Thanks so much to Jessica for the interview! It is no secret that one of my favourite bands are the Would-be-Goods, so it was really cool for me that during the Covid pandemic I got in touch with Jessica Griffin. I may have had opportunities before, the one time I remember most clearly was in 2012, in London, outside Bush Hall while my friends were having a smoke, I saw the band outside, but I chickened out! I must say that’s not being common in me (though I did get the setlist that time around). But yeah, being a big fan and all, didn’t want to bother! So yes, for me this interview is quite important and means a lot. And on top of it all it is great timing! The band is releasing a new album called “Tears Before Bedtime” on February 13, 2026, on the very fine label Skep Wax. You can pre-order the album on Bandcamp now too if you weren’t aware.
There are also a bunch of gigs already booked for next year to promote it, including the album launch gig at The Water Rats, London on February 21. It is a very exciting time for the band and fans for sure! So of course it made sense to ask Jessica about this… and that…. and everything in between.
++ Hi Jessica! Thanks so much for being up for this interview! I am a big fan and I have tons and tons of questions. How are you? I hear you have news of a new album!
I’m very well, thanks, and excited to have a new full-band album coming out.
++ It is great to see a new record by the band. This time around you are partnering with Skep Wax Records who have quickly become an important label for indiepop. How is it working with Amelia and Rob? Does it help working with people who have similar experiences when it comes to music? Were you a fan of Talulah Gosh, Heavenly, back in the day by the way?
We’re delighted that Skep Wax wanted to release the album. They are everything you’d want a label to be, and the fact that Amelia and Rob are indie musicians themselves means that we’re always on the same page.
I came to Talulah Gosh and Heavenly quite late as by the mid-80s I wasn’t listening to much new music or going to see bands. But Peter sent me their CDs in the late 90s and I was smitten.
++ The album is coming out on vinyl, CD and digital, definitely this is good news for any fan. Is there any difference between the formats, or are they exactly the same release? One thing that caught my attention is that there will be a lyrics sheet! Don’t think that’s common for the band?
The album has been mastered separately for each format but the songs are the same.
It’s the first time we’ve included lyrics with an album. But lyrics are such an important element of my songs that it seemed like a good thing to do.
++ Who is in the photo from the front cover of the record?
That’s me, in the early 1990s. It was taken on the set of a film made by Tony Potts, who worked with The Monochrome Set.
++ Without listening to the album, I want to say it is sort of a melancholic album, but maybe I am wrong? I am just taking clues by the name of the album “Tears Before Bedtime” and that there are two songs with tears in their title and another with the word crying. If I am very wrong, how would you describe the album, what can a fan expect?
There’s always been a melancholy element to my songs but there’s also lightness and humour, and I think that’s true of this album too. I didn’t think about the tears/crying motif until later, when I had to choose a title for the album.
++ Do tell me a bit about the recording of the record. Where was it recorded? Who produced it? Did it take a long time to make the album?
We started recording at Jon Clayton’s OneCat studio in Brixton, in 2019. The pandemic held us up for a few years but we started working on the album again in late 2024, at Jon’s new studio in Crystal Palace. Recording is quite a slow process for us these days – a weekend here and there, unlike the first two Would-be-goods albums which took two weeks each. Slow recording works better, I think.
If by ‘who produced it’ you mean ‘who decided how the songs should sound overall’, the answer would be me/the band, although we needed Jon Clayton’s technical expertise and excellent musical ear to get the best sound and performances out of us and our instruments. I recorded all but two of the vocals myself, at home, as I’d learned to do this during my song-a-day project and find it more relaxing.
++ There is a listening party for the record on February 11. I’ve never been to one of them. I read that people can join and there will be a chat room to chat with the band. Is it going to be through zoom or something similar? Will there be a limit of people that can join? How is it being organized? I read that some cocktails will be recommended. Can you share any more details as it sounds quite fun!
The details are on our Bandcamp page – just click on the Tears Before Bedtime image. There’s a Listening Party link where you can RSVP. I don’t know if numbers are limited but Skep Wax say it’s probably a good idea to sign up as soon as possible. You may be asked to upload the Bandcamp app on your device. At the appointed time on February 11 you just sign in, sit back and listen as the album plays. There’s no Zoom/camera element but people will be able to make comments or ask questions in the chat room as the album plays, although you don’t have to join in.
I haven’t seen the cocktail menu yet but I’m sure they will be appropriate to the songs. One of them, The Tears of Cora Pearl, is actually named after a 19th-century cocktail which includes crême de violette, champagne and edible flowers. One for Peter, who’s partial to Parma violets.
++ And you have a few gigs lined up, all in the UK so far. Is there one in particular that you are looking forward to the most? And any chance you’ll be playing abroad next year?
We’re all looking forward to playing in the Wales Goes Pop festival in April. The weekend festivals we’ve played before (GlasGoes Pop in 2024, Paris Popfest in 2025) have been fantastic.
We don’t have any gigs outside the UK in our diaries at the moment but we love playing abroad so if anyone’s interested in putting us on, please get in touch.
++ Let’s go back in time. What are your first music memories? What sort of music did you listen to at home while growing up?
Sitting on my father’s lap, aged three, listening to a record of John Williams playing classical Spanish guitar. I also remember him singing me old songs which were meant to be funny but which always made me cry, including ‘My Darling Clementine’.
There was always a record on the turntable in our house. My mother (who played the violin and mandolin) liked classical music (Bach, Sibelius, Debussy, Satie, Poulenc, Peter Warlock, Borodin, Rimsky-Korsakov) and musicals (from ‘Top Hat’ to ‘Hair’). My father liked ‘cool’ jazz (Dave Brubeck, Modern Jazz Quartet), Django Reinhardt and songs from the 1920s and 1930s, especially Hoagy Carmichael’s. There were some pop records too – Françoise Hardy, Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood, Simon and Garfunkel, The Mamas and The Papas, the Beatles’ ‘Help’ album, Dionne Warwick singing Burt Bacharach, Sérgio Mendes, and later ABBA.
++ You grew up between Singapore and England. Why was that? When was the last time you visited Singapore? What are your fondest memories of that place?
My father was in the Fleet Air Arm and was posted to Singapore. We lived there until I was eight. I’ve never been back. I don’t think there’s much left of the Singapore I knew, with its dilapidated 19th-century shophouses, street markets and sampans in the Singapore River. At the weekend we used to go out in an old fishing boat to islands where we’d picnic on the beach and swim in the warm water. It was a shock coming back to cold, grey England.
++ Are you originally from London?
No. We moved around in my childhood and my family is from all over the place, so I never know what to say when people ask where I’m from. But I’ve lived in London since my early 20s and feel I belong here.
++ Had you been in other bands other than The Would-be-Goods? If so, how did all of these bands sound? Are there any recordings?
In my mid-teens I desperately wanted to be in a band but couldn’t find anyone else who was interested. I’ve always written songs of one kind or another but didn’t record with other musicians until my early twenties.
++ How did you all meet? How was the recruiting process?
Peter wrote to me, in 1995, I think. He told me he was a big Would-be-goods fan, asked if I’d written anything new and said that if I was interested in playing live, his band Heavenly would be happy to be my backing musicians. A few years later we met in London and I played him some of my new songs. (I’d started writing again in the mid-1990s.) He persuaded me to record them.
Peter and I did our first live shows as the Would-be-goods in 2001. Our drummer Debbie Greensmith and bass player Lupe Nuñez-Fernandez (from Pipas) joined us in 2002, recruited by Peter, who is well connected in the world of indie music. When Lupe left the band in 2004, Andy Warren (who had played on the first two Would-be-goods albums and had become a friend of mine) took over bass duties.
++ How is the creative process for you? It was only after “Mondo” that you learned the guitar, right? How did you compose previously?
I’ve always composed songs in the same way, writing everything in my head rather than with an instrument and singing it onto a tape recorder (nowadays, the voice recorder on my phone or computer) as I go along. The starting point might be a title or a very short musical phrase (just a few notes) I’ve overheard, or remembered from an old song. The words and music tend to come to me simultaneously, a few bars at a time. When I first started to play the guitar, strumming chords could sometimes spark something but very soon I went back to writing in the old way. I’ve always been able to ‘hear’ my songs, with quite detailed arrangements, but they do tend to change a bit when we start working on them in rehearsal. An example is ‘Miss La-Di-Dah’ (from The Morning After) which I imagined as a mid-paced, rather downbeat Motown-type song Iike ‘Heard It Through The Grapevine’ but which the band took in more of a garage direction.
I don’t tell the other band members what to play although I might occasionally ask them to try a part I’ve come up with.
++ Where do you usually practice? Has it changed much after the many changes of the band?
We’ve always practised in a rehearsal studio under the railway arches in West London. It looks exactly the same as it did 20-odd years ago.
++ What’s the story behind the band’s name?
It’s the title of a 1901 children’s novel by Edith Nesbit. I’ve always loved her books although The Wouldbegoods isn’t my favourite. It came to mind when I was recording my first single and needed a band name. Mike Alway didn’t like it but Simon Turner encouraged me to stick with it. I might have picked another name if I’d known we’d become popular in Japan, as ‘Would-be-goods’ doesn’t work well in Japanese.
++ Who would you say were influences in the sound of the band?
People say we have a distinctive sound but it has changed a lot since the early days. On the first two albums the Monochrome Set were my backing band – the sound is more sophisticated and the arrangements more complex but it doesn’t sound like a Monochrome Set record. The third album, Brief Lives, was made with the help of guest musicians and feels more like a studio project than a band album. The Morning After is the first Would-be-goods album that captures what I think of as our ‘band’ sound. On that album and the follow-up (Eventyr) there’s a touch of garage-band rawness and energy which comes from Debbie’s drumming and Peter’s guitars, but there are other influences, such as French chanson, which you can hear in songs like ‘Bluebeard’. The new album has a more lush sound, with more complex arrangements. Our sound has evolved naturally – we’ve never tried to sound like anyone else.
++ I have always wondered how you ended up working with Él Records. How did that relationship start? And who picked the two songs for the first single?
I was a fan of The Monochrome Set and met Mike Alway in their dressing-room at one of their shows after a friend dared me to go backstage. This was a few years before Mike started él Records – he was the A&R man at Cherry Red. We met up a few times while I was doing a summer job in London in my gap year. He kept in touch and sent me records while I was at university, and I wrote sleeve notes for his new label, él. After I graduated and moved to London he asked me if I’d be interested in making a single. I was surprised but of course I said yes. His first suggestion was that I should cover a song by ‘60s band The Herd and/or a very early Bowie song from his Mod period, then he wanted me to do a duet with a footballer, Vinnie Jones, but in the end he asked Simon Turner to write a couple of songs for me.
++ After the single, which had songs written by Simon Turner and Colin Lloyd Tucker, you decided to release an album of your own songs with The Monochrome Set as a backing band. Were you already friends or familiar with The Monochrome Set before this record? Was it something Él got for you?
It wasn’t my decision to make an album. Mike suggested it after the single got good reviews and some airplay. He approached various songwriters but either they were tied up with other projects or their songs weren’t right for me, which is why I ended up writing my own songs. Mike asked Bid, Andy Warren and Nick Wesolowski to be the backing band. As a long-time Monochrome Set fan, I was thrilled. I’d met them a few times but had never exchanged more than a few words with any of them.
++ I’ve always been curious about the photos of you and your sister Miranda from that time. Curious about what sort of hats you were wearing in them?
People often ask about the outfits we’re wearing on the album cover. The hats and jackets were from East Asia, I think. Mike sent us to a theatrical costumier (Berman and Nathan’s) and told us to choose anything we liked.
++ After this record you left music to work in the City of London. What did you do there? Did you enjoy this job?
I’d already been working in the City for a year when we made The Camera Loves Me. I studied English Literature at university then to everyone’s surprise (and by a rather roundabout route) I became a trainee Japanese investment manager. I loved my annual visits to Japan but I felt out of place in the City. So after a few years I left and worked as an editor for a small and eccentric publishing company before going freelance, recording Mondo and becoming a mother.
++ Soon after you recorded “Mondo”. I read in an interview with Marcus Törncrantz that this record received no promotion at all after being re-released in the UK (it was originally a Japan-only release on Trattoria). What happened? Why didn’t Cherry Red support this record as they should have?
I don’t know.
++ Reading your biography on your page, it mentions that between 2000 and 2001 you recorded 22 songs with Orson Presence, Struan Robertson and Jim Kimberley. Were these songs released?
Yes – they were the songs that became Brief Lives, the Emmanuelle Béart EP and the Sugar Mummy single. Orson Presence played keyboards and Struan Robertson and Jim Kimberley played drums. Another track, ‘Leave My Mind Alone’, is on a compilation, All’s Fair In Love and Chickfactor.
++ Then you started working with new labels, much smaller and indie than Cherry Red, like Matinée and Fortuna Pop. How did these relationships start?
After we’d finished recording Brief Lives, Peter and I approached some independent record companies. Several of these were interested in releasing it but we decided to go with Fortuna Pop!) and Matinée.
++ “Emmanuelle Béart” was your comeback EP in 2001. One thing that I always thought about your music is that it is very cinematic in a way. From the top of your head do you have a top 5 favourite movies?
People have said my songs are like novels but maybe they are more like little films. My imagination is quite visual – when I’m reading or writing I ‘see’ the characters and events.
Favourite films, off the top of my head: Jacques Tati’s Mon Oncle; something by the Hong Kong film director Stanley Kwan (maybe Rouge or Centre Stage); Bergman’s Smiles of a Summer Night; Kind Hearts and Coronets; something by Eric Rohmer (maybe A Winter’s Tale).
++ Then came “Eventyr” which of course means adventure in Swedish. Previously you had sung songs in French, so wondering how many languages you speak?!
My French is very rusty these days but I do try to read in French and speak it when we go there. I studied German for two years at school but have forgotten most of it. In the 1980s I learned a bit of Japanese. I started having lessons again a few years ago. I really enjoy it but it’s quite challenging.
++ And I have to ask, all of your albums had a photo of yours on the cover. But not on “Eventyr”? Why did you decide to change that on this one?
I wanted it to look like the cover of a book of fairytales from the golden age of children’s literature. ‘Eventyr’ was the title of a collection of stories by Hans Christian Andersen, some of which inspired songs on the album.
++ During the Covid pandemic you started making and releasing music on your own, as a solo project instead of with the full band. Four EPs have appeared on Bandcamp of wonderful new songs. What made you decide to pick up your guitar and start posting these on the web?
I needed a project while we were all stuck at home and only allowed out for one short walk a day. So I came up with the idea of writing (and demo-ing) a song a day, using a title which my partner Peter Momtchiloff would give me the evening before (with no other guidance). I sang, played and recorded everything myself. Making songwriting into a game took a lot of the pressure off and opened up all sorts of new songwriting avenues for me. For the first time since my teens I was writing without any intention of releasing the songs. Later I decided to make some of them into digital EPs. I took five songs at a time and worked on the original demos, re-recording parts if necessary and getting Peter to play bass if the song needed it.
++ And I have to ask, is there a possibility if all of or some of these songs will be re-recorded by the full band? Or a possibility for them to be released as they are in physical format?
I ended up writing 173 songs so it’s very unlikely I’ll ever release them all. The sound quality of the early songs is terrible. They sound as if they were recorded underwater, as I didn’t really know how to use Garageband and lacked some vital bits of kit, e.g. a guitar interface. It was a slow learning process.
I released twenty of the songs on Bandcamp (and later on a CD). You’ll be able to hear more of them on the new album and I’m sure we’ll work on others with the band for future release.
++ Only “The Camera Loves Me” was released on vinyl back in the day, and I wonder with these trends of reissuing things on vinyl, have you considered doing so?
Our new album is coming out on vinyl, as well as CD and digital, but there are no plans for any of our other albums to be re-issued in any format.
++ Are there more recordings by the band? Unreleased tracks?
There are a few songs which we started in 2019 and didn’t finish for one reason or another.
++ I think my favourite song of yours is “Pinstriped Rebel” (though it is hard to pick just one), but as I use it as my personal email address (!). I was wondering if you could tell me what inspired this song? You know here in the US people who read my email think I am a fan of the Boston Red Sox, or a baseball fan, because of the name! What’s the story behind it?
The title came from an article in the Financial Times, which I read every day when I was in the City. The character in the song is based on someone I was very briefly in a relationship with – he was the archetypal ‘City boy’ of the 1980s.
++ Comet Gain did a wonderful cover of this song. I was wondering what you think of it? And also if there are any other Would-be-Goods covers that you would recommend checking out?
It’s very good. It comes from a project which Matthew Jacobsen of the US label Le Grand Magistery began in the mid-1990s. He asked various indie bands to cover songs by él artists for a tribute album. It’s never been released, although some of the songs (including the Comet Gain ‘Pinstriped Rebel’ cover) appeared on another Grand Magistery compilation. I liked all the Would-be-goods covers I heard from that project – the bands took the songs and really made them their own. I don’t see any point in covering a song unless you do something different with it. The Softies covered ‘Perfect Dear’ and still play it live. And a young Canadian band asked me if they could cover ‘Too Old’. They did a good job – I think it’s on YouTube.
++ If you were to choose your favorite Would-be-Goods song, which one would that be and why?
That’s a hard one! It changes. At the moment it’s ‘Ouija Board Romance’ from my lockdown project. It was one of those rare songs that came to me pretty much in one go, despite being one of the most challenging titles Peter gave me. Most of them gave me a bit more scope, e.g. ‘A Family Secret’ or ‘I Loved A Ghost’.
++ Did the Would-be-Goods gig back when the first two albums were released? Perhaps with the Monochrome Set as a backing band, or not?
No – Mike Alway was very much against the él bands doing shows, although there was an él showcase event at the Limelight Club in London and a short Japanese tour. I sang backing vocals for Simon Turner and Louis Philippe in London and Tokyo but I’d never have had the courage to perform as a lead singer in those days, with or without the support of The Monochrome Set.
++ Did you play many gigs? In other countries?
We’ve been playing gigs since the early 2000s, mostly in the UK but also in the USA, Spain, France, Sweden, Denmark and Finland.
++ And what were the best gigs you remember? Any anecdotes you can share?
The Chickfactor 2002 show at the Fez Club in the Lower East Side was one of our favourites – there was such a gala atmosphere. The Would-be-goods were all wearing tuxedos. I was expecting to borrow an electric guitar but they could only find an acoustic one with a strap that kept slipping. Peter had to fix the strap to my back with a big ‘X’ of gaffa tape.
Glasgoes Pop in August 2024 and Paris Popfest in September 2025 were really special, too.
++ And have there been any bad ones?
We did a show in Nottingham in the early 2000s. It was a very rainy night and the promoter didn’t turn up. We played to an audience of five, all of them from the support band.
We also did a show at Cecil Sharp House (a folk venue in London) where we kept triggering the noise restrictor. It was the first and last time we’ve ever been told we were too loud.
++ There have been no promo videos for the songs for the Would-be-Goods in the past. How come? If you would have been able to pick one song that should have had a video, which one would it be?
I’ve had plenty of ideas for videos but for some reason never got round to making one until this year. ‘Velazquez and I’ would have been a contender.
++ Right! ‘The Gallopers’ is your first video ever. It was quite a surprise. So I wonder how it came together? Did you make it yourselves or did you work with someone? Where did you record your takes and where does the old footage come from?
Skep Wax like to release three singles before an album comes out, so we needed videos for these. We’ve been working with Ian Button, who’s made videos for Pete Astor, Louis Philippe and his own band, Papernut Cambridge.
I filmed myself singing and Peter playing guitar at home, and the old footage is from amateur films made in various parts of England.
++ Looking back in retrospect, what has been the biggest highlight for the band?
Playing live. Not just being on stage but everything that goes with it – meeting other musicians and people who’ve come to see us, and getting to spend time with the other band members.
++ Aside from music, what other hobbies do you have?
Drawing, cooking, walking around London, going to art exhibitions, but most of all, reading.
++ Been to London many times, and really liked it but I would ask a native about it, what are your recommendations? I want to know what would you suggest them doing here, like what are the sights one shouldn’t miss? Or the traditional food or drinks that you love that I should try?
I would go on a long bus ride through the city (a regular bus, not a tourist bus), sitting on the top deck; I’d take a boat up the Thames from Embankment to Greenwich, or if the weather’s good, I’d walk along the river – eastwards from the Royal Festival Hall along the south bank to Tower Bridge and beyond, westwards from Hammersmith Bridge to Richmond, or along Regent’s Canal from Ladbroke Grove to Islington. The permanent collections at the National Gallery, V&A and British Museum are must-sees, and if you have time there’s the Dulwich Picture Gallery in south-west London which has a lovely small permanent collection and often has good temporary shows. I’d go to Golborne Road at the top end of Portobello Road (north of the Westway flyover) on a Friday and have a coffee and nata at Lisboa Patisserie.
I don’t know what counts as traditional food in London – it’s such an international city and we’re adventurous eaters. I do drink a lot of tea, always loose-leaf, which I buy from the wonderful Postcard Teas in Dering Street, W1.
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Listen
Would-be-Goods – The Gallopers
