Ahead of the release of Vega’s new album Grit Your Teeth in June, we chatted with lead vocalist Nick Workman on the heavier new sound, how family members are involved in the album process and rescheduled plans for the year due to lockdown.
Interview by Adrian Ball
RC: We love the new album Grit Your Teeth which is due for release in June. How do you and the band go about creating new material?
NW: People have asked with the album sounding different did we consciously change the style, but we don’t write a particular song, we just write songs. So how we sound now is an evolution from album number one to album number six. One of the guys would send me some music and then I would do a ‘Dr Frankenstien’ and change bits and pieces then the band would critique this. We move it backwards and forwards between us until we get to a point where we are happy.
RC: What’s the decision process on how you include all the new material onto an album?
NW: You just know. There's usually one or two songs jostling for position with others that didn't quite make the album. We get to having nine or ten, then its down to the decision for the last couple.
You get a big elation moment when you've completed a song that you think is a corker, but then you get nervous when others hear it for the first time! We play songs to our nearest and dearest and look at their feedback, but really we pick our favourite and best songs.
RC: You’ve obviously got a great formula and your music highlights your influences, so why the decision to make an album with a heavier edge this time?
NW: We’ve never considered ourselves AOR as views on this genre are different person to person. We consider ourselves a rock band and sometimes others tag you maybe because the first album was more keyboard driven for example. We did say though on this album we wanted the guitars to be ‘bigger’. The whole band are very much about the song and whatever works best for the song is going to win every time.
The Graves brothers came up with the first mix and we were very happy with it and then worked on tweaking the songs. The songs are the same from demo to album; it's the sound they managed to help us create around them. We thought it would be a great move to mix our style of rock with their production. Plus it's more aligned to our live sound.
RC: Are you looking forward to getting out on tour to promote the new album?
NW: Absolutely. The album was originally due for an earlier release and we were going on tour with Magnum, then some H.E.A.T dates and then some headline shows. So we’re changing things around and the H.E.A.T dates are now in October, Monsterfest at the end of the year then next year the Magnum dates have been rescheduled. We have some UK and other European dates just being finalised. Once it’s all sorted it's going to be a very busy start to 2021 and I hope that it will give the album a bit of a second wind. Plus it gives us the opportunity to have something positive after the lockdown situation.
RC: You've toured with many greats and have played at Download festival; are there any bands you’d like to get on stage with or dream venues?
NW: It's like having a bucket list - we love being in this band and that's why we do it. We’d love to get to a situation like Thunder has done on their tour with having a local upcoming band open the show, which is an awesome idea. I’d love to play one of the big venues where I've seen these big shows, like my first gig which was Def Leppard at the NEC. I’d play a show like that at any level of support, it would be great.
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