Josh Hicks on the Pure Local Extra show

This isn’t Josh’s first time on the show, he came in a few months ago. This time, he had more to talk about and a new single to promote, but we’ll get into that later.

Firstly, Josh talked about his journey into music. It started with GCSE and A Level music. He didn’t do particularly well in it but he decided to power through since he loved the subject so much. This lead to him going to University and pursing a music based course, however Covid soon hit. While at home, he applied to Open Mic UK and ended up winning. Since then, he’s being going solo.

The next topic was music he listened to growing up. He listened to a range of music – his Dad liking Queen and his mum liking Kylie Miniogue. Quite a mix of music. As he grew up he became more interested in Jazz and more “adult” music.

Leading on from that was musical influences now. The music from his parents had a little influence on him but not greatly. Some of the artists that influence Josh now are the likes of Amy Winehouse, Adele, Duffy, loads more.

Next up was the creative process in creating a song. He said that he struggles to write listening to a track – he has to play and feel the music, it helps with the melody. As for the meaning behind a song, sometimes he knows what it means, other times he has no clue. When writing, sometimes the melody comes to him straight away and he has to play it straight away.

We listened to many of Josh’s songs throughout the show. One of which was Home Is Where The Heart Is. He gave us some insight into the song. It came from having to come back home from University during the pandemic. He was torn between staying home and going back after everything opened again. He ended up choosing to stay home. 

The topic of instruments came up and Josh said that he’d like to learn guitar or bass, two instruments that you can do a lot with. He said that if you were to ask him when he was younger he would’ve picked something completely different and say violin.

Finally, we discussed his newest single, which is to be released soon. Its a song with an uplifting message and about being proud of the people you love. It’s only just been sent off for mastering, so you should be hearing this mysterious song very soon.

You can listen to the full show here