Dougie Poynter talks new music from McFly, playing the Midlands and INK ahead of Wolverhampton show - with pictures

This news comes from heartthrob bassist Dougie Poynter, who has however added that the group is yet to produce music of the desired standard to release to the public due to the lads’ ‘high standards’.

“I’d never rule releasing a new album out, and when the time comes, it will happen,” Dougie revealed.

“The boys in McFly are my family. I left home at 15 to move in with them, and they taught me how to shave.

“My Dad left my mom two weeks before I joined the band, so they became my older brothers through that time. That is a bond that will never be broken.

“McFly will never go anywhere. We’ve been in the studio and we’ve written songs, we’ve just got really high standards.

“We've been in the studio over the past couple of years but there’s nothing that we deem good enough at the moment.

“Everyone is doing their own projects right now and then bringing all of that experience back to the table, which can only make it better.”

Essex pop rocker Dougie will treat Wolverhampton fans to a live show on Tuesday when he plays The Slade Rooms alongside his new band INK.

And he’s no stranger to the city, having played his first headline show with McFly 15 years ago, which he described as ‘incredible’.

“All I can remember was being scared stiff and not moving for the entire hour,” Dougie said.

“I’ve grown out of that, I move at least three feet now.”

Looking ahead to the show next week, the Corringham star said fans can expect a wild and unpredictable show.

“We’re almost halfway through the tour now and it's been a lot of fun,” 30-year-old Dougie told us.

“The shows have all been very sweaty and I trip over a lot of wires, but it's been so fun.

“We played Birmingham last week and loved it. What I particularly liked about the venue was its name.

“I want to meet the person who named it because it’s the best name for a venue I have heard in my entire life.

“The ceiling was very low so they had to put duct tape on it so I didn’t hit my head.”

Other links he has to the Midlands includes having previously worked with Bushbury’s Liam Payne during his time with One Direction.

“They were lovely to work with and they just reminded us of ourselves when we were just starting out,” he said.

“The guys were so down to Earth and none of them were acting like superstars.

“They were really engaged in songwriting and how to make their music the best it could be.”

Midland fans can expect to see Dougie make a return to the stage when he plays Download this summer alongside pop punk band A.

The group will play on the Sunday of the three-day festival on The Avalanche Stage.

“I’m thrilled to be playing Download, I grew up listening to that kind of music,” Dougie enthused.

“I’m most excited to be seeing Less Than Jake. Roger Lima is one of my heroes, how he can sing and play some of those bass lines is incredible.

“Seeing Ozzy Osbourne will be a privilege also of course.”

INK began as a spur of the moment idea when Dougie was writing songs at home, and decided he wanted to start a co-writing project with a singer/songwriter.

He contacted his friend Todd Dorigo, and INK was born.

“I got in touch with Todd and just asked if he fancied coming over to my house with his acoustic guitar,” Dougie said.

“We completed two songs in a day, which was really good and a lot of fun as well.

“Todd is really into John Cooper Clarke and Arthur Rimbaud, so I could throw a concept at him and he’d create these lyrics which were so deep and had all these different meanings.

“We demoed the songs and decided the only thing missing was a drummer.

“James Bourne recommended Corey Alexander to us. We got into rehearsals and it was so much fun that we made an EP, and then that EP turned into a tour.

“The coolest thing about this band is even in the studio, we were listening back to the tracks and not once did the words ‘will this play on the radio?’ come up.”

The band completed recording and released their debut EP, Heaven, last month.

“Heaven has been a slow burner because we didn’t want to come out of the gates all guns blazing, we wanted people to just discover it for themselves,” Dougie said.

“The recording process was fantastic, we went to ICP in Belgium which has the best backline you could wish for. It even has Lemmy’s bass rig there.

“We worked with Jason Perry from A who produced our album.

“He could always sense when the vibe was getting down, so he would get up and say ‘let's make a Star Wars video!’ to cheer us up again.

“Tom [Fletcher] co-wrote on one of the songs on the EP as well. It was a riff that he used to play during sound checks for years, and he put it into a pre-existing melody that Todd had.”

Dougie has achieved some amazing things in his extensive musical career, such as playing the Royal Albert Hall and winning a BRIT Award, but he mostly takes pride in the small achievements that have allowed him to play music for all these years.

“I just think being able to be in a band for more than ten years is a huge achievement,” Dougie said.

“I’ve experienced some really cool things, like Brian May playing with us on stage. We covered Don’t Stop Me Now and he came out to perform the solo.

“I also got to play with New Found Glory, the band that inspired me to pick up a bass in the first place, at the O2 Forum Kentish Town where I first saw them play.

“Little things like that really mean a lot to me.”

INK will perform at Wolverhampton Slade Rooms on May 22. For more information and to buy tickets, visit www.wolvescivic.co.uk