The great thing about working closely with Bradford-based bands — especially ones who practise or record at Prospect Studios — is getting introduced to more likeminded, community-spirited artists. So, naturally, after meeting Rob John Lee of the mighty Pulled Apart By Horses and grunge three-piece Scouge, I was eager to chat all things music with him. And we really put the world to rights at the same time…

RECORD WEEKLY’S INTERVIEW WITH ROB JOHN LEE

Hi Rob, how are you?

I’m well thank you. Just here in the room we have here in Leeds, as Pulled Apart By Horses.

Oh nice. It’s been a little while since I saw you and Scouge playing — has it been busy since?

Yeah, we’re working on various bits and pieces right now.

That’s really exciting! So let’s jump straight in then — did you always want to get into music? Was that evident from an early age?

Ah definitely. Not in a traditional sense; I didn’t study music or do it at school, but there was always music playing in the house when I was growing up. My parents didn’t make music either, yet they were certainly really into it.

Somebody bought me a guitar when I was about six or seven; it was a little acoustic one. But I almost used it as a toy at that age, rather than learning how to play it until I was older. As you did when you were a kid, I listened a lot to Michael Jackson and, as I’m from Sheffield, bands like Def Leppard came into rotation.

Oh no way! They’re one of my absolute favourites — literally, whatever the mood. They were the first band — with Whitesnake and Black Stone Cherry — I saw when I moved up north.

Haha Def Leppard was my first gig as well, at Sheffield Arena!

So good. It all built from there then?

Well, the first band that switched me onto making music properly was Nirvana. That’s a bit of a universal story for a lot of artists of our generation. But, up until then, I’d listen to lots of stuff and like it, jump around the bedroom with a tennis racket, you know, pretending to play? But when I first heard ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ on the radio, back in maybe 1992, that was a pivotal moment. It was an instant click of the fingers: “I want to do that!”

I saved up some money after that to buy an electric guitar and I sort of never put it down. From age 14, I started forming bands in school and it’s been a bit of a compulsion since then! And maybe a distraction, almost — I studied graphic design at uni, so it’s a different industry. That’s what brought me to Leeds actually.

How did Pulled Apart By Horses come to be?

A couple of years after finishing at uni, in the late 2000s, I met the lads and we formed Pulled Apart By Horses. I always assumed it would be more of a DIY sort of project, as the Leeds scene reflected that kind of thing back then. It was a really thriving community, based around the LS6 area. The Brudenell was in its infancy; bands would drag their amps out of their basements to play there, Royal Park Cellars, The Pack Horse, and places like that. Aptly, the latter was the first venue we ever played as Pulled Apart By Horses.

I was so inspired by local bands at that stage, and we were egging each other on with it and gigging as much as possible. Yet, before we knew it, we were approached with a record and management contract, which was quite a shock! I had a decent graphic design job at that point, but we had a phone call from this manager, who basically said they wanted us to quit our jobs and make a full-time go of it! The only other bands they had on their roster at the time were Muse and The Pogues, too!

Oh wow, as if!

Yeah, they said they were looking for a new British band to try and break into the UK industry — and that was us. And we did that full-time for ten years, as our jobs.

I didn’t realise it was for so long — or that was how it all happened! That’s amazing, because that’s literally the dream for so many bands.

So, what would you say in that time were your career highlights as Pulled Apart By Horses?

There are loads of them! Every step of the way, what we did felt like an achievement, so getting to make the first album was massive, but then the second, too. At that time, you went into the studio and, as recording technology wasn’t what it is now in a home environment, you pressed the button there and it was the real deal. It solidified the idea of us being a ‘real’ band, and album upon album, that feeling notched up a peg.

The second record was produced by Gil Norton, who’d worked with Foo Fighters and The Pixies. Again, another level up.

At one point, we were playing Leeds Fest every year and we went up the ranks in terms of stages. The first time was on the BBC Introducing Stage, which was so much smaller than the Main Stage that we did later, but it still felt amazing. I never had any ambitions to be super-wealthy and make tonnes of money from music, so I was always so appreciative of every single thing we did.

Yeah, some bands have such crazy, unrealistic expectations these days of where they could get to.

Absolutely. We were very lucky at that right time and place — the market’s saturated now, whereas it wasn’t as accessible back then. We were willing to do whatever came our way and, as we put the effort in, too, it paid off and had an effect. Everything seems to have changed so rapidly since — the pandemic being responsible for some of it. I don’t know how possible it would be for a band to do all that in exactly the same way anymore.

Definitely. It’s hard, and so many artists are trying desperately to make it now and just might not. There’s a lot of pop versus other genres, too!

Music has definitely got more possibilities now, but the result is that it’s becoming very homogenised and formulated. There’s perhaps this expectation of being able to skip ahead and replicate what others are doing, rather than roughing it in vans and sleeping on kitchen floors, like we did!

We chatted further about the pitfalls of technology in music, short attention spans of prospective fans, and the working hard with so many financial considerations for up-and-coming outfits — plus my desire to always keep RW free and genuine. But we then circled back to Rob and his CV…

So, how did you go from your business-as-usual setup with Horses to forging Scouge?

It was always about doing something with a more DIY approach. I was used to having booking agents and a label behind me, and so with Scouge, I wanted to do that myself — not an experiment haha, but just more DIY. It was interesting to understand the inner workings with offers, enquiries and such.

We found with Horses that, as everyone got older, people’s lives went in slightly different directions — having families and whatnot. I’m still very much in the band and we still meet and crack on every week, but that’s where the balance is with the two bands.

So, yeah, around the end of 2021, things weren’t as full-on with Horses, so I sort of had a bit of free time. We’d taken a hit with COVID as well, of course, and for a moment, we weren’t sure if we’d continue to be a thing. It all went quiet for a bit. I’d done previous side projects before with different bands — including Menace Beach, who sort of turned into Yard Act, separate to my involvement. But I’d always been cautious of starting something fully, as I wanted to be available as much as possible for Horses. But having gone off and done little other bits here and there, I had the scope to explore this more at that time. And Tommy and Tom were off doing other things, too. I was bored haha!

I’d met my girlfriend in Bradford around that time and discovered this music community there, which drew me in. It reminded me of the older Leeds days. I met Ian, our drummer in Scouge, and we just got on really well and started jamming. I was playing bass but my first instrument is guitar, so it transpired that I could play this because we then brought Daz in, on bass. It all fell into place so easily.

At first with Scouge, the inbox was like a ghost town haha, but then it all started to pick up once we stuck at it and generated more songs. And that’s how we got the gigs with Elvana! I think they’d actually followed Horses but Scouge’s music was the better fit in regards to the whole Nirvana style.

And I’ve learned a lot as well from going DIY — I’d never had to upload anything to Spotify and I didn’t know what I was doing. It was funny really; all those albums behind me with Horses, but I had to teach myself all that stuff haha. Very valuable and empowering!

Do you have any other tips for emerging artists?

It’s difficult to making a living out of music, unless you’re like Taylor Swift! It’s rare that you’ll be able to have a full-time job in music these days, so a lot of people will recommend you keep a job that pays the bills on the side, and hone your art along with that. Steve Albini has a big advocate of that. You’ll have to make compromises along the way, sure, but it’ll feel less distilled if you’re able to work for the money you need as well, I think.

You’ve got to have a lot of tenacity regardless, though. And you might want to consider getting a manager if you can, if you think that’ll be a benefit on the admin side — it’ll free you up for more creativity. But equally, it’s up to you and you’ve got to find the right person.

It’s well worth getting out to other bands’ gigs, too — it’ll help to establish that community.

For sure! It’s been a really rewarding and insightful journey for me with Wolforna, but it’s not for everyone.

Definitely! It’s nice you enjoy that, as I often find that writing summaries of songs seems strange, when the lyrics feel as though they should do the talking enough haha. It’s great if you can find someone who’ll fight in your corner!

So, is there anything you can tease that you’re working on with Scouge at the moment?

The way we’ve been approaching things is to not put the pressure on with releasing an album; we’ve got into the studio to rehearse and just jammed and penned ideas. They’ve either morphed into singles or a collection of songs that work as smaller EPs, rather than us building everything into an album.

Without fail, we meet once a week. We practise when we’ve got gigs coming up, but otherwise, we use that time to be constantly writing and getting ideas out there.

We’ve spent a lot of time picking and deciding which songs were right to release, but we did want to get as much out there as we could. We’re certainly working towards consolidating things into an album, though, after what we’ll release as our third EP. It’s just very expensive and time consuming haha, and you end up putting a lot of limitations on yourself! So we’re more flexible with Scouge, and we’re taking our time rather than biting it all off as one huge chunk.

We also have some gigs coming up — one in Idle at the end of July, then a few more. We’re open to offers!

Finally, I always like asking this: what are your three favourite venues, either to play or go to as a punter?

The Brudenell, of course. I used to live up the road from there, so I was probably in there a few times a week at one point. I’ve seen it change so much over the years and I’ve also watched some of my favourite bands there! We played it recently as Scouge and I’ve done it a few times with Horses. When I was a kid, I used to go to working men’s clubs — very Phoenix Nights — so it has that appeal, you know? It’s amazing to see how that’s turned into an internationally renowned venue.

Before I moved to Leeds, I used to go to The Leadmill in Sheffield a lot. I’ve played there a few times with both bands, so that’s up there. And then, the third one has to be Barrowland in Glasgow!

Such a good choice!

Haha yeah, it’s got that working men’s club vibe but on a large scale. It has a lot of the original ‘60s or ‘70s décor. We played there as Horses, supporting Biffy Clyro on their tour — one of our first big opportunities, and it was over two nights. It was before they got mega-huge!

It was pretty magical and I remember seeing these plaster-cast stars stuck to the dressing room walls, painted in gold, silver and red. Their drummer, Ben, took one off and said you could do that if you’d made it big, and that one day we’d be able to. I felt so motivated to earn that star haha. But then I saw a roadie grabbing one! He said everyone takes them and they get replaced. I still didn’t take a star, though. One day, maybe…

You can listen to Pulled Apart By Horses and Scouge now, and follow their social accounts while you’re at it.