Exclusive:The Snuts: How hitting pause on touring helped the West Lothian indie rockers come full circle
The Snuts frontman Jack Cochrane talks about ‘finding joy’ in returning home, what’s next for the indie rockers, and why staying authentic is so important in music.
Having stepped away from the “relentless” grind of touring following the release of their most recent album, West Lothian indie rockers The Snuts are back with new music.
The four-piece band from Whitburn topped the charts with their debut record W.L. back in 2021, leading to a cycle of writing and touring with little time for breaks.
“When we made our first record [and] when we were touring that, we started recording and writing our second record. And then we were touring that, we were doing our third record,” explains frontman Jack Cochrane. “So we decided we were going to have a year just to make a record.”
It didn’t mean the band stopped playing shows completely, but instead allowed them to enjoy, and be “more grounded inside”, the writing. So far this year, The Snuts have shared two new - very personal - singles with fans and completed a warm-up tour of the UK which took them to towns they typically wouldn’t visit.
The Snuts return to West Lothian
“I think maybe in the last couple years a lot of artists kind of found themselves in this state of habitual touring, in a sense where we were only visiting the same cities every year. We were kind of choosing, I would say maybe like the easiest route. So we'd be doing like, Glasgow, Manchester, London, Liverpool, Newcastle – just kind of hitting these big cities.
“We feel like a lot of great music has started outside of the cities, and there's so many people outside of the cities that love music. So we decided we're going to hit some of these smaller places, you know, the B cities, for want of a better term.
“And halfway through that tour, we realised, ‘wait a minute, we're from a place like that, and no bands or artists ever come and visit where we're from’.”
The band cut their teeth playing “bowlers clubs and the miners welfare clubs and all the Working Men's clubs” in West Lothian a few times a week, according to Cochrane who says they hadn’t returned there for around a decade at that point.
With that in mind, The Snuts ended their tour with a one-off show at the Regal Theatre in Bathgate, where they chose to run a ballot in order to raise money for charity.
The idea came to Cochrane, whose wife had “miraculously” secured them tickets to see Paolo Nutini at Paisley Town Hall a few years prior.
He says: “We knew it was gonna be a popular show, but there's an opportunity to put this show on and also contribute to a really good cause. So we did that with a charity called Music Broth.”
In the end, The Snuts’ hometown gig raised almost £11,000 for the charity, which helps provide instruments to those who may not otherwise be able to access them.
‘Home is actually quite a nice place’
This homecoming was symbolic in more ways than one, as a few years prior the band left Glasgow behind to return home as their families grew. It’s a theme which Cochrane describes as a “catalyst” for their upcoming album and recent single Motherlands.
“Just finding joy in the places that we're from,” he says. “All the warmth that comes with that stuff that we've maybe necessarily tried to escape when you're younger and that kind of pull of home, and the comfort that has. So yeah, that's what the latest single is about, it's like the fear of coming home and then the realisation that home is actually quite a nice place.
“You question yourself, why you've been so desperate to leave?”
He continues: “It’s more common that you would think. You know you want to move away, you think ‘this place is holding me back or keeping me down, or there's nothing here’. And then you go out and you live a bit and you go, ‘it's actually kind of cool here, things are all right’.”
It is the second single from their forthcoming album, which Cochrane says is more personal than those which came before.
“I mean, I probably started writing and making demos as soon as we finished the last record, to be honest with you. But yeah, we've just been taking our time with it, trying to enjoy the process of making a record.”
He reflects that the pace of the music industry today means that many musicians feel as though they always need to be chasing the next thing.
Artists under real pressure to be pump out music
“I think maybe historically, artists were maybe granted a bit more time, and there was a bit more patience inside the industry for making a record, touring it, taking a break, living a little, starting again,” he says.
“I think in recent times, artists feel under a huge amount of pressure to be constantly active. I think artists feel like their music is way more disposable and more quickly consumed than maybe previously it has been. I think we've been trying to kind of fight that consciously as ourselves, and be in control of that process and just enjoy it and try and make something that we feel is really authentic and important for us as a band and just as people.”
The Snuts aren’t shy about letting their opinions be known, with their second album Burn the Empire particularly politically charged. Cochrane shares his belief that creating art which reflects personal values is key to a long and successful career – an ethos which he hopes is carried over to their own label, Happy Artist Records.
“I think for artists right now, it's a kind of crazy time to be trying to be yourself, when there's so much pressure for you to be something that's way more, I don't know what the word would be. Maybe like front camera facing? Acceptable? I think inside the label as well, hopefully we can take what we've been doing and the lessons we've learned over the kind of choppy waters of the music industry over the last eight years or so, and try and offer support and guidance and work out what it is with different artists, what they actually need to be themselves.
“I think that's the thing that always cuts through, and it's something I'm passionate about, is just authenticity in music. I think the more that you be yourself, the more chance of longevity in your career and a bit of fulfilment as well. I think we sometimes forget that, as artists now.”
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Snuts frontman promises fans ‘lots of new music’
For the first time in The Snuts’ career, the band has a body of work ready and waiting to be put out to the public, but fans still have some time to wait as “the record will come out when it comes out”.
But Cochrane does promise there are some big shows due to be announced for the second half of the year, likely following their upcoming set at TRNSMT Festival this summer.
“I think the first time we played TRNSMT was like a real, proper milestone for us as a band,” Cochrane says. “It didn't feel like we were just playing it, it felt like us and like all our friends and all our family and stuff; like that we're all playing it.”
While he says their first time at the Glasgow festival was a “magical, sunny experience”, he also acknowledges the fear that comes along with it.
“I was always terrified playing TRNSMT. We've played it a few times, and I've only ever not been terrified the last time.
“But yeah, this time, I think I'm more looking forward to it than I ever had before. I feel really happy where we are as a band. I think we know our audience really well, as well, which I think is something that just takes time as well. And I think you've got to allow yourself to work that one out. It always does feel like a big homecoming, TRNSMT.”
He continues: “We grew up going to all the festivals in Scotland, and there's just not many of them left. But I do think TRNSMT has managed to kind of still capture the culture inside what a Scottish festival is, and there's kind of a lawlessness to it, which I think we crave as a Scottish audience.
“So yeah, really, really looking forward to that one.”
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