Rhian Teasdale, one half of the hotter than hot Isle of Wight duo, Wet Leg, writes exclusively for News OnTheWight about receiving Four Brit Award nominations and 18 months of touring. In her own words. Ed
When Hester and I conceptualised the band, we never thought anything like this would happen!
We just wanted to start a band so that in the summer we might get lucky enough to be booked by a festival we wanted to go to and get in for free. Festival tickets are not cheap!
Strange and cool
It was a very strange feeling when we realised that perhaps we were gonna be too busy with music to continue our current day jobs. And as soon as we did, stuff just got more and more surreal.
We really can’t believe we just got nominated for four Brits! It’s very cool and very strange haha.
Keeping good people around you is key
It been incredible so far. Lots of highs, lots of laughing, lots of being silly and playing music and seeing new places as a group of friends.
But with all the highs comes some lows; noticing that touring and the music industry in general can be a bit of a minefield when you’re as fresh to it as we are, keeping good people around you is key.
A relentless touring schedule
It’s been a very steep learning curve for everyone in the band to adjust to such a relentless touring schedule.
But for the most part we’re happy (most of the time), healthy (most of the time) and are really lucky to have one another to look out for each other on the road. (All the time).
Hard working, kind, generous and hilarious people
On top of this, I must say that our touring crew have been absolutely key to keeping the Wet Leg motor running.
Our crew are the most hard working, kind, generous and hilarious people you will ever meet and if I have the opportunity to say anything meaningful in this article it’s that without our crew, the family that we’ve build around us, I don’t think we’d be standing anywhere near half as tall as we are right now.
Shout out for Karima
I especially want to shout out Karima Kingsley who has believed in us from the very start and has driven up and down the country with us in a tiny stinky van just to do our sound, at the same time as being our tour manager.
We have a much bigger team on the road with us now and instead of tiny vans and playing Tetris with our gear every night we’re on a giant double decker tour bus.
So yeah, big shout out to Karima for helping build our fantastic team and for believing in us from the very beginning.
Wet Leg now have 536,400 followers on TikTok, 310,000 followers on Instagram, 61,600 followers on Twitter and 59,000 followers on Facebook.
Buy the album
If you haven’t already, you can order your copy of the band’s debut album, Wet Leg, through Ventnor Exchange or AAA Records in Newport.
Article edit
4pm 15th Jan 2023 – Amended headline from “Teasdale on navigating ” to “Teasdale writes about …”
8pm 15th Jan 2023 – Tweaked the headline
