piss [easy]! It’s great! We’re gonna be fine!”
Then a few weeks later when we go to Idaho and it’s like no one understands English there… and they’re all fucking…

Matt: Hillbillies

Josh: And have probably suffered some kind off… retardation. It’s raining and there’s cow shit everywhere and you don’t even understand why you are in this place but you are.

Matt: Then there’s this 40 year old guy who in dungarees is just going like this [impersonates man] I was just like “Is this guy for real?”

Josh: Okay yeah, that day we played in the pouring rain, we clashed sets with All Time Low and the main stage was inside a little complex. There was only about 4,000 people at Warped Tour that day which is nothing… they expect about 20,000 a day. So 4,000 people in Idaho, all 4,000 people are watching All Time Low. Literally. There was literally about 20 people watching our set!
I can remember one of the days was my birthday and I remember thinking in the end “Fuck it. I’m having a beer.”
So with Warped Tour, there’s a flip side to it, it’s amazing, you have incredible highs, and incredible lows. In that heat and kind of environment, the smallest things become the biggest things.
I remember one time, in The Gorge in Seattle, that place was so beautiful…

Matt: The best thing I’ve ever seen in my life.

Josh: We had lunch and decided we should go for a walk! So we were like “Yeah we’ll all go for a walk down to The Gorge.”
I was like “Right. I’m just gonna go back and get our merch guy some food, I’ll meet you by the bus.”
Everyone had gone without me. That’s what happened right! I literally was like “Fuck it.” I walked around on the bus, throwing stuff on the floor, I was so pissed off and they came back about 5 hours later like “Oh it was an amazing walk! We walked through the lake and some mountains!”

Matt: No. That’s not what happened…

Josh: And I was just like “Hey. Thanks for leaving without me. Dickhead.” We didn’t talk for the rest of the day cause I was so angry.

Matt: We waited for about 40 minutes for him. Then me and Dan were just like…

Josh: You didn’t wait for me!

Matt: [continues] fuck it, yeah let’s go, let’s definitely go. Then Chris ran after us. It was fucking funny. We got some wicked pictures.

Josh: Yeah! Exactly! Even now they’re rubbing it in my face!

Matt: I had a wee off the side of The Gorge. It was 1,000 feet down was I was like “Yeah… Woo!”.

Josh: Killing birds as you did it.

There’s much debate over whose headlining Reading and Leeds this year, do you have any inklings over whose playing?

Josh: I know whose headlining. Matt aswell.

Matt: But you can’t know!

Josh: I think Reading this year, in my opinion as a punter, would be my favourite year. We’re still waiting to find out like, we’ve got two festivals… we want to do both of them but can only do one… we’re just waiting to find out whose gonna offer us what we want out of the situation… billing and stuff…
So people of Reading, if you’re reading this interview, just fucking do the right thing. You know what time it is! Give us the stage we want, the day we want, and we’ll do it! Otherwise the other guys are gonna get us and we’ll have to play with N-Dubz and I don’t wanna do that!. So please. Give me the right one! Come on!

You tweet alot about eating out, what’s the most amount of times you’ve eaten at Wagamama in one week?

Matt: Six

Josh: No! That’s a lie! Last week I went like three times… that’s so bad. Okay, what happened was me, Matt, our manager Carina and I think Phoebe who does our press, we went out for a Wagamama, so that’s one. Then I went out with my girlfriend for one because she wanted one so I was like “Alright, that makes sense…” and then on Sunday out of no where, me and Max went out for another one so that was my third Wagamama last week!

Matt: That’s quite alot isn’t it.

Josh: Dude! It means that going to the gym is pointless because everything you’re burning, you’re just putting right back on through the Wagamamas! I Love eating and I love eating out. I hate my cooking. I can’t cook, ask Dan who shared a flat with me in Reading, he was just like “Are you gonna make dinner or am I tonight?”. I was like “Thing is Dan… I only know how to boil some pasta and put some sauce in the pan…so unless you want pasta every night!”
He made some crazy shit! One night he made some chicken with potatoes and sweetcorn…

Matt: And then puts crisps on top.

Josh: Yeah! We had pasta bake and he put loads of crisps on top!

Matt: It was amazing!

Josh: It was well nice! Cheese and onion crisps on pasta bake.

RBR: Are you one of those people who cooks scrambled egg in a microwave?

Josh. I don’t cook full stop. I don’t have a microwave. I live at home with my parents who don’t believe in technology.

Matt: You don’t have a fucking microwave?

Josh: No we don’t!

Matt: So how do you cook popcorn?

Josh: I don’t cook! I make cereal in the morning and put toast in the toaster! That is it! That is as far as my cooking skills go. I did food tech for GCSE, I cooked some weird arsed shit.
I remember when you had to choose the style of food you were going to make and I did Italian. I made this one pizza that basically… looked like bread. It was really thick, doughy and horribly shaped. When you ate it, the top bit tasted like what pizza tastes like, cheese tomato whatever, then the rest of it was just bread. That’s when I realised cooking wasn’t my forte.

RBR: Cheese and ketchup sandwich, might as well…

Josh: Cheese on toast! This is what you do. Make the toast, cut the cheese, take the toast out the toaster, put the cheese on top, brown sauce.

Do you have any goals or aspirations left for the band? Tours, collaborations…

Matt: World domination.

Josh: I wanna tour with Jimmy Eat World so bad. Oh my god. Okay this is my deal: All the haters out there, if you somehow convince Jimmy Eat World to take us out on a tour, we will quit as a band. We both get something out of it. Once we tour with Jimmy Eat World, I would happily walk away from this situation because you’ve hit the goal.

Matt: You’ve done it.

Josh: You’ve done it. You’ve done everything you wanna do. I think one thing we’d really love to do is maybe try and as I said before, as we’re considered big in the UK, it would be nice to spread that out a little bit in other places aswell. It would be really nice to make the most out of our band’s potential wherever that may be. Yeah, that’s what I wanna do.
I dunno. I wanna get a drug addiction, like a massive coke problem…

Matt: Jesus.

Josh: Go to rehab, then all our cover stories can be about how I got over coke! It’d read lot better than me getting over a breakup.

Matt: Yeah we should do that soon. Forget about the girls and focus on the drugs.

Josh: Or we can get involved in slave labour!

Do you have any final words to people reading?

Josh: Don’t make jokes about coke.

Matt: Don’t do drugs.

Josh: And slave labour.

Tags: Fall Out Boy, Forever The Sickest Kids, interview, Josh Franceschi, Matt Barnes, Paramore, Wagamama, Warped Tour, We The Kings, YM@6, You Me At Six
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