Highland band explodes back to life with live debut on Black Isle and new single
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It has been a big week for Highland band Bad Actress with a new single to launch and a new singer to unveil.
Last Saturday, the band got their chance to make an official live debut at the Woodzstock festival.
And maybe taking their cue from the title of their new single out on Friday – Dynamite Lover – they made an explosive entrance for their afternoon set, new singer Toby Michaels appearing to gel seamlessly with the originals.
Speaking at the start of this week, singer Toby – formerly of The Broken Ravens and The Rolling Damned – said: “It was amazing! The set was tight, the single went down well and the crowd were awesome. We couldn’t have had a better gig for feeling at home. It was a lovely day and a great location!”
Toby and Chick might have had an excuse for feeling a little tense about the test of revealing the new line-up when we met a couple of weeks before, though neither showed any signs of it, quite chilled with the prospect of moving forward with the next phase of Bad Actress’s life.
Toby had been one of the contenders the band had chosen to audition.
But his call to arms came sooner than either side expected, when the temporary singer the band had called in to cover some pre-booked dates, was forced to pull out – and Toby stepped in at short notice to perform the songs.
Chick explained: “Toby had his audition the day before he started practising with us for that!
“We did do a couple more auditions with other people, but Toby was definitely miles ahead.”
So what does a Bad Actress audition look like?
Toby laughed: “It’s full X Factor, Chick was full-on Simon Cowell with the higher waistline.
“No, it was a pretty chilled situation, honestly. It was set up like a jam – and performing at a show, just to see how I vibed with them, sort of thing. Then there was the actual vocal side of things as well.”
Chick said: “We gave the same three songs to everyone. We picked three songs with variety.”
Toby said: “The thing I noticed with the three songs early on is they were very clearly three separate range areas, testing the full scope of the playlist. It was things I have had experience of from very early on. And theirs is an area of music I’m quite passionate about as well.”
He said: “I think it’s rock with an element of hard rock and I think if you were to pigeonhole it, it maybe goes towards glam rock as well. There is a sort of party energy to the music, I think. You’d call it party rock.”
Chick is agreeing enthusiastically.
“At the same time, it’s a feelgood vibe,” Toby added. “You could argue it’s a little tongue in cheek.”
Chick said: “We don’t really box it in. I think when you’ve got more or less the same members in the band, it’s going to sound like that band – we’re probably definitely not a reggae band, though.”
“Give it time,” Toby jokes.
After the band announced last year that the charismatic singer Vinnie had decided to leave, they had to wait to find someone new.
But there was no need to lose momentum.
Chick said: “I think we used the time quite well to do some recording and some writing and preparing for this next couple of days, announcing things and putting up shows. But we are going at a quicker pace now. Quite often I write melodies that end up going too much with the guitar, so it was cool to have a singer come in with an outside perspective.”
As the different pieces of Bad Actress come together and meld, are these two conscious it’s a case of softly, softly?
Toby said quickly: “I don’t think it’s very different to any band set up I’ve been in or the guys have been in.
“A new song is a new song. I’m bringing my own vibe to it and my own is going to be slightly different.”
But as Chick points out, when he came to talk about Vinnie leaving last year, he said right from the start that they wanted any new singer to bring themselves to Bad Actress.
“We did a song we recorded last September when Toby was filling in with us, that we had done with Vinnie. The two were very different and it is a very different song – and that is cool to see.”
Anyone at last Saturday’s Woodzstock debut would testify to it.
