In Conversation with Alex Spencer!

We had the lovely opportunity to sit down and have a chat with Alex Spencer, an up-and-coming artist based in Manchester. At only 19 years old, he already has a great body of work and his own headline tour to look back on and he supported artists like Corella, The Lathums and Louis Tomlinson. He's a singer you should definitely keep on your radar!

To start off, who is Alex Spencer in three words?

Anthemic, energetic and my music nostalgic.

You started your first European headline tour run in Cologne and the day before you did your acoustic set and Meet & Greet. How was it?

It was amazing! We were into Cologne two days earlier before the show which was so good, 'cause we got to explore the city. Sadly, we've not been able to explore Hamburg as much, but still cool. It was amazing meeting all the fans at the pop-up and after the show. Everyone was so nice, it's been great!

In addition to your headline run right now, you did multiple support tours. As well as your own headline run in the UK, in Reading and Leads. Having performed in stadiums, on festival stages and smaller stages, what do you prefer and why?

I love them all obviously! We supported Louis Tomlinson in the arenas, we did the Barclays arena, which was so special because his fans were amazing with us. Even though it was a big arena, it still felt quite intimate with the fans. I love the festival stages, 'cause everyone's proper energetic here for a good time and then the smaller rooms also have something quite intimate because you can connect with the fans. I can never decide on one, they're all amazing. I've been loving the most smaller shows, the more intimate so I can connect to anyone.

You're always doing backflips on stage, how did this come about?

When I was 10 years old, I learned when I went on holiday. One day we had a gig supporting The Lathums and Jake Bugg. Will [Alex's drummer] was like "Why don't you try a backflip off the drum stage?", I was "alright, why not." I did it and it was crazy.

You're also part Spanish. Do you think that your Spanish and English side, maybe also you specifically being from Manchester, influence your music or come through?

100% Manchester. If I was never from Manchester I wouldn't be doing music. Got such a rich culture and history of music and the vibes. That has inspired me a lot, from busking on the streets of Manchester, with my local club as well Man City. The Spanish thing, I was born in Barcelona! I've incorporated a lot of Spanish into my music, for "Nightmares" and "All of This Will Be Gone" and I still wanna keep that growing. I think I wanna build my Spanish and I'm gonna take my music over to South America and Latin America.

In an interview with Far Out Magazine, you named the Spanish band Malmö 040 as one of your favourite artists. Would you ever consider collaborating with Spanish artists or have a full Spanish album and songs like them?

100%, I'm working on something actually with full Spanish, I'd love to! I'm playing my first shows ever in Spain later this month with Only The Poets. That's gonna be special.

On July 24th, you released your 4th EP "These Will Be The Days". Congrats on the release of it! In your words, it's about "acceptance, letting go, friendship, nostalgia, feeling on top of the world and to then hit rock bottom," so it's an honest soundtrack about your last two years. How was the process of creating it and did this honesty to yourself, to the listeners and to the world come easily to you?

At first, no, because I thought it was quite difficult being very honest and open in my music, it took a while to get it right. But then it's been the best thing to happen, because people have been able to relate to it and connect with it. It was so special! It's been a crazy journey and this EP has been able to sum up the last two years of the soundtrack of my life.

You teased a song called "Chameleon." When can fans expect it?

We wrote it only a couple of weeks ago and we kind of not finished writing it, so it's a bit of a demo. But it depends, we've been playing it on this show last night, if fans love it enough and they'll ask for it, yeah I'd love to release it! But I've got lots of new music coming, I'm writing so much.

Nora: We'll be looking out for it!

What's your favourite thing about your fan base?

My fan base varies in England and Europe, obviously from supporting Louis, I picked up a lot of his fans and his fans are, what's the word …

Nora: Passionate?

Passionate, that's the exact word! They brought us presents and sang every lyrics, screaming and always wanting to meet us, so that's special. In a nutshell, my fan base is very passionate and I love to speak for this, my younger generation, this generation, passionate is the perfect word.

With the constant touring, it's obviously taxing on your body and your mind. What do you do on tour or maybe also before and after to try to counteract this?

You're not always gonna be 100% on tour, you have highs and lows. I just put some music [on] and taking time for me. When I get home, I'll probably just take a couple days to relax. I'm always on top of the world and energetic, but you do have your lows. I think being prepared before tour and before the show is so important. Today, I've not been very prepared, my mind is everywhere, I have got "this this this," but I'll be fine.

You talked about having started with busking in Manchester, then you played in bars and pubs. How did you stay so persistent that your dream came true and do you have any advice for young aspiring artists looking to do the same?

I just kept at it. There were so many times when I was younger where I was "Oh what's the point of doing this," but I was loving it and my dad kept pushing me "You got this, juts keep at it." From there: just kept busking, started supporting loads of bands, signed a record deal when I was 16 and it started toppling up and more opportunities and dreams came true. My advice to the artists is just keep going, there might be times where they feel no progress, but it'll come. Keep going, get stuff out on social media, take the risk and sing to people, share your music, because you never know who might be watching!

Do you think Manchester was a good crowd to have the start there?

Yeah, they're the best crowd in the world, my hometown, isn't it!

You mentioned Only The Poets, do you have anything you can or want to tease about those specific support shows?

It's going to be a very special set. New music and we're gonna be coming to new places, so I'll try to learn new languages there, like in Budapest and in Latvia, so that's going to be exciting.

THE UNSEEN has an artist recommendation playlist. Do you want to add two or three songs?

Florence Road, "Goodnight", is a good song; Balu Brigada – I love their new song "BedHead", it's a banger really and Turnstile – I love a song called "SEEIN' STARS", because it gives me so much nostalgia to the Louis Tomlinson tour. He used to play it after his soundcheck and we always used to hear it, such a good song!

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