One night last year, my phone repeatedly pinged with a series of WhatsApp message from my sister Carla, who had started doing some work at The Rig Arts Centre in Greenock. Carla's constant pings told me about how she had begun mentoring a young, still at school, teenage band called The Cords and she raved about their pure indie pop sound, comparing it Sarah Records, C86, early Pastels and Shop Assistants.
The Cords are Eva on guitar and Grace on drums, two teenage sisters from Inverkip in the West of Scotland, who have quickly gathered support via a couple of shows at Mono (supporting The Vaselines and then Carla) and a couple of in-house shows at The Rig Arts Centre.
My heart melted when I caught The Cords live. Warm guitar chords with limited/no effects, beautifully pure melodies and beats, playful hooks and a sibling chemistry easily won me and the Mono crowd over. Afterwards, it was great to see kids and adults supporting the band by buying up their pin badges and homemade bracelets. My youngest daughter Rosie and her friend Emily were in the front row and they proudly wore Cords pin badges to school the next day.
The Cords are definitely a band to watch out for over the next couple of years. It's still very early days for the duo, but I dropped them a message via Carla to ask a few questions for the blog and Eva kindly took the time to answer them.
When and how did you form?
My sister and I have both been drumming since we were 6-years old and our drum tutor Lesley McLaren started Rock school at Rig Arts to give teens the chance to form bands and be given guidance so we jumped at the chance to be involved!
I had started teaching myself guitar and Grace decided to learn bass. I hadn't even thought about singing or songwriting at this point but after meeting Carla she really inspired me to start writing. Keiran Savage (master of all things guitar) was a great help and gave us so much encouragement. Within the first few months we had written and learned 2 songs and learned The Pastels Check My Heart to perform at the first Gig@Rig. From there we carried on writing more and more and started an Insta account which gathered a great following @the.cords_band
Do you both write your songs?
I mostly write but Grace helps with ideas and she wrote Weird Feeling alone. Grace comes up with the drum parts but we mostly work together on everything.
Do you have any plans to record at present? Or are you taking your time?
We are very very excited to be going into the studio to record with Simon (Poster Paints/Frightened Rabbit) and Jonny (Chvrches) this month!
You've already played 2 shows at Mono. What do you enjoy about playing live?
We really love playing live as it's so much fun and we love that people come to see us and even the little ones when we supported Carla at her all ages album launch as it doesn't happen that often. They were dancing and enjoying the music which was brilliant. We just love Mono, it's our favourite so to have played 2 gigs there already is incredible!
Did you receive any words of encouragement from The Vaselines?
They said they enjoyed our set and we got a hug from Frances after the set. Their set was amazing and we never imagined that we would support The Vaselines never mind our 1st big gig!
What music are you enjoying listening to at the moment?
Anything Rose Melberg for me is a winner and she is such an inspiration to me. Also The Umbrellas can do no wrong as they are my favourite band. Grace loves The Cure, Slowdive, and My Bloody Valentine, she's a wee shoegazer. We both love most of the same music and both loving Seablite just now.
Any plans for 2024 or are you taking your time?
We do have very exciting plans for 2024 but you'll just need to keep following to find out more!
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