CHVRCHES is the collaborative musical effort of Iain, Martin and Lauren and on this very day, their debut record The Bones Of What You Believe is released in Australia. Due to a little bit of luck and a sneaky time difference, we get the record 4 days prior to the rest of the world and we’re oh so okay with it. If I were you, I’d drop everything I was doing and get your hands on the record. Unless you’re in the middle of brain surgery in which case -- carry on...

A little while ago whilst the Glaswegians made a whirlwind trip down under we spent some time together wherein they told us some of the stories behind The Bones of What You Believe and despite the widespread hype, the trio remain some of the loveliest, most humble folk I’ve had the pleasure of conversing with. We discussed musical origins, wild times in Sydney and their, (namely Martin’s) burning desire to play a game of table tennis against Win Butler. In a happy coincidence, early next year both Chvrches and Arcade Fire happen to find themselves in our fine country touring with Laneway and BDO respectively, so here’s to hoping that table tennis tournament occurs. *furiously crosses fingers and toes*...

I - Iain
L - Lauren
M - Martin

SW // Can you tell me a little about how The Bones Of What You Believe came to be?

M - It's interesting because, we've been effectively recording this album since the first day that we were a band; its just the way that our process works. There's no 'demo stage' or 'album stage', with an electronic project like this one you stay in the same place from the first day you start writing until you're done.
I - I've got a basement studio in Glascow and we recorded pretty much everything there, apart from a little bit of vocals which we did in a hotel in El Paso... That was interesting, it was about 120F degrees and we had to turn the air conditioning off so that we could actually get a clean signal on the mic. We were just sweating like crazy -- it was brutal.
L - All for the sake of Art.
I - In a way, the EPs we've released so far show slightly different sides of the band compared to the album, I mean on the record Martin does some vocals, there's some down tempo stuff and some more happy stuff. There's some stuff that people will have heard already while other parts are entirely new. Just mixing it up.

SW // How does a CHVRCHES song usually get written?

I - Generally all the songs will start with either a beat, a sound from a synthesiser or a vocal sample or maybe another recorded sequence. The first hour of working on something tends to go really fast with a whirlwind of activity, running around plugging things in and getting the idea down before we forget it. Thereafter it's usually a slow development which could take days to finish, it just depends on the song. But that's how things usually happen so far. The three of us just working together in a little room.

SW // How did the three of you begin playing music together?

M - We'd all been doing our own thing musically for a long time. Iain and I had known each other for years, we've been friends for nearly 10 years and through that time had worked together at different capacities. I started working on Iain's old band's last record in the studio and went on to tour with them after it. That was my first experience of being on the road. That band split up and we'd always talked about doing something. Loads of time passed and at the end of 2011 we sat down in the studio again and finally got something happening. We found out about Lauren through Iain because they were working together at the time so all came together in the studio to try things out. We then started writing songs together and it's all gone extremely fast since then!

SW // It seems like you guys have spent a fair bit of time on the road recently in the lead up to this album, has there been a moment that stands out? Maybe a wildest moment?

M - The wildest moments in our band are usually schedule related...
I - There's quite a lot of wild moments to pick from, but the wildest from the lot was probably playing on stage at the Sans Zero football stadium with Depeche Mode in Milan. That was a real, "Oh my God what are we doing here" kind of moment. It was probably the coolest thing I've ever done.
L - We went to a place called Consello's in Sydney the other day and that was pretty wild...
M - That was sexy and wild.
L - I feel like that stretch of street could get pretty spicy after a certain time of night.
M - We were the spicy ones! We were the ones in the bar just fucking slamming shots all night.
L - I was doing a pretty impressive job of pretending to drink the shots. I was quite proud.

SW // You mentioned earlier that you were coming back for Laneway and I'd imagine you've played some great festivals in your time so far, if given the chance to share the stage with any other artist in the world, who would it be?

M - Probably Radiohead. They're maybe my favourite band of all time.
I - Or maybe Arcade Fire, they seem like nice guys.
SW - They'll be in town for Big Day Out late January next year, maybe you guys will cross paths...
I - That'd be great. We're kind of friends with one of their tour managers so apparently we've got an infinite guest list at their shows.
M - I just want the chance to play Win Butler at Table Tennis. I hear he's pretty special on the court.
I - Well they tour with a competition grade table tennis table. It's inspired us, I think we're going to buy one for our next America tour.
M - Seriously, we're going to do it properly.
SW - So maybe next year when you're both in Australia it could happen?
M - Well that's enough time to practice.
I - Really? You could get that good by then?
M - Come September we could have a table, then I intend to play every day until we get back to Australia.
SW - And how are your table tennis abilities right now?
M - I feel like I have an outrageous amount of potential..
I - Maybe that's what the album should have been called!