3 April 2015 East Kilbride Post
ARTS Kudos To The Band
Despite working in a nightclub and gig venue in a former life, I always feel somewhat out of place when walking through club venues during the day.
Sean Geddes
editorial@eastkilbridepost.co.uk
ll One person who doesn’t look out of place is Josh La- dds, front man for East Kilbride’s Kudos. As he took me through the empty cor-
ridors he chatted easily and after introducing me to the rest of the band we sat to talk about their band, whe- re they've come from, whe- re they're going and about the music scene in East Kilbride. Having gone through a number of changes throu- ghout the years Kudos’ li- ne-up includes Josh (vo- cals), Stuart Polland (Gui- tar/Vocals), Gavin Kennedy (Bass/Backing Vocals) and Ross McEwan (Drums)- all from East Kilbride. The fo- ur are now gigging again af- ter releasing their first album Fadeaway Faraway last year. As the band continued their sound-check Josh explained how the album came to be. In 2013 Kudos entered a battle of the bands competition, the prize was the recording of a ten track studio album. After beating between 50 and 60 other bands they were able
to create Fadeaway Faraway. “We had two months to sit down and write the songs.” Josh remembered, “We we- re really impressed by how it turned out.”
And so am I, Fadeaway Fa- raway is very good. A rock al- bum with plenty to keep peo- ple interested. Two tracks in particular stand out; Dream a Little, which wanders into the metal genre, and Take Me Ho- me, which is a much more me- lodic and thoughtful song, des- pite starting its life, according to the band’s Facebook page, as a “fully upbeat rock song.” 21-year-old Josh ex- plained where the ideas for songs came from, especially for songs like Take Me Ho- me, which discuss alcoho- lic fathers and having nothing to show for life. He said: “It's not from my own experience, I take inspiration from people around me. I know a lot of pe-
ople that are in those positi- ons, that's where I get my in- spiration from.”
East Kilbride isn't generally considered a font of commer- cial musical success, with its biggest export being The Je- sus and Mary Chain, but Jo- sh believes there are a num- ber of good bands coming out of the town. “The Northern are a band you should listen to, there is also a band called The Lapelles, they're a brilliant rock band... They're all East Kilbride based.”
Despite the East Kilbride music scene being subsumed by Glasgow's, Kudos are ma- naging to carve out for them- selves a significant fan pre- sence, this is something the band has worked hard on. Over the past two years they
have worked on their social media presence to the point that they have 165,000 twitter followers, 4500 likes on their Facebook page and almost 4000 subscribers to their Yo- uTube channel. Josh spoke with a smile on his face as we discussed how important fans are to them: “I don't believe in doing the music and then just leaving. I do keep in touch with every single one of them, or at least try to,” he laughed.
Josh grew up on the Ca- lifornian punk rock of the late 90s and early 2000s, bands such as Blink 182, +44, and Simple Plan to name a few, and you can hear those influ- ences in Kudos’ music. How- ever, there are also harder elements in their playing from such bands as Funeral for a
Friend, You Me at Six and Bring Me the Horizon (which the band covers in an excel- lent rendition of Drive on their YouTube channel).
As I left Kudos to get re- ady for their night and wan- dered out through the empty corridors and staircases of the ABC, I knew that I’d just talked to a band that I will be hearing a lot more from in future. You can follow Kudos
on Twitter (@KudosThe- Band), check out their masses of covers and vi- deos on YouTube by sear- ching for KudosTheBand or listening to their album on SoundCloud (www.
soundcloud.com/ku- dostheband). The album is also available for purc- hase on itunes.
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