With their debut album, Who Let The Dogs Out, launching at number one in the UK Rock & Metal chart and following a blistering run of in-store gigs up and down the country, Loverboy was lucky enough to catch up with Brighton’s Phoebe Lunny (guitar/vocals – she/they) and Lily Macieira (bass- she/they), otherwise known as the inimitable Lambrini Girls.

Ahead of their upcoming world tour, the duo took time out to talk about their ferociously fun album; their hasty, but effective, writing process; their reaction to reactions and how important it is to stand up and shout out for others, as well as cartwheeling on stage in front of Iggy Pop.

Lambrini Girls, really appreciate you taking the time to talk to us today!
Lily: Thank you for having us, mate. It’s an honour!
Phoebe: Yeah. Thanks for having us.

First of all, obviously massive congratulations on the release of the album. Did you celebrate?
Lily: Not really. We didn’t have time. The day before we did this long photo shoot and the next day was our in-store tour. So we just went to a pub and did a Bandcamp live thing which was really fun. Then we had to drive an hour to the hotel. So it was pretty unceremonious to be honest. We originally planned to have a bit of a release party on a boat and they were like, ‘No, it’s too cold. It’s too expensive.’

Brutal!
Lily: Yeah.

Raincheck it, definitely. The reception to the album has been crazy. What kind of reaction were you expecting and whose outraged opinion have you enjoyed the most?
Phoebe: It’s good to ruffle some feathers but I don’t think I’ve enjoyed any of the outrage. When we have loads of Terfs and stuff coming for us, that doesn’t make me happy. It just makes me sad to see the absolute cognitive distance and hate. If you think that this is how they treat us, as these femme-presenting blonde girlies, it shows the realities of how awful it must be for trans women.
One thing we can laugh about is how fucking angry cis men get at what we’re doing. They say things like, ‘Ah, it’s the Spice Girls. It’s Geri Halliwell from Poundland.’ We also get these kinds of comments on our YouTube channel where some guy writes, ‘What happened to music? Why are there no bands like Queen around or The Rolling Stones? This is so shit.’ And it’s just so typical. You can’t do anything but laugh at them. I feel this is a trope that pretty much any female artist gets.
Lily: It’s just silly and it feels kind of sad that they can’t enjoy anything around them because they’re so stuck in whatever happened fucking 50 years ago.

And I guess ironically, there is like a huge swathe of bands that do sound like The Beatles and do sound like The Rolling Stones, but like…
Phoebe: Yeah. This ain’t it. Keep walking.

Yeah, thank God. I imagine you’ve had a lot of press lazily labelling you as simply angry. I felt the album was more hopeful. So what is the biggest misconception about Lambrini Girls?
Lily: There are a fair few and I do think that is one of them. We do get questions a lot like, ‘Why are you so angry?’ And it’s like, ‘How can you not be?’ Also we’re not just conveying anger. Like you said I feel there are a lot of other things going on in Phoebe’s lyrics if you really look. Just because the music is loud and fast people perceive it as something one-dimensional which I don’t think it is. And you know, us being women, we get the whole ‘industry plant’ trope a lot.
Phoebe: People will be like, ‘She’s putting on her accent. She doesn’t talk like that in real life.’ I’m just shouting really loudly. Like, it’s literally just the way I sound.

The album was written in ten days, is that right?
Lily: Thereabouts, yeah.

So how did you manage to keep that kind of pace? Were you sleeping in shifts? Pounding Red Bulls?
Lily: We don’t really know any other ways to write. We’re so busy with work and touring. This time around writing the album has been a lot more intense. We’ve been on tour almost non-stop for about two years now. So the actual songwriting process was cool because we went into a rehearsal space on a farm in the middle of nowhere. There were literally no distractions, no coffee shops, no pubs, nothing. And yeah, I think that worked really well.
Phoebe: Yeah, yeah.
Lily: We’re musicians. We love writing songs. I think people sometimes forget that because the politics takes precedence which is fine. Obviously, we want to talk about these things and we want people to discuss them as well.

At the moment my favourite track is ‘Love’. The breakdown in the middle is just so good! Can you tell us more about this song? And also is love overrated?
Phoebe: No, love is not overrated. The song itself is about mistaking toxicity and then coming away from something horrible and feeling really disillusioned with this idea of what you think love is. But all of the things that are described and referred to as love in the song aren’t love at all. It’s like, you know, when you mistake control and possessiveness for deep care. You’ve just got this really skewed idea of what love is, because that’s how you’ve been conditioned.
Lily: That’s also one of my favourites. I like the sounds we use in it and musically, it’s something I’ve never done before, playing harmonics on a bass with reverb. Kind of untraditional, I guess. And yeah, I think dynamically I really love it because of that middle bit you pointed out. I always knew that Phoebe was an amazing guitarist and I was really excited for her to add some little finger picky bits and stuff. It’s always really beautiful. I’m like, ‘I could listen to this forever.’

Do you think that being queer and being punk are lifestyles that innately go hand-in-hand with each other. Is being punk a natural part of queer growth?
Lily: I think to an extent. I think punk is merely a questioning of the status quo. To question that I think is part of what punk is. And in terms of queerness? I feel it is being queer in a way. But personally, I would like to strive for a world in a future where it’s not something challenging or provoking to be queer. I would like it to be widely accepted that different people have different definitions and orientations. We’re all so diverse as human beings, I’d love to see a day where that was known and accepted.

The album was mixed by Seth Manchester, who worked with the incredible Model/Actriz. Could you see yourself collaborating with them or are there any other bands you would like to collaborate with?
Lily: I think that would be fucking sick. But I don’t really know how these things happen because we don’t know them personally. So we can’t just be like, ‘Hey, do you want to do a song with us?’ But theoretically, yes, I would absolutely love to. I would love to work with a lot of bands like Gilla Band, Mandy, Indiana. I’d love to work with CLT DRP as well. They’re one of my favourite bands. I’d like to do a song with Amyl.

Outstanding choices! So if you could choose an artist, queer or otherwise, to co-headline with, alive or dead or on hiatus, who would that be?
Phoebe: Divine! Divine!
Lily: Oh, my God. Yes. That’s a great shout, yes!
Phoebe: They would just be so sick. Like ‘Here’s a microphone. Have some fun.’
Lily: Yeah. And ‘We’ll provide the soundtrack. You just do whatever.’

I love the crowd interaction at your shows. It’s a real lost art. There’s still such a divide between artists and audience. How important is it to you for you to break that wall and be in the crowd? Are you finding that more difficult now?
Phoebe: I remember when we were playing small shows of like 100 capacity in Brighton, someone said to me, ‘If you guys eventually end up doing big stages like how the fuck are you going to do that?’ I remember being like, ‘I don’t know.’ But I love it. I don’t struggle with it at all.

You guys supported Iggy Pop & Blondie back in 2023. That must have been absolutely wild.
Phoebe: Pretty wild because we were relatively small still and we’d just started doing our own London headlines. We had just sold out a 150 room two days before. So yeah, playing that massive stage was wild. Very alien to us. It was very exciting.
Lily: A lot more people as well. I was unbelievably nervous and I don’t usually get nervous before shows, but obviously that felt like such a big leap. It was like should we be doing this? I didn’t know. I didn’t know what to do, so I just cartwheeled on to the stage.

If in doubt, cartwheel!
Lily: And I’m like, ‘Oh, hello! There’s thousands of people there.’ Luckily, I nailed the cartwheel.

Do you have any advice for girls, gays, theys who want to start a band or a music career?
Phoebe: Don’t let anyone try and change you into something you’re not. People might tell you to do things differently. I say fuck ‘em. Blind delusion and self-belief always help, but it does come down to sheer luck and money. And if you see people doing better than you just keep on fucking trucking and don’t let anyone tell you that you’re less.
Lily: Ignore stupid, wanky gatekeepers. Don’t chase perfectionism. Just prioritise having fun.

Finally we are named after the biggest-selling single of 2001 and we always ask what is your favourite Mariah song?
Phoebe: ‘Fantasy’.
Lily: Good one. Or ‘Why are you so obsessed with me?’ Is that Mariah Carey? ‘Obsessed!’ Yeah, let’s go! I like that one.

Who Let The Dogs Out is out now via City Slang
Lambrini Girls tour EU, UK & US this March-May, for tickets see www.lambrinigirlsband.co.uk

Interview: Tom Le Coyte