The boys are back in town

IT'S not easy getting hold of The View these days. Cancelled interviews stretch back to September as the pace picked up around the making of the Dundee band's second album.

This week they were juggling rehearsals for the upcoming tour of their favourite small venues including the Raigmore, Inverness – where a likely rerun of the hottest, sweatiest, craziest gig of recent years is on the cards.

This week alone has seen rehearsals, interview and photo shoot for Q magazine, plus a couple of acoustic sets – one for their artwork man Ryan McPhail.

But just as the last deadline was slipping away, the phone rings and it's View guitarist Pete Reilly. And though these days the band's often hob-nobbing with the rich and famous, he doesn't seem much bothered by the thought he shared an event with Paris Hilton this week.

"We did acoustic covers of Gnarls Barkley and Babyshambles at the event, and yes, seemingly Paris Hilton was there."

He's more excited by the chance to get back out live on familiar territory to showcase the follow-up album to last year's staggeringly successful number one Hats Off To The Buskers.

"I'm really proud of this album. It's as strong, maybe even stronger than the last one. It's weird but once we had the songs and we'd demoed them, we knew we had cracked it again. It's not as stripped back as it was before, there are strings on it. I think it's a different style, and makes it sound nice. I don't think it would sound the same without it now."

Don't expect a string section on tour, though. The band plan to keep it simple.

"It was just an idea from our management because a few bands that were trying to do their second album released a single and did big gigs – and it never really happened. We just want it to be exciting again, doing these little shows. We'll get match fit and get the new songs broken in by the time we get up to the big, massive gigs."

V was the last big live gig Pete reckons the band played this summer, but it wasn't a favourite: "We did some of the new songs, but we were a bit subdued for us. I never really liked that crowd – they were into bands like Scouting For Cheese. But when we played Rock Ness, it was brilliant, it was good to play to our own fans again."

And Pete's been showing off the wonderful Highland landscape to his girlfriend.

"I've just got back from camping all the way around Scotland in a little red sports car with Hannah, because she's from London. So I was showing her all the beautiful parts of Scotland."

But it's not so likely the band will be getting out and about when they're up tomorrow (Friday).

"We'll probably stay on the bus most of the time nursing our hangovers!" laughed Pete.

Yes, The View are back.

By Margaret Chrystall, Highland News, 17th October 2008