As a freelance writer specialising in music, I’m all too aware of what a big news story X Factor is when it comes on our screens each autumn. But while some of the articles, particularly those focussing on the back stories of successful contestants have some semblance of truth, other pieces when laid bare are little more than fabrication and misinformation, commonly ‘sold’ to the press by those cashing in on links to contestants, that can at best be described as tenuous.
Such is the situation surrounding X Factor favourite Matt Cardle, and the band he fronted prior to X Factor, Seven Summers. While the romantic links, inflated headlines, and the unearthing of a ‘bad boy past’ might be typical X Factor fodder, the recent articles surrounding Matt and Seven Summers are not quite as easy to dismiss as ‘yesterday’s news’.
Newspaper reports that have appeared since Matt’s first audition was shown on ITV 1 have suggested everything from Matt dumping his band mates, or abandoning a sinking ship, to more recently, a supposed rift between Matt and Neil, Alex, and Jon who complete the Seven Summers line-up. If rumours were to be believed, then Seven Summers are also cashing in on Matts X Factor appearance, by arranging for HMV to stock their debut album, and pocketing the most amount of royalties amounting from it.
While the Essex based band have kept a dignified silence, refusing to be quoted in the press, as the one writer with an inside track on the band, I feel that they would support a piece about the truth, in the hope that it will quash some of the rumours that have been circulating.
To understand why none of these rumours are true, it’s important to first understand how the band works. Seven Summers began in early 2009, forming of the back of existing friendships, previous playing experience in bands, and in Matt’s case a request from Neil to ‘do a song together’. Quickly forming an all important connection as a unit, they penned material for their debut album throughout 2009, and road tested this at numerous gigs and festivals in the Essex area. The response was immense, and up until July this year the band was still packing out venues such as Barhouse in Chelmsford, and getting the crowds dancing at festivals such as the Fling (also in Chelmsford).
Their debut album eventually made it out of the studio in January 2010, which they launched to a small scale fanfare via a launch gig, and two video’s for their songs ‘Way To Be’ and ‘Youngblood’. I say small scale, because the release received very little promotion at that point, one of the reasons why many people have never heard of the band before, and why they assume, however wrongly that the band never got anywhere. It also gives rise to the question, why release an album and video’s if you’re not going to promote them.
The answer to this lies in the fact that, although the band have had creative control over everything they do, and enjoy the fact that they can go out and experience things like making video’s if they want too, they are also serious musicians who put a lot of hard work into the music they record. They felt that their debut release served as a launch for the band, and gave them material to develop as a live act, but that launching was entirely different to promoting to the wider public and the music industry at large.
So Seven Summers were a band with a plan, a plan that saw two thirds of a new release being written prior to Matt entering X Factor, material that was ready for studio treatment. Not quite the failed band recent reports would have us to believe then, more a band who believes that they are capable of bigger and better things. As to the additional reports that Matt dumped the band, or there is a rift existing between them, again untrue and unfounded. Matt entered the X Factor on his own terms as a solo artist, and the band have never stood in the way of their friend.
As I write this the X Factor final is but two weeks away, so it won’t be too much longer before we know which path Matt’s future music career will take. But while the X Factor results are uncertain, one thing is for sure, if Matt does at any point in the future return to Seven Summers, they will continue as the tight unit they have always been, and rise above all the speculation to show the world, that with them, it is purely and simply all about the music.
