Gainsborough: Sam and The Introspects have a chance to shine on the big stage

Sam Gosiewski and his band The Introspects have won the Scotland and North East section of SoundWaves 2015, a national competition to give unsigned bands their chance to make a breakthrough into the industry.

As a result, Sam and his band will now get to play on the main stage at the O2 Arena in Sheffield in the new year.

Among the audience then will be some of the industry’s top insiders and A&R people.

“We’ve come through heats and various stages from about 1,000 down past various judges and finally to playing on the main stage at the Sheffield O2,” said Sam.

“We were happy to get through the first few stages but then we kept getting through and thinking ‘okay, this is good’ and now suddenly we’re through to this.

“We’re all very happy about it and we;re really looking forward to it.”

“It’s not the sort of place you get to play very often as small local band.

“We’re essentially just four guys who play music together and we’re all really proud of what we’ve achieved.”

“When we play there, we’ll be playing against other regional winners from around the country.

“But we’ll also have all these record label people and industry people there judging us too, not that we haven’t been judged already.

“But the fact they’re there makes it a little more never-wracking.”

The band consists of Sam on guitar, Jim Beecroft on bass, Jack Tremellen on drums and Jack Constantine on vocals.

They have been together for around two years and class their sound as rock indie.

As well as the Sheffield O2 gig, the prize for winning their section of SoundWaves includes radio, newspaper and magazine coverage, a photoshoot and the chance to record a CD with professional producers.

But ti’s the live element and the chance to be noticed by the influential people in the industry that excites Sam.

“As well as the O2 we’ll be playing gigs in London and we played in Sheffield just last week,” he continued.

“We’re headlining another night in Sheffield and then the promoter has some London venues they can get us into .”

“It’s quite an achievement to have got to this stage and the A&R people and record labels are the last ones we’ve got to impress now.

“But we’re delighted we’ve managed to impress a lot of judges already and hopefully we can do that again when we play the O2 in the new year.”