It’s been a whirlwind twelve months for The Xcerts, announcing their comeback with the massive choruses of ‘Feels Like Falling In Love’, completing two headline tours and releasing ‘Hold On To Your Heart’, a triumphant album of romance, last chances and huge 80s anthems. Taking a breather after their busiest festival season, the three-piece are releasing ‘Late One Night’, a collection of stripped down songs from ‘HOTYH’, all recorded in (you guessed it) one night. We caught up with Murray and Jordan to get the lowdown on the new music, acoustic shows and their massive tour with You Me at Six to close out the year.
How’s festival season treated you this year?
Murray: Good, man. It’s been amazing. It’s the first year where we’ve felt wanted and in demand. Usually, we’re begging festivals to let us on, but this year we’ve been asked to play quite a lot. All the festivals have been amazing, and we did three shows with Goo Goo Dolls. We’ve had a really fun summer, it’s felt like a victory lap. I think because it’s our most accessible record and because we’re playing to a lot of new people they’ve been drawn in a lot quicker than they would be if we were playing the older stuff. Just ‘cause they’re built for big stages, and a lot of the songs fit the sun and outdoor stages, and hanging with your best friends and making memories. I think that ‘Hold on to Your Heart’ is the soundtrack to those moments, that’s what we wanted the record to be.
Jordan: That’s what we thought when we were making the record, so it’s nice that it seems to work on a festival stage.
Murray: I think when people were passing in years gone by they probably thought “Jesus that’s a racket!”, but now it’s like “Oh this is a nice pop song!”
Your festival set is all ‘Hold on to Your Heart’, do you miss playing any of the old songs?
Murray: We’re always thinking about now, and the future…
Jordan: It’s a shame because the old stuff is great, but generally, yeah you get stoked on the new stuff it’s the only thing you wanna play really.
Murray: And we believe all the new stuff is our best material so if we can play as much of it as possible that’s great. It’s our fourth record so the fact that it’s more relevant than ever and people are enjoying the band is a really big deal. We’re very fortunate that it’s our most successful record because it’s our favourite. We do try and cater for people who’ve been with the band a long time; we don’t want to shun anybody, so we throw in a few older songs.
Jordan: But then that guy that’s always yelling out that weird song from the first record, they’re always gonna be unhappy.
