NME, Clash and more love them already - meet Cowboyy who support Pip Blom at The Wedgewood Rooms in Independent Venue Week

​Numerous music magazines and online tastemakers have been queuing up to heap superlatives on the south-coast four-piece, from NME to Dork, Louder Than War, Clash, Gigwise and many more.

The band is the brainchild of Stanley Powell, who may be familiar to local gig-goers as the guitarist in indie-rockers Flowvers.

The project began as a solo outlet for his spikier, post-rock impulses, but has become a full-fledged band with Stanley taking on the frontman role.

Stanley began playing with bassist Reubin Yarnold, and rhythm guitarist Kai Smith after the first pandemic lockdown. Drummer Rhys Teal joined several months later, cementing the line-up.

‘Before it was just Stanley Powell doing some music I recorded at home,’ he says, ‘but now it's like a proper band. The dirty secret of Cowboyy is that it's a solo project, but I want it to be a band! ‘I love jazz and all kinds of electronic stuff and weird instrumentation – music that's a bit out there. I wanted to do a pop version of some of the stuff that I like, so it takes some of those pop songwriting ideas and structures and applies them to some experimental stuff.

‘I've had the ideas and songs, some of them have been on Logic on my laptop for ages.’

With Stanley based in Havant, Rhys in Brighton, Reubin in Southampton and Kai in Bournemouth, the band are well spread out along the coast. And with things picking up for them, Stanley admits that the logistics of getting together for rehearsals is the biggest problem they face right now: ‘It's more of a money thing – the price of train tickets is the biggest thing!’

But the wave of praise off the back of their first shows in London and at The Great Escape in Brighton – before they’d even released a single – keeps them focused.

‘It's really cool – you don't want to say it, but as an artist there's a certain level of validation – do people like it, do people think its good? You can say "I do it for me", but that's always going to be there. All the stuff that's come back has been mega-positive. I wouldn't have expected half of the things that have been said - whenever we get them, it's like: “Wow!”’

And they’re also gelling as a unit: ‘The last two gigs we've played, we turned to each other and said, this feels real now, we've got over the nerves and we're feeling like a band. The last two gigs feel like the first real gigs. This first year we've been finding our feet and we've got really lucky and got in front of the right people and had some great feedback, but I think the goal for last year was to prepare ourselves for this year! We really want to give it a big crack this year – do as many dates as we can and get in front of as many people as we can.’

Cowboyy have released two singles so far, Gmaps and Tennis, with a six-track EP, Epic The Movie pending on March 10.

‘A big thing a lot of people say about us is that our recordings are quite different to our live set – which is intentional. It's the same sound, but they're a bit more intense, a bit more heavy, and we jam them out a bit more. The rest of the EP is pretty in line with the first two singles.’

But not one to rest on his laurels, Stanley is already looking ahead – and has been busy writing more material. ‘The idea at first was for a second EP, but there's already about 11 tracks, so it will probably be our first album. We've recorded the first three songs already.’

And then of course, there’s his other band Flowvers, who are still very much a going concern too.

‘I'm still doing stuff with Flowvers – we're working on an EP at the moment, and I think the first single is due next month or the month after… It's very busy!’

They support Dutch indie-poppers Pip Blom at The Wedgewood Rooms, Southsea, on Monday, January 6 as part of Independent Venue Week. Go to wedgewood-rooms.co.uk.They play their first local headline show at neu waves at The Loft, Southsea, on April 6.