• Home
• News
• Features
• Reviews
• TV
• Photos
• Win
• Blog
• Magazine
• Merch
• Festivals

Band of the Week: The Subways

Billy Lunn gives Rock Sound a track by track guide to new album 'Money & Celebrity'.

The Subways released their third album 'Money & Celebrity' last week and went straight out on tour to play it live. You can still catch the band at any of the following shows:

SEPTEMBER
27 - MANCHESTER Academy 3
28 - SHEFFIELD Foundry
30 - SWANSEA Sin City
OCTOBER
01 - BRISTOL Thekla
03 - SOUTHAMPTON University
04 - LONDON Koko

Get tickets by clicking here and keep reading as frontman Billy Lunn talks us through the new record track by track.


01. It's A Party
"This song was written halfway through the writing sessions. All we wanted was be out on tour and onstage, having a massive party with our fans, playing our music and going crazy. That's probably why this song is the perfect opener for the album."

02. We Don't Need Money To Have A Good Time
"This was the first song I wrote for the album. I was out with a group of friends, some of whom had just lost their jobs due to the government's austerity cuts to the public sector, when we realised we'd all run out of cash and that our night had to end early. My best friend, who'd just lost his job, turned to me and said 'ah, don't worry Billy, we don't need money to have a good time, do we!' I ran out of the club and ran back to my flat and wrote the lyrics down."

03. Celebrity
"I wrote this song after my wife and I went to a supermarket to pick up some little bits and I saw a lady's face on the front page of every glossy magazine on the stalls. I asked my wife who she was and she said 'some famous girl'. I asked why she was famous and my wife said, 'I don't know'. I found that very strange, the fact that someone was famous even though it wasn't for doing anything contributory or important, just because she was, well, famous! After we got home I wrote a fictional story about a local girl who just wants to be rich and famous, and that became this song."

04. I Wanna Dance With You
"This song was basically the result of so many years of being rejected on the dancefloor. You see a girl and all you want to do is dance with her, make her yours and make her want you, and as soon as you try you are rejected. It's a very familiar and regular experience for me, and the last time it happened I decided I'd had enough and I needed to write a song about it!"

05. Popdeath
"After seeing Pete Doherty, Britney Spears, Amy Winehouse, et al on the news, I felt like I just wanted to write a song about the public and the media's obsession with watching a popstar's life fall apart. And begged the question, 'what if it gets to the point when they actually die?', which was, sadly, what actually happened shortly after we finished the album with Amy Winehouse's death. It was morbidly prophetic."

06. Like I Love You
"We all get into arguments with the ones we love. This song is the result of an argument I had with my wife, and me finally realising how verbally violent I can be - so I tried to write a song from the other side. I can be a horrible person to be around sometimes, and this song is me telling a loved one that I know just how awful I've been. I put myself in her shoes for this song."

07. Money
"During the writing process I was sometimes finding it difficult to be creative, so now and then my mum would text me words or phrases to inspire me. Usually the ideas were terrible, but one day she texted me 'you've gotta play it harder, charm the charmer', and it really reminded me of Oliver Stone's movie Wall Street, for some reason. I ended up writing about the greed of the capitalist system, whose one concern is making money - nothing more. It represented the financial ilk we were dealing with during the crisis. Thanks, mum!"

08. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang
"This song is basically about how crazy my wife drives me, even though I simply can't stand being away from her. That devilish lady, pushing you deeper and deeper into insanity, but it makes you love her more and more."

09. Down Our Street
"This song came about after I moved into my flat last year and met my neighbours, and realised just how crazy they were. I was walking down the street one day, and just starting singing the lyrics to this song about all my neighbours. Simple."

10. Rumour
"We all know what it's like to have an untrue piece of information circulate around your social circle, especially when you're in a rock band. This song was a reaction to a lot of the bullshit I was having to hear about myself in my local town."

11. Friday
"My sister came into the local Welwyn pub one friday after finishing a shift at her work, I was sat at the bar, and I saw her greet a group of friends further down the bar from me, and all I could her them all say was 'yes! It's Friday! This is our day!'. I knew then that I had to write a song about that little moment. There were tons of people in the pub that night who constantly reiterated that sentiment. I was wholeheartedly with them!"

12. Leave My Side
"I wrote this song after realising that being alone is the worst feeling in the world, especially when the threat of the one you love not being there is so apparent. It felt like the perfect song to end the album on. Bittersweet melodies!"


For more head to thesubways.net, the band's new album 'Money & Celebrity' is out now.