Little Boots

It’s a treacherous path that a pop star must walk. Dodging press, critics and the trappings of success, it’s a journey that not many complete scar-free. But when you’re treading the pavements in some Little Boots grounded by technical prowess and a treat of charm, it’s one you can take confidently and in your stride. Being very busy as one of this year’s most hyped artists, we were very lucky to catch up with Little Boots, aka Victoria Hesketh, ahead of her Latitude date.

So where are you at the moment Victoria?I’m on the tour bus in Newcastle.

Have you got a few dates coming up?We’ve got an in-store today and a small festival later called Evolution.

And you’ve just come back from America haven’t you?Erm… yes! Yeah, we were in New York last week – it was good, really great.

How’s the reaction in the good ol’ U S of A?Erm, really great actually, I mean, I’m going out there at least once a month – we don’t always do shows, but they’re definitely getting used to us over there.

You hit nearly every ‘Act to Watch Out For in 2009’ list when they came out at the beginning of this year – does this kind of hype excite you or do you feel pressure to live up to it? I think I didn’t really realise the implication of them when they first came out – I didn’t really get it, but then you realise the impact of them, so it’s obviously a great thing, but it puts a lot of expectation on the album, especially with the critics, because the lists judged everything only after a couple of songs. Then you’ve got to live up to that, so it’s kinda good and bad I guess.

You’re quite a heavily blogged-about artist, so do you think that without the internet, Little Boots, as you are now, would have made so much of an impact so quickly? Erm, I still think it would have done what it’s done, ‘cause I think I would have found different ways, but it’s just ‘cause this is the time we live that I’ve made use of all these tools available to us and taken advantage of different creative opportunities. If they didn’t exist I’m sure I would’ve just found something else, y’know.

I think acts with genuine talent have much more longevity as artists – as someone who’s played piano since they were 5, do you feel the same?I think for me, all the training really, really helped. I almost feel like I’m fluent in another language, so for song-writing that can be really useful. But you know, it’s not for everybody and there’s something that can be said for naivety and discovering things for yourself as well… but you can’t really break all the rules unless you know them all in the first place.

I noticed that you were born in 1984 – the same year as me – so I wondered what artists formed the tapestry of your childhood… for me, Michael Jackson, Yazz, Black Box and Fairground spring to mind!Erm, probably like the first people I remember listening to were Kylie Minogue and Take That, and then like, I’m from Blackpool so it was probably bad 90s dance music as a teenager. I was kind of into happy hardcore and shit like that. When I was an older teenager I started getting into a lot of older bands, like prog stuff like Yes and The Moody Blues and Pink Floyd and stuff like that. That then kind of led me on a discovery of a lot of electronic artists like The Human League and Bowie and I was also a fan of a lot of female singer/songwriters like Kate Bush, Joni Mitchell and Annie Lennox.

That was a rich tapestry then – and far more credible than my Yazz memories…!Well, I dunno man – happy hardcore’s nothing to be proud of.

Oh yeah, you did start with Kylie Minogue – did you have the tape with her in a massive hat with her hair cascading over the top of it?Yeah! That was the one!

You reached a level of success with your former band, Dead Disco, who I was a big fan of – I actually saw you come to the Queen Charlotte in Norwich – but before that, were you in any other bands?I was in loads of bands! Like, I was in tribute bands, wedding bands, like, I did a lot of jazz in hotels and stuff, bad girl bands, punk bands, prog bands, literally everything!

Any bad names?No, most of them were unnamed!

When you joined the girls in Dead Disco, did you think ‘this is it’, or were you aware early on that you had other directions that you wanted to explore?No, I was totally happy – I loved the band and I didn’t really think anything else – I just thought that was gonna be it. It’s just that over time, things didn’t quite work out which is kinda sad, but looking back, it was best to enable me to do what I’ve done now.

You were signed to 679 Records who have been quite an ill-fated record label – did their troubles lead to the demise of Dead Disco? No, I mean, I’m still signed to 679 now, but no, the label did have some involvement, which didn’t go down well, which made things difficult. But like, Nick, who owns the label and who’s my A&R guy, I have a brilliant relationship with and we get on really well and I’m really, really glad about. But label involvement in general is quite a difficult thing to get your head around.

Dead Disco were a bit of an art-punk band, but you could say Little Boots is more an injection of pop – is it strange to play to different audiences? Erm, they’re not different ‘cause it seems that it’s still the kinda indie crowd that I appeal to for some reason, but then we get a lot of older people and then some younger kids as well, and then we get a lot of gays as well, which is always nice. I guess it’s more varied now I say.

I was going to ask actually, I noticed that you have a few dates at gay venues coming up – do you think you’re becoming a gay icon? Erm, I don’t really think I’m a gay icon, but we definitely have quite a strong gay following and they’re always a really good crowd, so yeah, it’s cool.