INTERVIEW: By Hilary Porter

NEW Forest Indie band The Magic Gang are celebrating after signing a record deal with Warner Brothers Music.

The news follows an exciting few months during which they played the main stage at Southampton's Common People Festival followed by other acclaimed festival performances including Reading and Leeds.

The future certainly looks bright for the talented foursome - Jack Kaye, 23, (vocals, guitar), Kristian Smith, 24, (vocals, guitar), Angus Taylor, 22, (bass), and Paeris Giles, 22, (drums), who grew up in Hampshire but are now based in Brighton.

In deed, you’d be hard pushed to find a 2016 ‘Ones To Watch’ list that didn’t include The Magic Gang.

The boys' signing sees them sharing the same label as the likes of Duran Duran, Green Day, Michael Buble, Muse and The Red Hot Chili Peppers - to name but a few!

The Magic Gang only released one single in 2015 – ‘No Fun’ with its flipside ‘Alright’ – but support tours with Wolf Alice and Swim Deep secured their reputation as one of the country’s most enjoyable up and coming live bands.

Contrary to the song title, their well-crafted pop songs have a feel-good vibe which is only enhanced by how much fun the band obviously have on stage.

They ended last year on a high with their own headline tour and continued that momentum into 2016, releasing their debut EP in January and announcing a London gig as part of NME’s awards shows.

Talking to The Daily Echo about the record label signing, lead singer Jack said: "We've been going for three years now and there's been a bit of a buzz around it for a while . There has been other interest and meetings but Warner was quite quick and painless and they suited us. Obviously Warner are one of the massive ones but what's important is not going with the biggest label but the one that's the most enthusiastic and suits us best and they made their objectives clear.

"In a way it was a weird couple of years to start out because we weren't signed straight away but those formative years were a bit of a god send to get on our feet . Now we feel established and have a fan base this is the perfect time for them to step in."

"We got experience under our belt this year with some major festivals. Reading and Leeds was pretty amazing. We didn't play it last year and I feel good for it as by the time we did it we had a huge crowd. A lot of people are thrown into major festivals at an early stage when no one is there for them."

Magic Gang has established a strong following of fans who you will find singing along at the front of all their gigs.

Jack added: "It's weird a lot are from the north, particularly Birmingham and Newcastle and some in London which is probably due to us touring with Wolf Alice and Swing Deep. "

The signing will see them release another EP in the coming months and then an album in a year or two.

In the mean time they will release their self-produced 'The Second EP from the Magic Gang' on September 23 - the last thing they will do before they release on Warner.

As for whether the signing will influence their musical style Jack feels it is in a state of flux anyway:"Because of the nature of what we are doing it will change no matter what, quite naturally because it is so early on. When you do an album it does change. We've been working with different producers so we haven't stuck to a production sound."

As for their musical influences he says:"It is rooted in traditional song writing from the 50's and 60's. The Beatles and early Beach Boys inspired us but because of our environment and age and what we listen to and peers it sounds a bit more alt-rock and 90's sounding, like Pavement and Weaver."

They celebrated the record signing by going down the pub but says Jack: " It can seem like a big break-through from the outside but in reality all we are thinking about is what we are writing next: it's not like we have been fired up in a rocket.

"Now we have just got to keep writing. We live in a house together an are constantly writing. We can write ten songs and only one could be used for a single. Now we are not just writing for fun because we have a brief it give us more reason to just keep doing it."