They might not have won X Factor but the JLS boys are making up for it now with a MOBO award under their belts and a sure-fire hit album just released. We caught up with the band to find out how they're dealing with their massive success and what we can expect from their debut album...
Congratulations on winning at the MOBOs. Not only did you win Best Song, but you also won Best Newcomer. How did that feel?
Oritsé: Absolutely incredible. We were in a category with Alexandra Burke and Master Shortie and Jade Ewen. Obviously they're great artists and have done a lot over the last year and bring British music to where it is now, so we're very privileged to win that award. We've had one release and to win Best Newcomer off the back of that is just incredible.
Beat Again was extremely successful, selling over 100,000 copies in the first week. Are you feeling the pressure to repeat the success with Everybody in Love?
Marvin: You know it's funny, when Beat Again went to No. 1, straight away people were saying, 'Are you going to come back with a bigger single?'
Aston: Before it went to No. 1!
Marvin: Yeah, even before that. And honestly, Everybody in Love is our favourite song, collectively, off the album and it's actually the song we thought was going to be our first single. No-one anticipated how well Beat Again was going to do and if Everybody in Love does equally as good, it's going to be incredible. But no, we're not feeling the pressure. We've got a great support network, great fan base, and we're sure the song's going to do well. How well, we don't know yet.
You shot the video for Everybody In Love in California. Did you enjoy the LA lifestyle?
Oritsé: You can't complain when you wake up and the sun's shining and you go on the set at about 10am and there are four lovely girls to work with.
Aston: There were about 80, to be fair.
Oritsé: We had a lot of female extras. We had a great time. Obviously it's a learning curve and to go abroad to do our second video is absolutely incredible. We loved the experience.
For a long time boy-bands have been quite traditional and now you have come along with lots of choreography, showing a bit of flesh. How do you think you compare to other boy-bands?
Aston: There are no other boy-bands around, to be fair. They're all man-bands now. They're all veterans in the game. We're only just starting out in our career and we've got to set our benchmark and show the direction we wanna go. We just don't just wanna have a fireworks stage show, for instance. We wanna do something that can be shown worldwide.
You're going on tour in February 2010. Are you looking forward to it?
Marvin: We want it to be really explosive, in terms of the way we perform and the visuals, as well as the vocals. It's going to be really exciting. We just really wanna go out there and give our supporters the best that we can. It's going to be a lot more us. So far we've supported Lemar, we did a club tour and we did the X Factor tour, and now it's just JLS. We're so excited, we can't wait.
What can fans expect from your debut album?
Oritsé: From our new album, I think fans can expect a lot of songs we've co-written. We've more or less been involved in writing nine of the thirteen tracks. There is going to be a song for everyone. It's going to be tracks that we enjoy performing on our tour and we're very excited for all of our supporters to hear the material we've come up with. We've definitely done our best and we hope that they're proud.
Everybody in Love is released on 2 November. The debut album is released on 9 November.
Interview by Colin Gentry
