This Saturday, Scottish synth-pop trio CHVRCHES is taking time out of their busy touring schedule to headline the Pygmalion festival. Just one year after the release of their debut album The Bones of What You Believe the band is still going strong, having toured extensively and making appearances at Coachella, Lollapalooza, Bonnaroo, Reading and Leeds, and many more.

We chatted with lead singer Lauren Mayberry about the Glasgow music scene, social media and the band’s creative process.

buzz: What were some of your early experiences with the Glasgow music scene?

Lauren Mayberry: I grew up in the countryside and I moved to Glasgow for university. There’s not a lot of music going on in the countryside. If you wanted to a play a gig, you had to put it on in a town hall or something like that. When I was about 16 I started to go to Glasgow to see gigs, and the first two bands I remember seeing were Jimmy Eat World and Queens of the Stone Age. I think those were pretty good ones to start with.

buzz: How would you describe the local music scene in Glasgow?

LM: The interesting thing about Glasgow is that there isn’t really a “Glasgow sound.” There are a lot of different kinds of bands and a variety of music. It’s got a really good mixed musical heritage, I think.

buzz: You guys have really blown up over the past few years. At what point did you take a step back and realize that this was turning into something huge?

LM: For us, we’re still kind of in the middle of it. We’re still working pretty hard so we try not to focus on that stuff. We try to focus on the shows and keep our heads down but I think we’re going to take a break in December, so maybe it’ll start to hit us then.

buzz: Social media has become such an integral part of the music industry. Were you met with any resistance from management when it came to wanting to run your own social media?

LM: We were very careful about what we signed, so we generally don’t have anyone telling us what to do. We spent the first three years of this band making sure that we were doing things in a certain way so that people wouldn’t push us around. For me, social media is important because I grew up being into bands and being apart of message boards. When you’re growing up and you’re really into a band, it’s nice if they can take the time to get back to you. You should try to create a positive community, help people meet each other, and just be generally positive especially when there are a lot of terrible, terrible things out in the world. I think that’s quite nice.

buzz: Are there any fan interactions in particular that stick out to you?

LM: The other day someone put up a picture of their school notebook, and they had put a picture of us on it. I never thought I would be in a band that would get to the point where people would be doing that. I was definitely the kid that was doing things like that. It always startles me when people get so excited about us favoriting tweets and things. I’ve never used twitter personally, so I’ve only used it as bands and stuff. When people are like “Oh my god, CHVRCHES just favorited my tweet, I’m freaking out!” I’m kind of just like “okay!” but I think it’s kind of nice to do. It only takes a minute out of your day to scroll through and favorite a few tweets and it makes so many people happy. We get a lot of people sending us fan art through Instagram as well. Some of them are really good and others are kind of ridiculous, but either way people are taking the time to make them so it’s pretty awesome.

buzz: You’ve written in the past about sexism on social media. In light of that, have you ever considered distancing yourself from the Internet? Have the negatives ever outweighed the positives?

LM: Just because you can’t see it, doesn’t mean it isn’t there. I’m sure it would probably make me feel better sometimes, but I don’t think that I should be bullied into silence. It just means that those people have won. There are definitely days where I’m like “okay, I’m not going to be on the internet today because I don’t feel tough enough” but I kind of feel like backing down and admitting defeat isn’t a good way to live your life.

buzz: You guys make an effort to be as independent as possible when it comes to making your music. Can you talk a little about the band’s creative process and your experience working with a label?

LM: Me and Martin come from production backgrounds so we’re able to self-record and self-produce. For us, the writing process is the recording process. A lot of the stuff that ended up on the album were things that we didn’t do initially but changed up here and there in the studio. The label knew what they were getting before we signed, so we were pretty lucky in that regard.

buzz: As someone with a background in journalism, have you noticed a difference in the way music writers frame questions directed at you compared to how they treat Martin and Iain?

LM: When we were first starting out, we would definitely get questions for the “girl singer” and questions for the guys. One of the first interviews we did, we sat down and the journalist asked us “Iain and Martin, how do you write the songs?” and I thought, “that’s an interesting assumption you’ve made”. I guess you have to try to be vigilant and challenge those assumptions when they arise. The media is a scary beast and you have to kind of play the game to an extent, but I wouldn’t ever really trust media outlets. Everyone needs a headline and everyone needs an angle.

buzz: What are your impressions of American audiences versus those in the UK?

LM: You notice a lot of cultural differences in terms of how audiences behave. American audiences are a lot more visibly enthusiastic. They dance a lot more and they’re a lot more vocal. On the other hand, we played a festival in Japan and people were reading books in between sets. It’s different, but I think that’s amazing. We’re really lucky to get to experience all of that. Before this band I had never played in America. I had played three or four shows in Europe but beyond that we pretty much stayed in the UK so we’re lucky that so many people want to come to our shows.

buzz: What’s it been like playing so many huge festivals over the past year?

LM: We existed as a band for two festival seasons before we started playing any. We’ve always been careful to hit the ground running while still trying to be aware of what you feel like you’re ready for. I don’t really know if you ever feel like you’re ready to play Coachella, but it comes to a point where you realize that you just need to jump in and that you need to just do this. Coachella was definitely one of the band highlights up to this point because we came out swinging, which is always good. We came in, we gave it all we got, and I think we came out quite fine so, phew, relief!

buzz: What advice would you give to aspiring young artists trying to get their start in music?

LM: Figure out what your convictions are. Figure out what you want to do and what you don’t want to do. Don’t let people tell you what to do. Be as sure as you can of what you’re doing so that when you’re playing it and when you’re recording it you can feel like it’s all yours.

CHVRCHES will perform Saturday from 10:30 to midnight at the Highdive Outdoor Stage 1, followed by a DJ set at the Highdive indoor from 12:30 to 2:00 am.