The stories in the music industry rarely read like a soap opera, preferring instead to be tales of explosive introductions, poor follow-ups and a fizzling out into nonchalance.  It has happened time and time again with former NME pin-ups such as The Vines, The Datsuns and The Darkness.

Electric Soft Parade fit the script quite well; although comparisons with any of the above will bring massive protests from fans of the psychedelic masters’ work, the band have been quietly recovering from a confidence-battering from the major record labels, rediscovered their sound, and come back better than ever before.

It was back in 2002 when the band shot to fame with the release of debut album Holes in the Wall.  The album included soon-to-be temporary indie dance floor classics Empty at the End, There’s a Silence and Silent to the Dark and was released on small independent label Db to huge critical acclaim and a Mercury Music Prize nomination to boot.

But the storm clouds behind the scene were brewing - ESP’s success on Db was being funded by major label BMG, and the money men were wanting in on the band’s achievements:

“It was bad because the guy from Db would just be in the office having a go and collaring everyone shouting 'right, what the fuck are you doing?' at everyone, screaming the place up,” comments singer, guitarist and pianist Alex White.

“When we went in-house for the second album we thought that was the problem but then actually, because he wasn’t around, there wasn’t anyone shouting our corner.”

“Aside from that,” pipes up Alex’s brother, vocalist and guitarist Thomas White, “we weren’t that hungry, because we’d had so much success early on, well not ‘so much’ but we kind of did shit like Top of the Pops and Jools Holland and all that. 

“BMG paid for a lot of that stuff the way BMG can, they just made it happen and I really wasn’t that arsed on the second record for a hit.  That was all they were after.”

The major problems for the band emerged when they were gearing up for the follow-up to Holes in the Wall, the record that would finally come out almost two years later as The American Adventure.

“They spent a lot of money on it but they did it early on, well in the middle of the life of the album,” says Alex.

“When we were making it and demoing it and recording it, we did it all in the same studio at the Metway in Brighton for about six months and they weren’t involved.

“When the whole Db BMG thing was switching over who we were dealing with, they came onboard and were like ‘we definitely want to do this or whatever’ and started getting involved saying ‘that doesn’t sound right, it needs to be changed and blah blah blah’ and made us go to Abbey Road and re-record a bunch of it at a cost of a lot – almost one hundred grand.

“Then they went, ‘oh shit, this band isn’t actually that bankable maybe they won’t have a hit’ and realised that they’d spent loads of money when actually we’d made the record for about ten grand over six months - a really good economical record.

“The record is basically what we recorded and they spent the money on three tracks. Loads of the main tunes, like Lights Out and Bruxillisation were all done at the Metway.

“The ones we did at Abbey Road sound alright but they don’t sound amazingly different to me once it was mastered and everything.  It was a case that they weren’t really into it and they just hung onto it thinking that maybe there will be success for the band later or whatever and that is, ultimately, all they were thinking about and we weren’t on that page, we were just thinking about making a really good record because we felt that the first record was taken out of our hands a little bit and the sound of it and the whole vibe of it was not quite what we wanted, not that we should have what we want.”

Cue a messy, lengthy, dispute between the band and BMG about the record, and just two limited edition 7” singles: Things I've Done Before and Lose Yr Frown got dribbled out into the public domain before the album failed to break the Top 40 and the band went on a two year hiatus.

In December 2005, the band returned.  After having success alongside Eamon Hamilton with side project Brakes, and having matured beyond their years, the band released The Human Body EP on Truck Records to universal critical acclaim.  It then saw them break the US for the first time, signing to Better Looking on the opposite side of the Atlantic, and exhibiting a much more defined, experimental sound than before.  Now Tom White is optimistic about the future.

“I really didn’t like the way The American Adventure came across.  The whole situation surrounding the record didn’t allow people to see it for what it actually was and I think we are doing the same kind of thing in terms of the direction we are going. 

“It’s a continuation of what we started on The American Adventure - the sound of it and the studio we were in and the guy we used for recording and all that sort of stuff.  We wanted to be the same band doing the same stuff but succeed at it rather than have it swept under the carpet by a label.  Truck have been fantastic and allowed us to do that.

“With Truck, it’s very personal,” says Alex, “we phone them personally, the people who paid for the record to be made and they’re talking to the people who made the record, it’s very direct, there’s just one line between us.

“We can’t believe it a lot of the time, not having people who have to have their way and have to be in the studio and be interfering artistically with the sound of the record or with the artwork or whatever. 

“We literary delivered the record in the true sense of delivering.  We delivered it to the label, we just went ‘here it is’ and ‘this is what it is’ and they went ‘right, okay, we’ll press it up’ and they did and they released it – it was literally that simple.”

Now things are looking forward to continuing their relationship with Truck and, more importantly, releasing their long awaited third record – tentatively titled No Need to Be Down-Hearted – early in the New Year.  The band have gone out on two UK tours since the EP release in December showcasing tracks from the new record, and it points towards increased experimentation entwined with the band’s more renowned tender or rockier moments.

Exemplary instrumental The Friday Before Christmas is not expected to feature on the record, although it is available on the Trucknine compilation, but standout EP track Cold World, the fantastic If That’s The Case, Then I Don’t Know (a demo of which is on the band’s MySpace page), beautiful acoustic-led ballad Secrets and pop number Misunderstanding, which has been in the ESP arsenal since the dark BMG days, are all in the mix for inclusion.

An introductory taster of the album is due to be released later this month, with new track Life in the Back-Seat set to feature on a split 7” single with Alex White-related project Actress Hand’s Why the Sale?.

The band is also on tour throughout October and on the road with Brakes irregularly until the end of the year.

ESP are on the comeback trail, and they are out to prove that DIY is the best way:

“Minutemen are a massive influence, they are a band that just takes all its own gear, roadies its own gear, fucking produces the record, does the artwork for the records, and if you do that you just feel prouder of yourself at the end of the day,” says Tom.

“Some people can buy their time and just not worry about what people think and just go with things and let things be changed but, for us, it is very important that we know what it needs when it’s written; we work it out in the studio.

“I don’t appreciate when people don’t see what we’re doing and, frankly, people like that aren’t musicians, they’re businessmen and don’t even appreciate what they have a lot of the time.”

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