Adult Leisure are an alt-pop fourpiece born during the COVID lockdowns. During the pandemic, members of different Bristol acts, like Moon Club, Aztecs and Towers, who had become friends after spending time together on the same bills during the 2010s, decided to start something new. The band’s drummer, Nathan Searle, explains: “We’ve actually known each other for a long, long time; I’d say probably over ten years. Yeah, and we’re all kind of from Bristol, yeah, all in different projects, and I think we’ve probably all been out of projects for a couple of years. Then I had a text off of Neil [Scott, the band’s vocalist] one day, saying, ‘Do you want to do something?’ because he was doing something with James [Laing, the band’s bassist] and Dave [Woolford, the band’s guitarist], and it kind of went from there, really. And, it’s just…yeah, just been growing from there.” From there, the band would exist mainly online, and practices would be conducted over Zoom calls.


Once the project was solidified, they needed a name. Dave explains the reasoning behind their decision to go with Adult Leisure. “When we were sort of looking for names, there’s a song by Bowie, called ‘Teenage Wildlife,’ and I was just like, ‘I’m just going to nick that, and maybe change it to “Adult Wildlife.”’ So, that’s how we got the ‘Adult,’ and then the ‘Leisure’ part, I’m not quite sure how we settled on that, but we kind of liked it, because it sounds like it should be rude, but it’s not. Like, if you actually look at it, it’s completely…it’s innocent, but it sounds like…You know, you tell certain people the name, and they think, ‘God, that’s a bit naughty, that, Adult Leisure.’ I think it’s ‘cause it’s so close to ‘Adult Pleasure,’ which is rude. Very naughty.


“But, yeah, it was just a combination…We liked it, though, because I think, for us, it just meant for us, as you get older, the mundane things in life that you get to do, that aren’t necessarily fun, but you consider them your little getaway or break, all these things are adult leisures. Rather than being childlike and having all these massive dreams, you kind of just go, ‘Oh, do you know what I like? I like having a lie-in on a Sunday. And it’s like, there you go, that’s your little adult leisure, there; that’s your little boring remedial thing you get to look forward to, as you’re older.”

The band decided during lockdown to release music before people could even have the opportunity to see them live, therefore giving them a leg up when it came to having material out when they could start performing. The result was immediate, and Adult Leisure saw popularity like none of their other projects prior could have hoped for. For Dave and Nathan, the biggest surprise was being able to leave the familiar comfort of Bristol and find that their shows were selling out across the UK, and that more than just their mates were listening to them.

“I think it’s the most sort of cohesive unit I’ve ever been a part of,” says Dave, on how this band differs from the other projects that he has been involved with. “I think that, sometimes you’re in bands and, for whatever reason, things don’t work or, you know, understandably life gets in the way of things. Whereas, in this group, it’s kind of like everyone is on completely the same wavelength, which is, ‘We’re going to give it a shot,’ do you know what I mean? ‘This is, like, our chance to, like, really go out and push it.’ And to have three other people all in the same mindset, and then to see what we’ve done in such a short amount of time, compared to, like, you know, I think we were all in our old bands for at least four, five, six years, and what we achieved in Adult Leisure in not even a year completely eclipses what any of us did previously. So, I think it just goes to show [what you can do], if you are all on the same page and you know that the quality of the material is good.”

“It’s a whole ‘nother level to stuff that I’ve done in the past,” adds Nathan. “It’s been exactly like Dave said. We formed a unit, we created a team of people, and it’s not just us; it’s the help from other people around us as well, you know? It’s the help from everybody who takes photos for us, who does all of our graphic stuff. We’re kind of building a family, and I think that’s what we’ve got within this project: we’ve got that kind of family feeling. And we just work together so well; there’s so much cohesion. I think that’s what kind of differs from that, and it’s just the dedication from everyone, as well. Like, this is what we want to do, this is where we want to be, and we’re all on the same page and that, in a nutshell, that’s what’s different.”

The band themselves are extremely proactive and versatile in their songwriting, sitting on probably several albums worth of music already. Last December, the band put out their first EP, The Weekend Ritual, which was a melodic post-punk-inspired five track serving, with some Johnny Marr-influenced jangling guitar throughout. Only half a year later, the band are already gearing up towards the release of their second EP, with “Bad Idea,” a synthy, new wave-esque rock track, as its first single, giving an indication of just how different the band can get.

“I think it’s different,” says Dave on the new EP. “When we first started, we first had our influences. Our first EP is very much just finding our feet. […] It was like a patchwork quilt, where you’re kind of going, ‘Right, these are our ideas,’ and I think now what we decided is…I write songs in little pockets, so there’ll be three or four or five songs that will all sound like ‘Bad Idea,’ they can all sit in the family of that kind of sound.

“But also, we are really conscious, and the bands that we admire, they don’t abide by the rules of, ‘Well, we’re this. We’re this type of music.’ For example, one of my favourite bands is Talking Heads. Now, ‘Psycho Killer’ is totally different from ‘This Must Be the Place,’ but it’s all Talking Heads. So, that’s the band we want to be; we want to be a band where it’s kind of like, ‘If you liked that, brilliant, but we’re not going to do that for you, ten times over.’ It’s going to be something different, and hopefully something good, until we’re in our forties and that’s when we’ll start making the awful shite that no-one cares about!”

On what to expect from the new EP, Dave says, “’Bad Idea,’ I would say, there’s probably one other song on the EP that sounds similar to ‘Bad Idea.’ Then we have two others on there at the moment and, again, they would be like a feather to a bow, basically. They aren’t like ‘Bad Idea,’ but they’re still Adult Leisure. But I would say, for people who liked ‘Happiness’ off the first EP, they like the sort of punkier one, it’s probably not going to be like that.

“We want to be… – going back to what I said earlier – with our type of music, it’s going to be different each time but remaining – and I will die on this hill – it has to be catchy. So many people, when they consider art for art’s sake, and I get it, not everybody wants a chorus and stuff like that, but I think there’s a lot of denial about what makes people popular, and as long as you embrace it and you can dress it in whatever you like, but they have to be catchy, and that’s it.”

Adult Leisure’s latest single “Bad Idea” is available to stream from today. You can follow the band on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. For a much more extensive interview expanding on the topics discussed in this article, as well as Dave and Nathan also discussing touring the UK, stories from on the road, their versatility, how Adult Leisure could only exist today, the correct pronunciation of the band’s name, how they feel they fit into the music scene of today and more, tune into the latest edition of POSTBURNOUT.COM Interviews…, premiering today on YouTube at 17:00 and will be available on all other streaming platforms after.

See Adult Leisure on their upcoming Bad Idea Tour of the UK this June. They will be performing at:

16^th – London – The Old Blue Last

17^th – Southampton – Heartbreakers

18^th – Brighton – The Green Door Stage

19^th – Bath – Moles

21^st – Birmingham – The Sunflower Lounge

22^nd – Leeds – Northern Guitars Cafe Bar

24^th – Sheffield – Record Junkee

26^th – Newcastle upon Tyne – Little Buildings

27^th – Hull – Polar Bear Music Club

Aaron Kavanagh

Aaron Kavanagh is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Post-Burnout. His writing can also be found in the Irish Daily Star, Buzz.ie, Totally Dublin, The GOO, Headstuff, New Noise Magazine, XS Noize, DSCVRD and more.