Interview: Same Difference

Same Difference are lovely. Ignore the ‘irritatingly sunny, borderline-incestuous, X Factor flop’  tag chasing them around, which they deflect with a deadly combination of cheer and determination. Despite initially resembling your pair of average Sunday school teachers, Sean and Sarah Smith are tough. Having cheered up one half of the nation while inflicting cringes from the other with their irreppressible urge to sing and dance on X Factor, it all seemed  all over after they were dropped by Simon Cowell having sold nearly 200,000 copies of their brilliant PWL-inspired debut, Pop. But it seems you can’t put a stop to those who literally eat, sleep and breathe a simple desire to entertain. Now they’re back, with a slightly more grown-up image than the asexual CBBC presenter look they were forced into before, and backed by a high-powered team of producers. Their second album, The Rest is History, promises to be nothing less than a dance-pop gem.  It’s time to put some preconceptions to rest and realise that Same Difference are two siblings whose only mutual passion is one about pop – and it’s a passion they’re rather bloody good at.

SSG: You sold a hell of a lot of records with your brilliant first album, Pop (Nearly 200,000 copies), considering how little you were promoted by Syco. Were you surprised to be dropped, or was it a relief?

Sarah: To be honest we were expecting a second single. We were told that they were going to give us one in January or February, so when we were dropped it was a bit of a shock as we were still in discussion over what the second single was going to be. Having said that, although there was initial sadness we soon realised that it could be a really good thing for us because we weren’t the highest of Syco’s priorities. We were then free to do what we wanted to do. If we’d been their main priority then we’d have been gutted.

Do you ever wonder that you might’ve been more successful if you weren’t a brother and sister duo? Some people just have never ‘got’ you and still think you’re weird.

Sarah: It’s difficult for us being brother and sister, because people have constantly got this whole ‘oh, they’re singing love songs’ confusion, and things like that. But if you look at many so good pop songs they are love songs, so we’re not going to write those off. It’s not like we’re ever singing them to one another. That’s one of the things that are really annoying. It’s not like we’re standing there belting them out to each other – our voices just work really well together. I think people would ‘get it’ a lot more if we were just two random people off the street, but because we’re siblings they look far more into it than what it is. It’s silly. Having said that I think it also makes it easier being brother and sister – the stresses of being in a band are ridiculous. If we’d been just some mates we probably would have broken up through the pressure of being dropped, but instead we’ve just carried on.

Were you both really banned by Simon to date, let along shag anyone while you were with Syco as not to ruin your ‘family friendly’ image?

Sarah: Pretty much. We were told that it wasn’t good for our image the whole way through. I mean, I had a boyfriend throughout but I had to keep very vague about it because obviously they didn’t want sex stories and things like that being dug up. It was more so with Sean than me, because coming out of X Factor he had a lot of female attention so they did try and put a stop to it!

How did you get involved with PopLife? The guy who runs it seems like a really enthusiastic champion of pop music.

Sarah: Once we left Syco we got a new manager with whom we recorded one song, ‘Souled Out’. He took it to PopLife who then agreed that the whole project could really work. And the rest is history … like our new album title!

The video for ‘Shine On Forever’ was a bit more ‘grown up’ than anything you’d done before, including some canoodling! Was that something you deliberately chose to do?

Sarah: I think so. We needed a bit of an image change. We’d been jumping around like kids for three years and it felt like we’d grown up a lot as people, but our image hadn’t grown with us. We just wanted to be more ourselves, so the video was just showing the mature side of Same Difference, having it filmed it in a club and us each having love interests. It was fun! It sounds silly but I’d felt like a child because of the way that things have been perceived. It finally felt like me.

You’ve got such an amazing mixture of amazing pop producers such as Topham and Twigg (Steps) and Tony Nilsson (Alcazar and Darin) – how did you manage to nab them?

Sarah: We’d worked with Topham and Twigg on the first album and we’d written a few songs with them but they didn’t make the final cut. They didn’t get through to Simon’s level. But when we got the new manager he knew Topham and Twigg. And because they’d given us ‘Souled Out’ which is arguably one of the best songs on the album we were able to take that to other people. And when they heard that they were able to go  ‘Same Difference have grown up, I’ll work with them now’. We definitely owe it all to Topham and Twigg because they worked with us in the first place.

Was it nice having more artistic freedom, co-writing on ‘Heartbeat’? Did you co-write any other tracks?

Sarah: It was really nice. With Syco we’d done a bit of songwriting but we knew it wouldn’t be taken seriously because Simon’s got the same team of songwriters he always uses. When we started the second album the first thing we asked when we signed with PopLife was if we could write songs. Automatically they were like, ‘my god, what a nightmare! We thought we’d just signed two artists who’d do our kind of music and now they want to songwrite!’ So they rather reluctantly agreed to put us in the studio for a couple of days just to humour us but when the songs started coming back they were like ‘you’re rather good, we’ll put you in for some more sessions!’ We proved them wrong just a little bit and got our own way! We also co-wrote ‘Broken Memories’, ‘Shine on Forever (Photo Frame)’, ‘This Is Me’ and ‘Superstar’.

Which are your own favourite songs on the album?

Sarah: ‘Souled Out’ as it got the ball rolling.

Sean: Probably ‘Broken Memories’.

How did you go about working with Alcazar on the track ‘Karma Karma’? Did you meet them in person?

Sarah: Unfortunately no! I was gutted over that. We were supposed to be flying to Sweden but because last summer we were on a sixty six date tour we didn’t have time. Ultimately we recorded our vocals here and they recorded theirs over there and the Swedish producers put them together. I’d still love to meet them, perhaps over a drink to catch up on pop experiences!

As a male and female dance-pop duo are you fans of the former Steps duo H & Claire’s rather underrated album?

Sarah: I absolutely adored Steps but I didn’t really listen to the H &  Claire album back then as by the time it came out I’d sort of moved on. But I was completely crazy about Steps back in the day; the best thing about them was when they released their singles they also released the backing tracks which for a budding singer was fantastic. I learnt all the choreography as well. When we got to the X Factor final I really hoped they could reunite and perform with us for one last time. We ended up with Jason Donovan which was nice but it would’ve been amazing if we’d had Steps!

What are your thoughts on Blue representing us for Eurovision this year?

Sarah: I’m really excited about it as I really loved Blue. They were great as a boyband so it’ll be interesting to see what they come up with as a man-band. We went to see them live last year when they supported the Pussycat Dolls for a Formula 1 gig – they were brilliant. It seemed to me like the crowd were more engrossed when they were on stage than the Pussycat Dolls! So for Eurovision I think it’s going to be really good for the UK, they’ve got a big fanbase in Europe, as back in the day they really promoted themselves internationally. With a bit of luck everyone will sit up and listen when it’s the UK’s turn to perform.

Would you like to enter yourselves for Eurovision one day?

Sarah: We’ve actually entered Melodifestivalen twice, this year with ‘The Rest is History’ and ‘Emotion’ last year and we’ve managed to get down to the last hundred each time before not making the final cut. But I’d still love to enter Eurovision someday, it’s something that I’ve grown up with. It’s a tradition in my family to sit down and watch with lots of popcorn and alcohol!

Sean, the Checkum photo look pretty good. And at G-A-Y again! Are you going to be making stripping off a regular thing?

Sean: I can’t help it, whenever the word ‘charity’ is mentioned off come they come! I’ve never been embarrassed about my body or anything. It was an HIV charity for the G-A-Y performance and testicular cancer awareness for the photoshoot. I covered myself up on stage at G-A-Y but apparently bits did fall out!

Do you reckon Sarah would consider doing something similar for say a breast cancer charity?

Sean: If it was for charity I’m sure. You never know. She’s not the sort of girl who’d appear in Nuts magazine but for a good cause I’m sure she’d consider it.

Do you think that X Factor has now run its course? The last series seemed more about controversy and absurd personalities than singing and talent.

Sean: Hmm. Well it seems to be getting bigger every year and you can’t really argue with the viewing figures but personally I didn’t feel anything in the final this year. It was weird. The year after us there was Alexandra and JLS in the final which I got really involved with. It seemed a bit dull most recently. But Simon Cowell’s a smart guy and knows his stuff. He won’t let a brand that big die so I’m sure he’ll sustain it somehow.

Do you have any upcoming performances – we’d love to see the new tracks performed live.

Sean: We’re on This Morning and Live on Studio 5 this week. and we’re also doing a tour over the summer at Haven venues and we’re really looking forward to getting the songs out there. It’s always good to get out there and see what a crowd makes of the songs. The music seems to really come alive on stage as we’re such a visual act. We always go to radio and they very rarely take us on but TV seem to be different. Maybe it’s because of X Factor but maybe it’s also because we can sing and dance together while performing. Everything with Same Difference comes alive when you see us on stage!

Is ‘This Is Me’, the rather brilliant B-side to ‘Shine On Forever (Photo Frame)’, still available to order from your website?

Sean: It is, but funnily enough it’s  also ended up on the album as a bonus track. When we first released it as a B-side there were some fans who even thought it was better than the single which isn’t what you always want to hear! But the fact that they really liked it said that it was a song to chill out on in the middle of the album amongst the ‘going mental’ feel of the other uptempo tracks.

If you could reunite/relaunch any act/group who would you pick and why?

Both: Steps!

Sean: There’s this Facebook group ‘Bring back Steps’,  but if that doesn’t work there’s always  S Club 7. To see them back together would be fantastic as they’ve got some brilliant hits like ‘Reach’ and ’Don’t Stop Movin” which still sound really good today. Every time we cover ‘Reach’ at a gig everyone knows immediately what moves to break into. It would be wonderful for us to have a song like that, so that even if we went off radar our song could still put a smile on people’s faces. That would be enough for me. Hopefully some of the songs from this album will do the trick; I know ‘Karma Karma’ is one with that potential to be a real summer anthem, but we’ll have to wait and see! There’ll definitely be more singles in the future, if not here then definitely in other countries.

Part of the reason why our label took us on in the first place was because they saw potential in other countries and also because feel we’ve got unfinished business here. We’re sometimes seen as a failure in the UK because the first album wasn’t a smash hit, but we should still be proud of it given the level of promotion we had. And we haven’t given up either – there’s no way we’ll do that. We’re brother and sister; it’s not like we’re a band with members who are replaceable.

Tell us what winds you up most about the other?

Sean: She tries to keep a hold on everything! You only live once and this is such a fun job!

Sarah: He’s a bit too chilled out sometimes!

I read somewhere that you guys have rather wisely invested in property to let out to students in Portsmouth – do they know that Same Difference are their landlords?

Sean: Yeah, it was a good idea. We’ve got it for life which is a good idea when you work in the unpredictable music industry. Rather than just giving them a complete dump to live in we decided to make them feel as at home as possible, we made everything really nice and gave them welcome gifts and it all paid off, they left the place in a lovely state. I’ve been around Portsmouth and had people come up to me on occasion and say ‘I know someone who’s living in your house!’ It’s weirdly cool!

We’re really looking forward to hearing the album!

Both: We can’t wait for you to hear it! Hope you all enjoy listening to it as much as we enjoyed making it!

The Rest is History is out now to download and buy in stores. The single, ‘Shine On Forever (Photo Frame)’ is available to download. Visit www.samedifferenceworld.com for more information.