U.S. TV DARLINGS ARE REIMAGINED
THEY had become the unlikely darlings of latenight American television, but four years ago East Kilbride band the Imagineers broke up.
Now frontman Stevie Young has brought the group back to life, with a new line-up, a new sound and a new album.
The outfit earned attention in 2012 when comedian Craig Ferguson, a man no stranger to Scottish music, picked them to play on his late-night chat show.
Yet the foursome soon went their separate ways, only for Stevie to team up with producer Tommy Philips to work on an acoustic EP – a release that, various twists and turns later, sees the Imagineers back and ready to play at the Old Hairdressers in Glasgow this Sunday.
“Stevie was busking in the likes of Madrid, meeting local musicians,” says Tommy, who also plays keyboards in the band.
“He wrote a whole catalogue of tunes and in May 2015 got in touch with me about doing an acoustic EP. He wanted to put the songs down but there wasn’t any talk about even releasing them at first. But then we started talking about getting some drums here, or some strings there, and along the way it became more and more of a production, and the sound was becoming more cinematic.
“At some point we said ‘we need a band’ and over the course of about a year, we grew to a full five-piece band. We had various session musicians, some strings and some brass, on the album too, so it has really evolved from an acoustic thing to a massive production, which is quite funny.”
The finished product, Utopian Dreams, is a record as influenced by the Western themes of Ennio Morricone as it is the classic guitar pop that sparked the band’s earlier work, with new single If I See You Again offering a flavour of what is to come later this year when the full album will be released.
Stevie is the only original Imagineer still there, but Tommy feels it was a natural fit to return to the group name rather than take a fresh identity, while old favourites such as Spanish Sands are likely to be in the group’s sets.
“Most of the songs have that classic twang in them, like the old tunes did,” he says.
“The Imagineers had been born out of Stevie’s songwriting, so the whole thing just morphed into an Imagineers project as we went along. There’s definitely something for everybody on the album, because there’s a mix of Imagineers styles old and new.
“People might be like ‘Stevie packed that in a couple of years ago, is he trying to relive old glories?’ but what he’s doing now is writing something that’s more mature, but still with a healthy dose of pop. It’s a great balance.”
The keyboardist mentions that the band’s former members were asked if they’d be interested in returning, but they “politely declined”. Instead the group signed up Scott Forsyth on drums, Lee Ballard on guitar and Marc McCallum on bass to complete the line-up.
However Tommy, who stays in Clarkston, wasn’t expecting to be asked to join the band himself, as opposed to just being a producer.
“It was never something that had crossed my head,” he admits.
“It’s quite common for me, as a producer, to play on other people’s recordings, but it’s not every day you get asked to join the live set-up. It wasn’t something I had to think too hard about.
“Stevie didn’t want to lose any of the production elements in a live setting, or for this to be stripped back much. He wants to stay true to the record and there’s a lot of layers that would be hard to do as just a four-piece.”
Of course the last time the Imagineers were around they found themselves appearing on late-night American television. Although Craig Ferguson has moved on to pastures new, the band wouldn’t say no if James Corden came calling.
“Stevie did send a copy to one of the producers of the Late, Late Show,” laughs Tommy.
“I don’t know if it’s very likely that we’ll be appearing in the carpool karaoke anytime soon but if anything came up we would jump at it!” The Imagineers, Old Hairdressers, Sunday, £6, 8pm