"Isn't that a picture of a man at his absolute lowest point? Just retching whilst shaving!" Notion meets a fragile morning-after Luke Taylor, guitarist and lyricist from the Hot Puppies. It's just a few hours after the band finally got to sleep following the last night of their UK tour at Water Rats (King's Cross), and all of them are feeling the effects. Not that the Puppies are your average testosterone-fuelled sex, drugs and rock'n'roll cliché. Rather, their throwback romanticism and lyrical tale-telling is setting them apart for the indie kids and charming critics along the way. Chat about the scene allows bassist Ben Faircloth to spit some bile: 'Razorlight's new album has just been called the great rock album of the decade or something. It's ridiculous!' 'And they've been compared to Bruce Springsteen,' adds Luke. 'Are they assuming people haven't heard 'Born To Run' and are just going to believe them? That’s just laughable. Laughable!' Here the boys break into a chorus of their most outrageous pantomime laughter as the other three Puppies look on, bemused.

So there are five in the band, Beck(y) Newman (vocals), Beth Gibson (keyboard and vocals) and Bert Wood (drums) completing the line-up. Beck and Bert are a couple, as are Beth and Luke. As delicious a scandal some serious postshow orgy resulting in these blissful couplings might have been, the lovers' have actually all been together from the start. So we can be sure they'll never be short of raw emotion to carve tunes from but... isn't it all a little bit Fleetwood Mac? 'It's a little fucked up,' grins Beck. 'But no-one's blown cocaine up my arse recently!' Luke continues, rallying boisterous laughter from the rest of the group. 'It is one of the things that people always ask,' he continues when the noise dies down, 'but if that's all you've ever known, it’s not really that odd. It's probably odd if you're used to being a bunch of blokes in a band together who play out and pull girls afterwards. To me, that would be odd. I would find that quite strange!' Over to Beck: 'In our couples, we've been together for bloody ages. It's always been that way'.

So there's no fear that a relationship might splinter and bring the band down with it? Cue five shaking heads. 'If you’re in a relationship with somebody for a long time, explains Luke, who is easily the most talkative Puppy, ‘you can’t really think, ‘Well, who’s going to get this flat if we break up?' You can't really think like that if you’re in a relationship.' 'And also,' adds Beck, 'say if we split up, it would be so devastating that I probably wouldn't care so much about the band. I'd think 'Shit, I've just ruined the best thing in my life.' I wouldn’t think, 'Oh shit, the band's going to break up.' 'I would!' bellows Bert, to a healthy chorus of laughter and a 'Wanker!' from Luke in mock indignation.

Since their debut album 'Under The Crooked Moon' was brought out by Fierce Panda last summer the have been touring hard and building an ecstatic following with their bittersweet somg-smithery. Ben confirms, 'Last night was really good - it makes coming to London an absolute joy. We all go home happy rather than sulking!' 'It's a bit of a shock though,' Beck chimes in. 'Like last night, you finish the song and there’s huge applause and screams and it's like, 'What?' And then you look out and there's someone singing along, and not just to a chorus. And it feels wonderful.' 'There can be a big contrast between gigs,' reasons Bert. 'I mean, certain nights it might not have come over that way. But when it's right, it's right.'

WORDS: MISCHA PEARLMAN

PHOTOGRAPH: DAVID RYLE