Lia Metcalfe was just nine years old when she stepped on to her first festival stage. It was 2011 at Guilfest, and the future Mysterines vocalist/ guitarist was hauled up by Bez from the Happy Mondays. “He gave me a set of maracas and my friend a foghorn, and we went on stage and introduced The Noisettes,” she recalls now. “It’s on YouTube somewhere.”
Metcalfe was destined for touring life. Her dad Andrew Metcalfe was the vocalist in noughties indie band the Sound Of Guns, and often took his daughter on the road with him. As a result she spent her childhood hanging around backstage at gigs and festivals, being mesmerised by artists from the side of the stage. “I remember seeing [prog-poppers] MGMT and I just thought they were really fucking cool,” she says. “It was around the time I’d started learning guitar and wanting to be in a band.”
By the time she was 14 she’d formed The Mysterines with bassist George Favager (they met in a Home Bargains store).
