What’s your earliest musical memory? At what point in time did you become aware that this thing we call music exists? Scottish synthpop band Chvrches told MTV News theirs — complete with terrifying “Wizard of Oz” flashbacks — before taking the stage Friday night (September 20) for MTV’s Artist to Watch Live in New York City.
“My earliest musical memory was going to see an amateur production of ‘The Wizard of Oz’ at Whitburn Academy and having to be taken out at the interval because I was in tears because the music moved me so profoundly,” said the band’s Iain Cook, recalling when he first had a brush with tunes.
Bandmates Martin Doherty and Lauren Mayberry’s first interactions, however, were less dramatic — and both involved family car rides. “Mine is actually listening to Tango in the Night by Fleetwood Mac in the back of my parents’ car,” Doherty said. “Particularly the song ‘Big Love.’ Those vocal samples, they sounded weird. Just go listen to it. If you’re at an impressionable age it’s pretty interesting.”
“I think I was going to go for a car memory as well,” Mayberry added. “Just being in the back of the car with my parents listening to a lot of Steely Dan, Whitney Houston — stuff like that. So it’s not quite as cool as Fleetwood Mac, but I don’t really believe in cool, anyway.”
Despite Mayberry’s contention that she’s not a believer in “cool,” Chvrches are unmistakably so — at least where buzz is concerned. The band first captured the attention of the music world with its excellent Recover EP, which dropped in March. Chvrches have made their bones on dance tracks whose catchiness belie their darker undertones, a style that’s in full effect on their first full-length effort, The Bones of What You Believe, which drops September 24.
Chvrches takes the stage tonight at the Studio at Webster Hall for MTV Hive’s Artist To Watch Live, kicking off at 10 p.m. EST. You can watch all the action go down at MTVHive.com
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