Lopez Blogs

~ You have spent most of the past five years travelling round the world in the company of four other guys, which probably sounds like heaven to our readers... did you get up to any hi-jinx along the way to liven up the journey??

We were pretty tame actually, normally we would just play music or sleep on the way to the next destination and just get some energy back. Of course we had practical jokes here and there, but nothing too elaborate or cruel...

(did anyone have bad hygiene, morning breath, etc?)

(Laughs) I think we were all probably the same as each other –and when you are sharing space with people every day for that long, you either become immune to it or everyone just has good habits. That was a really diplomatic answer wasn’t it?

(You played big crowds before – actually I saw you at V Festival a couple of years back and you looked exhausted!!) *asked after question on live shows!

(laughs) Ha, I remember that show, that was a great venue to play and the crowd were really receptive. But, yeah, after 3 ½ years straight performing the same songs over and over again, you get so depleted and start to lose energy. There are things that you want to do, creatively back in the studio and even sleeping in the same bed each night. I do realise, however, that there are worse things than being tired and I feel incredibly lucky to be doing what I do. Actually we are unofficially on tour from now doing some club shows, but our official tour will start in September. I am very excited to get out there and open up people’s perceptions of what we are about. I think folks will be surprised.

~ The album seems to have a great number of eclectic influences and styles running through it and is a little darker in it's tone - particularly Wake Up Call which addresses cheating and murder and the lovely ballad Better We Break. Was it hard to chose songs for the final tracklisting - are there any that didn't make it that you are sad to see the back of?

It was a very long process and it took a while to digest what was working and what wasn’t, but I am very happy with all the songs on there. We definitely went with the strength of the songs and we wanted to have songs on there that were well constructed. Some that didn’t make it had a beat that was too similar or didn’t quite work, and I do believe it’s about strong lyrics and melodies.

(Do you have a favourite? And you can’t say all of them!)

If I had to pick just one, I would go for Better We Break. I think it’s a really really strong song.

(Do you think it will be a single?)

I don’t know about that. I don’t choose the singles, the powers that be decide that for us. As a singer and writer, it is my job to do my best and leave it up to the record company to decide. You just have to ensure that all songs are strong enough to be singles so that you will be happy with any choice.

(That’s interesting, because I was sad that The Sweetest Goodbye wasn’t a single from the first album)

Yeah, that was in Love, Actually and that’s a favourite of mine too.

Any chance of you dumping your supermodel girlfriend and flying over to England to talk fashion??) *asked after talking fashion and flirting!!

(laughs quite a lot)

Obviously, it's a little disjointed when taken out of context from the entire interview, so go buy the magazine and check out instinct's website for the full glorious experience :P Thanks to the Instinct dude for making it happen - it was a very thrilling 42 minutes :)