Indie-rockers Grapefruit's tales of sweet success

With indie bands emerging left, right and centre; one Wigan band is surging onto the scene with a sound 'like no other'.
GrapefruitGrapefruit
Grapefruit

Grapefruit, comprising John Collier, Lee Davies, Damian Pemberton and Ryan Moss, is taking Wigan by storm one venue at a time.

The band, which formed in October 2015, has secured live gigs at The Boulevard, Rok Box and Indiependence, as well as Crewe’s iconic “The Box” alongside tribute band Black Zeppelin.

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Ahead of the April release of their debut album, which has not yet been named, Grapefruit talk about what makes them unique to the Wigan scene.

John, a 32-year-old father-of-two and lead guitarist of the band, spends seven days a week working as a boxing coach at Majestic Gym.

“I decided to start the band after seeing Noel Gallagher live in March 2015,” he said.

“I used to be in bands for years prior to this and I wanted to do that again.”

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John called upon old school friend Lee to lend his vocal expertise, which have been described to similar as those of Eddie Vedder, Pearl Jam’s smouldering front man

Lee, 33 also a father-of-two, works as a senior test engineer when he is not heading up Grapefruit.

“Our tastes are quite eclectic,” he said. “We are influenced by all sorts of music. I particularly like classic rock like Thin Lizzy and Led Zeppelin.”

John enjoys writing the songs, taking input from the rest of the band. At first they found their cohesion doing covers, but have since moved away from this with a focus on original material.

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Their first EP Tales in the Middle of Nowhere” caused a stir on the scene.

“We have been received really well,” he said. “We decided we don’t want to be a tribute band. Loads of people have said that some of our originals, like Getaway are better than the covers.”

Bassist Damian, a 25-year-old father-of-two and mental health nurse, said: “Everyone has done, in bits, what we are doing, but nobody has ever put it together like we do before.”

Grapefruit will next grace the stage on Friday, March 18 at Rok Box from 10pm.

Find the band at facebook.com/grapefruituk1 or on Twitter via @grapefruituk1

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