About

With Noisettes, it’s always best to expect the unexpected. Two years on from a second album Wild Young Hearts, awash with stomping electro-rock and galloping funk grooves, the London duo are set to return with their third album, a set of sleek pop songs steeped in soul, dizzy on disco and harking back to the days of blues and jazz greats.

Never fond of a formula, the duo always intended on a radical musical detour from both Wild Young Hearts, and their acclaimed debut, What’s The Time Mr Wolf?, an album that spawned five singles and took them on tour for over a year, sharing arena stages with Muse and criss-crossing the States with TV On The Radio and Bloc Party.

“Some bands stick with the same style forever,” says singer Shingai Shoniwa, whose versatile vocals have seen her compared to everyone from Deborah Harry and Kate Bush to Billie Holiday and Diana Ross. “They get together because they share identical musical tastes, then never do anything different. We’re a gang, but we’re also two divas with different record collections who constantly introduce each other to new sounds, whether it’s African music, jazz, Van Morrison or Black Sabbath. For us, making music means keeping our ears open.”

“I grew up with traditional music from Zimbabwe – Afrobeat mixed with reggae and funk, which my uncles played,” says Shoniwa. “Then I studied musical theatre, sang in choirs and jazz bands. Dan even got me a job singing vocals in a Diana Ross covers band. Because of that background, I can wrap myself around anything from a sweet soul ballad to a jazz song to noisy rock’n’roll.”

“We all felt Shingai’s voice was sitting idle a bit on the previous albums,” adds Smith. “Because most of the songs were guitar based, she had much less to play with. Shingai has an amazing jazz voice, but that didn’t come through before. Soon, you will be able to hear all her different moods.”

What hasn’t changed with Noisettes is the energy they put in to performing. Described as ‘the best live band in Britain’ by The Guardian, a recent London show saw Shoniwa charge in to the audience playing guitar and sing clinging to a ladder suspended from the ceiling, a nod to the circus skills she learnt in her teens.

“The idea of putting on a proper show seems to be missing from a lot of young bands at the moment,” says Shoniwa. “We always go that extra mile to give the crowd a night they’ll never forget. I love artists like Hendrix and Bowie who fussed over their hair and took time choosing an outfit.