Hailing from the Northwest town of Warrington, The Ambersons have been making music together for more than 20 years — and this year is shaping up to be their biggest one yet. 2026 began with their first record deal and continued with the release of singles in anticipation of their debut album, Maps, which is out right now. With a sound that blends fuzz guitars and psychedelia with synths and anthemic hooks, you’d be a fool to mistake their unpopularity for a lack of talent, and their newest record is proof of their talents and synergy. I’ve had the pleasure of interviewing the indie-pop six-piece in anticipation of their debut album. Frontman Stephen “Midge” Fairnington, bass guitar player and songwriter Andy Fairnington and guitar player and songwriter Ben Ashton were kind enough to take some time off and give me an insight into their history, their process of creating Maps, and their place in Warrington’s music scene.

NOTE: The transcript below was edited for brevity. Some of the wording has been changed to make it easier to read. All photographs used with The Ambersons’ written permission. –PanosChris

PanosChris: For any readers who are not familiar with your work, give me the elevator pitch: who are The Ambersons?

Andy Fairnington: We are a six-piece indie-pop and rock band from Warrington, England. We’ve been together a long time; we’ve known each other since we were teenagers and we formed the original band, which was a four-piece, back in 2000 or something like that. A long, long time ago. We bonded over The Band, Bob Dylan’s old backing band, which we all loved and we’ve just evolved over the years and here we are today. Still doing it. We’ve had a couple of breaks in-between with kids and mortgages and this current phase of the band has been going for about four years.

So, you’ve been at it for more than 20 years, almost 25 now.

Stephen Fairnington: Too long we’ve been at it, yeah. [laughs]

Andy: [laughs] Too long. But now we are in a big purple patch, creatively.

Fast forward to December 2023 and you’re doing the Winter Songs show in Warrington’s venue The Pyramid. It was a huge success for you but, most importantly, you ended up recording the show and that live recording – which I had the pleasure of reviewing – was released last year. How did the idea of putting together a show with an orchestra backing come up? I assume it wasn’t easy having to score all the parts for the strings and the trumpets.

Andy: Usually, if I have an idea and Ben [Ashton] likes it or the opposite, and there’s two of us that want to do it, then it is happening. I feel like we can achieve a lot together like that. Whenever one person has an idea and the other person’s not keen on it, then it probably fizzles out. I remember having this idea and just mentioned it to Ben while we were having a beer and he jumped on it straight away and it was like two forces together. We just made it happen. I’m only a mere bass player, but Ben has been the main writer in the band for a long time. And he’s got connections with, uh, sorry, who are they, Ben?

Ben Ashton: It was a network of contacts that just revealed themselves. I went to one person who I knew could play violin, who then knew someone else who then knew someone else, and then it started to come together.

Andy: But the main thing was that Ben was really up for it and then we just plowed on. We had never played with an orchestra before and Ben had to score all the orchestra parts with another musician for all twenty songs we did that night. The venue was up for doing it with us and we sold that show out. We had a couple of friends on stage design, we had sound engineers, monitor engineers, the venue was really great, and it was also the first time we ever met the players — we’d never met them before, never played with them before. We sound-checked in the afternoon and then, all of a sudden, we were on this big stage with an orchestra, with 8 other players and it just sounded incredible. I think I nearly cried when I heard it back, it sounded that good.

Stephen: The important thing, though, is that we’ve got a lot of songs that we don’t typically play live, because it does require that big orchestral sound. That show allowed us to pick out songs that we would normally shy away from playing, because the orchestra brought the songs to life — to how we wanted them to be when we recorded them. That was one of the reasons we wanted to bring the strings and brass in, because it allowed us to play those songs.

Andy: Yeah, it was an amazing night. People are still talking about it now. We’re trying to get it this winter, but the venue’s having a big refurbishment, so we’re just looking for alternative venues. There’s still a little bit of hope for getting it on this year, so we’ll just keep our fingers crossed for that. But yeah, we’d like to get some of the new album tracks in that show, I think it’ll be amazing. But that night was incredible. Probably the best thing we’ve done live in all the years we’ve been together.

Looking back, do you think Winter Songs changed the way you thought about your sound?

Stephen: We’ve always had that kind of big sound; we just never had the chance to replicate it live. But I think it changed the way that we did this new album. It sounds a lot different than what we’ve previously done, because it was a more collaborative effort, we all chipped in on the writing for it. But most importantly, I think that gig saved this band, to be honest. Because at that point, we were wondering whether we should carry on or not. And then, when we played that show and realized how great it sounded with everything that we could do, we decided to push on. And that’s when we got the record deal and everything else kind of came from there. So, it was a pinnacle moment for the band, I think.

Enough foreshadowing; let’s talk about your debut album, Maps. First of all, congratulations! In my review of Winter Songs Act I, I said that I was crossing my fingers that this orchestral sound would inspire you going forward, and I’m happy to report that it did and I’m happy to report that I love the album.

[All]: Thank you so much!

I’m only mad at you for one thing: the release date. Because to me, this is a summer album, and there are songs here that are begging to become summer hits. But I’ll forgive you.

Andy: Well, we did want it to come out in the summer! But because of the number of singles that we had from it, we needed to do a run-up of four singles before the album. The record label proposed we put out a single every four weeks and then the album and that was as early as we could do it. But it is a summer album, I agree. Although there is a song on there called “Puddles”, which is about, uh, rainy puddles.

Stephen: Not sure that’s what it’s about. [laughs]

Ben: Definitely not about puddles. [laughs]

Andy: It’s probably the only song that fits the autumn release date. But thanks for listening, really glad you enjoyed it.

When did you start writing songs for this album specifically?

Andy: We signed up with the record label around about this time last year. But we had already started recording a batch of songs before we even got the deal. So, we were in with about six songs –some old, some new. And then we got the deal with the label, which gave us forward motion to make the album. That’s when things started to come together; Ben had gone away and written a couple of songs.

One of the album’s tracks (and latest single) “Tin Hat Crown” holds special significance as the very first song written by your frontman, Midge. How did that come into fruition?

Stephen: I have never written a song before, but because there was an album coming out, I thought: “Well, I want to put a track down.” Because here’s the thing: every time I’m given a song, it’s usually from Ben or Andy and it’s about their experiences with some failed relationship or something that’s gone wrong in their lives. When I am given a song like that, I try to get my own story in that song. Otherwise, I can’t perform it.

So, this time I thought I should write a song — in my view, a basic song. Just a generic chord sequence and then I relied upon the rest of the band to turn it into something that was actually good. I knew that I couldn’t take a song from an idea right through to production, but I knew that I could take a song as an idea and give it to these guys to make it into an album-worthy song. So yes, it is the first and probably last song I’ll ever do.

How did the rest of the band react to it?

Stephen: The reaction was very good. The reaction was: “Yeah, that’s a great track, we can do something with this” — I remember Ben messaging me saying: “Do you want me to just take this and do what I need to do with it?” I think Ben had an idea in his head of which way the song should go. So, I left him with it and when he sent me a demo back of what his ideas were, I went: “Yeah, that’s it. I would never have thought of that.” And I think that’s how it organically grew through that, it is a level of trust that you give to the band. When you write a song, it’s part of you, it’s part of your journey, and part of your life. To bring that into a practice room means that you’ve got to have a level of trust with these people, because sometimes the song is very emotional or precious to you. But the reaction was very good when I first did it.

More generally, where does a song usually begin? Do music or lyrics come first? And what role does everyone play in bringing a song to life?

Stephen: Generally speaking, you’ve got people bringing songs in and then you’ve got Ben and the others that would add more of a production around those songs. Take, for example, the song that I wrote, “Tin Hat Crown”. Whilst I play guitar, I don’t know it very well, but as I said, I came in with some basic chords and gave them to the likes of Ben and Andy, who would take it to another dimension. So, you bring a song in as a core idea and then the people around you embellish that idea into something more complete. Making this album was more of a collaborative approach, but that’s not how it normally happens; it’s usually more of a dictatorship. Ben would come in with a song and say: “This is it” and that’s how it was, and Andy would come in with a song and say: “This is it” and that’s how it was. But this album was a little bit different, because we had different writers on it, which made it a bit more fun and everybody was kind of involved in the album’s creation.

Ben: Generally, no one ever thinks about Midge. He just gets the song on a sheet of paper. [laughs]

Stephen: I’ll give you an example, I got “Flicker” on the day of recording it. Ben had created the song ahead of time, but I’d never heard it until that day — he gave me a quick demo, I think it was the day before. But on the actual day of recording, that’s when I got the full list of lyrics that was to be recorded.

Ben: I was finishing it in the taxi on the way to the studio. But it was pretty much fully formed. But yeah, no one thinks about Midge. [laughs]

Stephen: You see, I look at that as though they’ve got full confidence in me, Panos. [laughs]

Ben: That’s what it is. [laughs] We don’t worry about the vocal part, we know that bit will be good. You just get locked in a room on your own for two hours.

Stephen: Yeah, I’m alright with that.

The album has a very romantic quality in its music, which is interesting, because the lyrics tell a different story: there’s often a sense of distance or disconnect. Was that tension between the music and the lyrics something you were consciously exploring?

Ben: From my side, it’s exactly how you describe it. My songs aren’t happy ones, but I don’t want to not do happy songs. I don’t really like minor keys or anything like that, so I do put those songs in sounds that aren’t as miserable. But lyrically, you’re right, mine are quite desperate.

So, am I correct to interpret this as a set of songs about longing for connection?

Andy: There’s a theme running through the album; we are a band of a certain age, you know, we’re not 19 or 20, we’re in our 40s, so we all have got lived experiences and there have been ups and downs in life and that’s why the record is called Maps. It felt like these songs were landmarks, sort of signposts in middle age. We’re writing about stuff that’s personal to each person who’s composed the lyrics, but then we want this kind of an upbeat feel to the track. For example, “(I Don’t Hear You) Call My Name” is about detachment but the sound is really upbeat. “The Easy Way” is about battling drug addiction. When struggling with work, with family, with all the general life problems, my easy way out was to go and do drugs. That was my easy way out to forget about everything. So, it is a bit of a stomping rock and roll song with dark lyrics about a dark time, but then it still sounds quite fun. It’s a weird paradox.

Ben: I think what Panos is getting at is: do you deliberately do that where, because the subject matter isn’t something that’s quite sunny, do you couch it in a sunny sound? Is that a deliberate act? Because for me, it kind of is.

Andy: Oh no, not for me. I’m not the greatest lyricist, but I’m a very melodic guy. I’ll have a batch of lyrics that I’ve written down and then I’ll be singing on a sunny day and come up with a melody and it’s just always kind of upbeat and happy and it’s just like: “Well, that’s the song.” It’s not really a thought; it just happens.

“The Way We Used To Feel” might be my favorite song from the album. It sounds like something Phil Collins could have made; there’s a similar emotionality to it. How did this track come into fruition?

Stephen: Mark [Gerrard], who’s the keyboard player, he wrote that song. He wasn’t in the studio at the time and there was a verse that I didn’t know the melody of. So, I had to basically come up with what I thought it should be, because he wasn’t there to correct me.

Andy: Like we said, everyone was writing songs when we got this deal, so Mark brought it in and we actually recorded that on the same weekend as we recorded “Funny Ways”. I didn’t like that song at the beginning. I wasn’t really into it. I thought it was alright, I just didn’t think–

Stephen: Is that how you want to put it in the interview? “I didn’t like that song, mate”? [laughs]

Ben: Put that on record! [laughs]

Andy: — when it was first recorded, I didn’t think it sounded like an Ambersons song. In the context of the album, I think it sounds great. I love it.

Ben: Just, can we get down in black and white that I fought for that song? Only me. No one else wanted it.

Andy: I’m not having that. [laughs]

Stephen: I’ve got the results; I’ve got an Excel spreadsheet of all the votes. That song was at the bottom. [laughs] What attracted you to that song? Was it just the way that the song sounded? Was it the melody?

I think the melody in the chorus is just very hooky; it grabbed me immediately. And I just love the harmonies on this. Does everyone do harmonies on that song?

Stephen: Yeah, that’s our big thing, to be honest. Live or recording, we all participate in the harmonies. We don’t try to record something that we can’t do live as well. If we’re doing harmonies, they’ve got to be able to be reproduced live.

So, you all do harmonies live as well?

Stephen: Correct, yeah.

If I’m not mistaken, you’ve said that you recorded almost 20 tracks for this album, but only 10 made the final cut. Will we ever get to hear those other songs?

Stephen: I think you’ll definitely hear them. Whether you’ll hear them within an album, or as just standalone singles — we’ve already tracked them. They need mixing and mastering, obviously, but you will hear them at some point. For me, what I’m always thinking is this: “What is the next album from The Ambersons? Is it those 12 tracks that didn’t make the album, or is it a completely new batch of tracks — or a combination of new tracks and the ones that we’ve already done?” But we’ve already tracked those and they will be released at some point.

One of my favorite songs from your catalogue is not even a song from you — it’s a feature on “For All the Silence in the World” with Ben and The Believers. How did that collaboration come up?

Andy: Oh man, thank you for mentioning that song. We have known that band for twenty years, we have played with them for a long time. Ben [Titley], the lead singer and writer for Ben and The Believers, had this song and he wanted to do it as a duet with Midge. So, he came into my studio and they recorded it and Midge came in and did the second verse. We did a tour with them last year –I say tour, but it was, like, six gigs or something — and we ended up getting up on stage and performing it live with them. They’re a good bunch of guys and that’s a great song, one of the best songs I’ve ever recorded in my studio. I will pass that message on to Ben, he’ll be really happy with that.

Are you interested in collaborating with other artists in the future?

Andy: If the right project comes along, for sure. If that song with Ben was a bit rubbish and we didn’t like it, they wouldn’t have done anything on it. But if an artist wants to collaborate, we’d be open to that.

Stephen: When we started off, we were very much “We are The Ambersons — that’s it, that’s all we do.” But with age, you start to expand a little bit. And you’re okay to collaborate with different people. In the past, we used to chase a dream to be signed, to be famous, to make money. But that’s not really where we’re at anymore. Where we’re at now is to make good music, whether that’s within the band or with somebody else. It’s about the enjoyment of music — being together as musicians, as friends — whether that’s The Ambersons, Ben & Believers or somebody else, it doesn’t make any difference. That’s why we do this. We don’t do it for anything else other than just because we enjoy it. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be doing it.

How have your recent gigs been going for you? I assume you’ve been playing songs from the new album — how are they being received?

Andy: People are enjoying the gigs and buying merch, there have been some five-star reviews, it’s been really good. We’re headlining a new music stage tomorrow but the forecast says it might be cold with thunderstorms — but we’ll do the show! I’m really enjoying these gigs, they represent the band at our current state and we enjoy playing the new songs. It’s been loads of fun, man.

Stephen: Here’s my take on it: when we first started the summer sets with the new songs, I was more nervous. Because obviously with the previous set, we had been doing it for a long time; this new set had come along, and we’ve got new songs in there, new lyrics, new everything, and we had to kind of adapt to it. Over the last two to three months, we’ve been doing that and each one has gotten better and better.

I believe it was you, Andy, who praised Warrington’s live scene and described it as thriving. Not only that but you’ve headlined your local music festival many times and also created a recording studio there called Big Pink Music to make music recording accessible to newer artists. For all of us who aren’t from the UK, what makes the music scene in Warrington unique?

Stephen: Warrington’s always been a very good town for music and it has spawned a lot of musicians in the industry. But because we’ve been together for so long, we’ve seen a decline in the Warrington music scene. When we joined the band, it was thriving. And then it kind of took a dip, but now it’s back on that upward trend. In these last four years, a lot more venues have opened up, a lot more interesting live music has been active and that’s what we’re hoping to ride the wave on now.

Andy: Warrington is equal distance from Manchester and Liverpool, two big music cities, so there have always been places to play. If you’re a musician in Warrington, you’ve always got an outlet for your music in terms of live performances. I think there’s not much to do in England, because it rains all the time. You either play football, or you’re a musician. [laughs]

Before we wrap up, I want to ask: After more than twenty years of making music independently and doing so many shows and becoming an established part of Warrington’s scene, how does it feel to have a complete artistic statement like Maps out in the world?

Stephen: I’ll tell you what it is for me. Whether it goes global or not, I don’t put much thought into that. I want to have songs that I can actually pass down to my kids, my family, my friends –everyone else can see what I’ve done and actually listen to it and once it’s done and out as an album, it’s eternal. It’s there forever, right? Now, whether it’s something that will ever make me a lot of money or not, I don’t really care about that. The album is something that means a lot to me, it is something that we have produced together as friends and as a band. And that’s the main thing, as far as I’m concerned. We’ve done singles, we’ve done EPs, but we’ve never done an entire album. And like I said, it’s a collaborative approach, it’s collective work that is released for everybody else to see, and it is there forever.

Andy: It feels great — I want to really enjoy this album release and do all the press. I want to talk about it and really enjoy the moment. But then, it’s been made since — God, it’s been months, probably about four months now. So, as a creative bunch of people, we’re already moving on in our heads to, like, what we could be doing next. So, although this is a good moment for us, I’m thinking about what can the next slot be? I actually want to book us a cottage in Wales and hunker down for three days and demo a new EP or something like that and do it together in a room. So, it’s two parts for me. I want to enjoy this moment, but automatically you start thinking, “Well, what’s next?”

So, what do you hope people take away from the album?

Andy: I hope it makes people smile, I hope it makes people get a bit emotional. I hope it makes people think. I want them to sing it loud in their car, or on the way to work, or if it’s a rainy day and they’re feeling a bit down. I just want people to really enjoy the album, as much as I’ve enjoyed it and connect to it.

Stephen: If somebody’s feeling down, and they want to put “Puddles” on and listen to that, or somebody’s feeling happy and want to put something more upbeat on, then great. That’s what I want people to do.

Andy: I’ve said it elsewhere: this album has songs that will make you think, songs that will make you dance, songs that will make you cry and everything in between. I think it’s got every single emotion going on in there and that’s why I think it’s a great piece of work.

Well, thank you for taking the time for this interview. And once again, congratulations on your new album. Take care!

[All]: Cheers, man — thank you so much! Have a good night.

---

Official siteThe Ambersons’ YouTubeFacebook