BBC Introducing... Pickpockets

"Leicester is one hell of a place to be for music at the moment"

Where are you based?

Glen Parva, Wigston and Leicester

How did you get together?

We all knew each other from college and decided to give making a band ago.

However after the original drummer left we heard Dave play one beat on the drums and insisted he play for us!

Who or what are your greatest influences?

Glenn and Omar - Arctic Monkeys, Strokes, Libertines.

Dave and Jon - Alexisonfire, You Me at Six, Deaf Havana.

Don't forget a cheeky bit of Larry Graham and N.W.A though (mostly Dre).

What do you do when you're not making music?

Check out other local bands, eat chicken and play X-Box 360.

What do you make of the music scene in Leicestershire and Rutland?

Leicester is one hell of a place to be for music at the moment.

There's loads of bands about making cracking tunes playing some pretty exciting gigs. We'd like to think we come under that category.

Who are your favourite local bands at the moment and why?

The Heroes are an older group than us that we really look up too.

Their guitarist has helped me out loads with general pearls of wisdom and they make pretty good tunes on top of that.

Where have you toured? Do you have any singles out?

We played Brixton, London earlier on in the year which was a good laugh.

We'd like to sort out some coach trips to some other Midlands places soon, such as Birmingham and Nottingham.

We'll be releasing a single onto iTunes next year so watch this space!

Best gig so far?

Valentines Day. It was an early gig for us so we still weren't sure how to play our songs properly but the crowd were absolutely brilliant. They were mad for it!

And worse?

The band hope to release a new single in the new year

We went up to a place called Hallaton to play, which our guitarist couldn't come to. So as a three piece it was... eventful.

If you could change one thing about Leicestershire what would it be?

More attention drawn to unsigned artists.

What's been your most embarrassing music themed moment?

Well we were "advertising" one of our gigs a few months ago and there was an incident with a riot van to say the least.

What's the best line you've ever written?

I Won't Apologise - "I could not get a word in, I could hear your mate, the one with the double chin".