<\/p>\n
Midland are one of the most beloved country acts in the UK \u2013 and it\u2019s fair to say that feeling is mutual.<\/p>\n
Since making their debut here all the way back in 2018, the trio have been regular visitors on this side of the pond, most recently for their second C2C appearance in 2023. Along the way they\u2019ve also released four albums, including their 2024 project \u2018Barely Blue\u2019. They\u2019re currently in Europe for their latest headline tour, which kicked off with them headlining the Saturday night at this year\u2019s Long Road festival.<\/p>\n
Ahead of their set, Laura Cooney sat down with Mark, Jess and Cameron to talk about their experience of the festival, their plans for the tour, latest single \u2018Glass Half Empty\u2019 and more.<\/p>\n
Welcome to The Long Road! How are you finding it so far?<\/strong><\/p>\n Cam: It\u2019s going amazing.<\/p>\n Mark: [in posh British accent] Splendid darling, splendid.<\/p>\n You\u2019ve been pretty regular visitors here over the last few years\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n Mark: Yeah, this is our fourth or fifth time playing in the UK.<\/p>\n Cam: There were a few years where we came here twice a year.<\/p>\n Mark: Yeah, we\u2019ve been here a lot, and we\u2019ve fully, fully embraced ourselves in the culture. We got in a couple of days ago. We did some pub crawling and tried to find the best pint of Guinness in London.<\/p>\n Did you succeed?<\/strong><\/p>\n Mark: [laughs] Yeah, we found some good ones. I think the best was probably the Devonshire. It was in the neighbourhood.<\/p>\n Cam: I had one yesterday at the Harp which was really good.<\/p>\n Mark: Angie\u2019s Too is the best. So yeah, we love it here. It\u2019s really fun because it\u2019s exotic, but at the same time everybody still speaks\u2026<\/p>\n Cam: English? [laughs]<\/p>\n Mark: A different English! Sometimes it\u2019s hard to understand.<\/p>\n Cam: I was saying this yesterday, this is why I love London because it\u2019s got all the real old history. America doesn\u2019t have [that] \u2013 we only go back to the colonial era, 1600s. It goes so much further back, what survived out here. But because it\u2019s English speaking it\u2019s just accessible enough to really appreciate. For an American abroad, it feels like kin. But it\u2019s just so cool. There\u2019s a lot of culture that we appreciate and immerse ourselves in.<\/p>\n I was going to ask if there\u2019s any British slang or anything like that that you guys are still a bit perplexed or \u2018wait, what?!\u2019 about when you come over here\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n Cam: Oh, perplexed? No, we embrace all of \u2018em. Mark, give \u2018em a couple.<\/p>\n Mark: Uh, we went on [in East London-type accent] a bit of a lash the other night\u2026 [laughs]<\/p>\n Cam: We like \u2018treacle\u2019. What else we got?<\/p>\n Mark: \u2018Innit\u2019 is one of them. Yeah, it\u2019s fun. Every time we\u2019re here we kind of pick up on stuff. It\u2019s cool. I feel like every time you come here you\u2019re investing in the fan base and they appreciate that, and they do their job which is to spread the word. And every time we come back here the crowds are bigger and bigger. Now we\u2019re headlining our first ever festival. We\u2019ve done C2C but we haven\u2019t headlined that one, so C2C you might wanna jump on!<\/p>\n Cam: It\u2019s our first outdoor festival.<\/p>\n Mark: Which is like, to me, a proper festival. So pretty cool.<\/p>\n You\u2019ve recently released your latest single \u2018Glass Half Empty\u2019 \u2013 so what does the next chapter musically look like for Midland?<\/strong><\/p>\n Mark: [in a posh voice] Turned up to 11!<\/p>\n Jess: We\u2019re almost done recording the next album. We\u2019re working with a new producer, Trent Willmon. It\u2019s very country, fiddle, as well as a lot of the same kind of stuff you come to expect from a Midland album. But I would say Trent makes a very Texas country sounding record. And we\u2019ve had some top notch fiddle players playing on it, [like] George Strait\u2019s [fiddle player] Jenee [Fleenor].<\/p>\n Cam: Is she mandolin too?<\/p>\n Jess: Yeah, I think so.<\/p>\n Cam: Also, in terms of the song choice, we went more for\u2026 Like on \u2018Let It Roll\u2019 there was a lot more rock-forward things we were trying and doing and achieving and loving, and this one is really more traditional down the middle Texas country. Or just traditional country that we have been referencing since the beginning of this band. And it\u2019s nice to really just go straight at that, in a way that Midland has been doing and maybe can credit ourselves with being some of the first to popularise that and bring it back, since the late 90s.<\/p>\n