Fresh Meat Monday - Iain McLaughlin and The Outsiders

Would you care to introduce yourself?

My name is Iain McLaughlin and I'm a singer, guitarist and songwriter from Inverness and play both solo and with my band The Outsiders.


How would you describe the music you make?

I like to experiment with the arrangements of my music and like to use looping during my solo shows. In The Outsiders we play rock n roll with a grunge edge we like to keep things quite intense and use a lot of dynamic builds in our music. In the past people have described our music as a cross between Kings of Leon and Queens Of The Stone Age.


How did you start out making music?

I started making music in my teens then continued to write when I went to study a music degree at university. I've been playing acoustic shows since I was 16 and like a lot of people I started out playing open mic shows to develop my songs and live performance.


What process goes into the way you write songs?

I write music first then lyrics. Melody is the most important thing to me. I don't always know what a song is going to be about when I start writing I like to record everything and write down lyric ideas as I go along and see how it develops.


What can people expect from your live shows?

People can expect really high energy performances from the band. We like to put everything we have into the gig. It gets sweaty.


What are you all listening to at the moment?

I'm really enjoying loads of Mark Lanegans back catalogue and been listening to the Afghan Whigs a lot. Also really into the latest Horrors album. I like to listen to loads of unsigned bands online and on podcasts as well and get to every gig I can locally there's so many great acts in the highlands.


What can we expect to see/hear from you in 2011?

We are playing at festivals throughout the summer including main stage at Belladrum at 1:30 on Sat 6th Aug, Wizard, Bfest, and Gig in the car park at the Greenside in Leslie. In sept we play the Cavern Club in Liverpool and then we record our album with Andy Miller. The first single should be coming at the end of the year and we'll be touring from November onwards. Log onto the website to keep up to speed with tour dates and sign up to the mailing list on the Facebook page to hear all the latest news.


Tour Dates
August
6th – Belladrum Festival (Main stage), Beauly near Inverness
7th – Gig in the Car Park, Leslie in Fife
20th – B-Fest, Wick
27th – Wizard Festival (Second stage), Aberdeen-Shire

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