How old are you?
Hattie: I'm 25
Charley: And I'm 27
Where are you from?
Charley: We grew up in Kent, and lived there until we left school.
How would you describe your music?
Hattie: Well, it's kind of singer/songwriter but obviously as a duo we incorporate different elements. Our music's quite melodic, and lyrically we feel that we have quite a strong message. Charley plays the guitar and sings and I play the harp and sing.
What kind of people would you say you were aiming for?
Charley: Anybody who likes music that's got a strong melody that they can sing along to. A lot of our songs are about personal stories of our own. One of my favourite things to do as a listener is to hear somebody else's song and think it's about my life - I think that's what we all do - you associate the story with how it touches you and we wanted to do the same thing with our record.
What's the theme of your album?
Hattie: It's about a journey. We've been travelling as musicians a lot since we were really young. We made an album in Nashville and used to sell our CDs out of the boot of our car at gigs. Then we went to LA and started gigging there and eventually came back to make our record in London. It's definitely been a long journey so we called our album 'Daylight Crossing' to reflect that.
Who are your influences?
Charley: Growing up we were surrounded by music - our dad was an old rock 'n' roll drummer and did a lot of gigs that we'd go to late at night - so all the music that he'd be listening to on journeys. It's the kind of music that has influenced us as we've grown up: bands that have got strong melodies and lots of harmonies, like Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers and the Travelling Wilburys, or artists like Carole King and James Taylor – musicians like that, who really touch you.
Have you been compared to any body musically?
Hattie: We've been compared to Fleetwood Mac a few times. They're such a great band, I love them, so that was a great compliment.
How did you get to where you are now – what's the story?
Charley: We were introduced to a producer a few years ago by a musician friend of ours at a gig, and we really clicked. We were talking to him about the songs that we'd written and our vision for our music and so on, and he just really got the vibe and said, 'Why don't we put some tracks together and see what happens?' and it turned into a whole album, which we recorded in Nashville. From there we went travelling and we played songs from that album at gigs and, through that, made our way to California to meet some friends. We loved it there and ended up staying for a while, and it was there that we were approached by some people from our publishing and record company. We signed our record deal out in California and came back to the UK to make our album because this is our home, and there were a couple of producers here that we wanted to work with.
Which producers are they then?
Hattie: Steve Lipson and Martin 'Youth' Glover. We had a brilliant time working with them both, but it was a very different studio experience. With Youth we worked with a band, and we had some of guys from The Verve playing with us. Then with Steve we worked in a much more detailed way, and we also got to work with two of our favourite musicians - a drummer called Steve Gadd, and a bass player called Pino Palladino, who we've always really admired. It was really inspiring to play with them. Charley: We grew up watching Steve Gadd play drums with people like Paul Simon and Eric Clapton, so it was a dream come true to play music with him and experience his vibe.
So how did the record deal with Universal come about?
Hattie: When we were living in LA we were living in Venice Beach and we met a lot of musicians…
Charley: There's a real community there - it's a sort of beachy nut house. Some of the houses are like shacks and some of them are like million-dollar homes and there's always somebody's getting shot on the next street, so it's a complete melting pot of different people. We were lucky enough to fall into a great group of creative artists and musicians so when we were in that community together we really bonded and met lots of people.
Hattie: So we played a lot of gigs in LA and we met a publisher who offered us a publishing deal and it went from there. Our publisher took us to meet lots of different label people and that's how that evolved, but it's really just through playing out and people seeing us play and that's what sparked an interest, I think.
What's going to be your first single?
Hattie: 'I Still Hear It'.
Did you get to choose your first single?
Charley: It was a joint effort. We were really happy with that choice because it's a great introduction to who we are. The song evolved through Hat playing this riff on her harp and I came in and put some chords to it, then we wrote the lyrics together with a couple of friends. There are lots of harmonies, and it has a good groove, it's probably good driving music actually.
What gigs are you going to be doing in the UK?
Hattie: We're playing with Jamie Cullum on three of his summer dates in July, they're up on our website. We're also playing a headline show at the Borderline in August.
What are your aspirations, career-wise – are you looking for chart success or would you prefer to remain outside of the mainstream?
Charley: The priority for us both as musicians is to play as much as we can, and to really be fulfilled in terms of playing live and gigging with other bands. We'd like to do some festivals and tour as much as possible, and obviously there are some other musicians that it's always been a dream to play or write with - like David Bowie or Cat Stevens.
What's the best lyric you've written to date?
Charley: For me, different days bring different emotions - one day you need one lyric and one day you need another. There's a song on our record called 'Everything Changes', and when we wrote that, we had about five different versions of the chorus. The one that we ended up with is the definitive version really, and that lyric for me always has a big emotional memory of the time that we wrote it.
Do you feel like pop stars yet?
Charley: I don't know what that is really. I mean, we feel lucky to be working with the kind of producers and musicians that we have because that's really the big inspirational thing.
Do you have an interesting/funny fact about yourselves for us?
Hattie: Yeah! I'm a complete foodie. I love to cook as much as I can. I love having dinner parties and good conversation. I especially love making savoury dishes, Hat is a complete dessert and pudding queen - she makes all sorts of special turnovers and stuff - I can't make anything like that really. My favourite things to make are stews and soups and salads and tarts and quiches.
You both sound quite handy to have around the house!
Hattie: I think my fact would be that I like eating honey straight out of the jar with a spoon. Love honey. Love it.
Charley: I hate honey.
