StooShe: I think we’re just three lucky girls
“It’s really surreal,” muses Courtney of StooShe, when asked about their newfound success. In under a year, the South London girl-band have gone from unknown hopefuls to the coolest new kids on the block. A few months after forming, the trio hit London hot spot Brick Lane and shot a colourful low-budget video entitled ‘Fuck Me’, complete with expletives aplenty.
Before they knew it the clip had gone viral and soon Warner Music were paying attention. Fast forward ten months and they are now signed to the label, who have given the song a radio friendly makeover, renamed it ‘Love Me’ and flown the ladies out to L.A to reshoot the video with Travie McCoy. “I think we’re just three lucky girls!” observes Karis, “we don’t even see the exposure that we’re getting right now. We’re always in our little bubble working in our van and going to places, so we just hear about it!”
Starting the year on the prestigious BBC Sound of 2012 list, the girls are now sitting pretty on both the Capital and Radio 1 A-Lists. Their material is being produced to a large extent by Future Cut, who have made music for Wretch 32, Plan B, Lily Allen and Kelis. Alex explains the creative-process: “After they send us a beat, we’ll be chilling in the studio, vibing and coming up with melodies and then we might say a word, and the topic will come from that”. “Or we’ll be talking about a certain topic and then we’ll just start writing about it!” throws in Karis.
As well as garnering growing acclaim for their cheeky lyrics and big voices, the girls are attracting attention for their signature quirky style, fast cementing their place as the new ‘it girls’ of pop. But far from embodying the all too often ‘too cool for school’ persona typical of many so-called scenesters, StooShe are refreshingly down to earth. When asked about their favourite hang out spots, Courtney replies; “I don’t think it’s about having a cool place, it’s more about having great people around you and that makes the surroundings.”
“We can chill wherever”, adds Karis; “One day we were in Croydon chilling in Starbucks, we’d just come from the gym. I saw a girl, and for some reason I said to myself that she looks like a StooShe fan! And then we went home and she had written on our Facebook wall that she’d seen us and I was thinking ‘You saw us like that!’” endearingly embarrassed at the notion that they may be expected to put on an image now that they are in the public eye.
“We get people looking at us in the road,’ Karis continues, and we’ll wonder why they’re looking at us and later on we’ll get a tweet saying ‘We saw you!’” Courtney finds this equally mind-boggling: “It’s strange having ‘fans’ support us. I was out the other day and someone was like ‘are you that girl from StooShe?!’ and I was like ‘Oh my God, you know who I am!’”
With their debut single set for imminent release and an ever expanding schedule of live appearances including the Wireless Festival this Summer, the girls better get used to being spotted out and about, as the way things are going for them, it won’t be long before StooShe won’t be able to go anywhere unnoticed.
Love Me is out on March 5th on Warner
Interview by Anna Nathanson www.annanathanson.tumblr.com and photography by Stephan Gregoire www.stephangregoirephotography.com
Tagged in: BBC Sound of 2012, Future Cut, music, StooSheMost viewed
|
|
Latest from Independent journalists on Twitter