INTERVIEW: Bailey Tomkinson on new single 'Supermoon': "There’s this outdated idea that women can’t “rock” as hard or aren’t as technical...it only made me more determined to prove people wrong."

Published: 10 July 2025

British singer Bailey Tomkinson hails from Cornwall and has earned the moniker ‘coastal cowgirl’ since she first released music back in 2018. Originally starting off with a country pop sound, her artistry has evolved over the years into a warm, delicious take on the 1960s-1970s Californian style, which she calls Kernowfornia (Kernow being the Cornish language term for Cornwall)

Tomkinson came to national attention in the UK in 2020 when her single ‘I Wish (It Didn’t End Like This)’ stormed to the top of the iTunes Music Video Chart, beating out releases from global superstars like Dua Lipa and Miley Cyrus. Originally releasing music as a solo artist, last year she converted her act into a band, Bailey Tomkinson & The Locals, its members made up of musicians who had been performing with Tomkinson for many years. This year, the band’s potential was recognised with them appearing in BBC Introducing’s Ones To Watch list for 2025.

She recently released the new single ‘Supermoon’. It brings in a perky, poppier soundscape after a number of rockier releases, with soaring melodies in the chorus, some lush backing vocals and a saxophone solo, evoking a hint of nostalgia for 1980s glam pop as well as the California sound she is known for.

Lyrically, the song explores that moment of finding you are attracted to a passing stranger, even though you are happy in a committed relationship. ‘Oh baby it’s just make believe…I was just window shopping / It doesn’t mean I don’t love you,’ she sings.

“‘Supermoon’ puts words to the things we all feel but rarely say - that quiet, guilty moment of noticing someone else, even when you’re happy in your relationship,” Tomkinson says.

After recently performed a headline show in London, Tomkinson and her band will continue performing live over the next few months with appearances at September Festival on 21 September and Kernowfornia Festival on 27 September. The band will also play a series of stripped back solo sets across Cornwall, while also planning a major UK headline tour towards the end of the year and an EP release.

With a lighthearted and carefree sound coupled with exceptionally strong storytelling, Bailey Tomkinson & The Locals create music that lets you escape entirely into the sounds and forget the outside world. It is easy to see why Tomkinson has been touted as the UK’s next big artist, and ‘Supermoon’ is evidence of her talent and charisma as a performer. We recently caught up with Tomkinson to chat all about ‘Supermoon’ and her music career to date.

Hi Bailey! It is lovely to chat to you today, thank you for your time. How is everything in your world right now?
Honestly, everything’s great at the moment. It’s been a whirlwind lately with the new single out and so many exciting things happening, but I’m loving every minute of it. Life is pretty busy – in the best way – and I’m feeling super energised. I’m down in St Ives most of the time, right by the beach, so whenever I get a spare moment, I’ll go for a surf or just enjoy some Cornish sunshine to recharge. Overall, I’m happy, busy, and grateful to be doing what I love.

As you mentioned, you have just released your new single ‘Supermoon’. You have said this song is about having your head turned by someone else when you are already in a happy relationship. Can you tell me more about the inspiration behind this track?
‘Supermoon’ came from a very real, slightly uncomfortable truth. It’s about that quiet, guilty moment when you catch yourself drawn to someone else even though you’re happily committed. I think it’s something a lot of people experience but rarely admit – that flicker of ‘Oh, they’re interesting…’ followed immediately by ‘wait, what am I thinking?’ I wanted to be really honest about that feeling instead of dressing it up.

For me, writing the song was a way to confront those emotions openly and without judgment. It doesn’t mean anything is wrong with your relationship; it’s more about being human and how instinct can surprise you. The title ‘Supermoon’ felt right because a supermoon has this magnetic pull – it’s rare, intense, and hard to ignore, just like that sudden spark of attraction. The inspiration was basically me acknowledging: ‘Yeah, I’ve felt this, it’s confusing, and I bet others have too’. So, the song puts those conflicted thoughts into words and wraps them in our sound.

Like much of your music, you wrote ‘Supermoon’ solo. What was the creative process for you to take it from an idea into the song we hear today?
I typically start writing on my own – just me in my bedroom with an acoustic guitar (or a piano) and a notebook. I’m very lyric-driven; often I’ll have a line or concept pop into my head. I journal a lot, so ideas often spring from there. With ‘Supermoon’, I remember scribbling down the core idea of that unspoken attraction and the chorus lyrics came pretty quickly after. Once I have the bones of a song – the basic chord progression, melody and lyrics – I bring it to the band and that’s when the magic really happens.

In the case of ‘Supermoon’, I took my rough demo to The Locals and we all jammed on it together. [Guitarist] Jordan came up with a gorgeous shimmering guitar riff that gave it this cool retro 80s vibe, and then Dan improvised a saxophone line that just sent shivers down my spine. Suddenly the song grew from a simple idea into this rich, layered sound. We’re all influenced by that Laurel Canyon folk-rock and heartland rock style, so we wanted to infuse those warm, vintage textures – you can hear a bit of that Fleetwood Mac-style glow in the guitars and sax. The creative process is very collaborative at that stage: I might have written the song alone, but the band brought it to life. I often say I come in with the skeleton and the boys bring the muscle and heart to it.

I have read there will be a video for “Supermoon” soon. When is this coming and what can fans expect?
Yes! The music video is on the way, and I’m so excited for everyone to see it. We literally just finished filming it - I was crawling out of a pool in a long dress – never let it be said I don’t suffer for my art, haha! I can’t give an exact release date yet, but it should be out very soon, likely in the next few weeks. As for what to expect: we really wanted the video to capture the song’s kind of fun, slightly nostalgic vibe. So, I hope the fans love it as much as we loved making it. Keep an eye out, it’s coming very soon!

For those who may be new to your music, what is your musical background? How did you get to where you are today?
I grew up in the beautiful beach town of St Ives in Cornwall. Music was always a huge part of my life: I started playing guitar when I was about nine, and I wrote my first song at eleven. By my early teens I was performing anywhere I could – school assemblies, open mic nights, pub gigs – you name it. I pretty much came out of the womb singing, to be honest!

As an independent artist, I built things up step by step. A big early moment for me was when I released a song and its music video unexpectedly hit #1 on the iTunes video charts, above some major label pop artists, even though I was completely unsigned. Things went mad and I even had national newspapers calling me “Britain’s Taylor Swift”. This all happened just literally days before lockdown, and I was actually asked by a bunch of major labels and artist managers to put on a showcase for them. Unfortunately, that night before it was due to take place, Boris [Johnson] ordered everyone to stay indoors and so it never happened!

Since then, I’ve released multiple singles and an EP (California Fire), and my band (The Locals) and I have played some amazing festivals – from local ones to big ones like Boardmasters and The Great Escape. We’ve toured around, even done some unconventional gigs (we once played on an RAF base next to old planes, which was wild!). It’s been a lot of hard graft, a lot of writing and self-releasing, and leaning on a really supportive community of fans and fellow musicians. We’re an unsigned band, proudly DIY, and I think that makes us worth rooting for.. It’s been quite a ride so far, but I feel like it’s just getting started.

Who were the artists that inspired you as a child?
I had a pretty eclectic mix of inspirations as a kid. I was exposed to all kinds of music from a young age. My music taste was all over the place in the best way. I absolutely loved Taylor Swift as a young girl. I was about 10 or 11 when Taylor’s first albums came out, and she was a huge influence on me wanting to become a songwriter myself. Seeing a young girl writing her own songs and dominating music made me think, ‘Whoa, maybe I can do that too.’ Aside from those, I was influenced by a lot of the classic sounds I grew up hearing artists like Fleetwood Mac, Carole King, The Eagles, Billy Joel, Bruce Springsteen – they all trickled into my childhood in one way or another. It’s a weird mix – from Heartland Rock to country to pop – but I think having that broad range shaped my own songwriting. I learned that a good song is a good song, whether it’s Sinatra or Shania or Stevie Nicks. If it moved me, I soaked it up.

You perform with your band The Locals. How did the line-up come together?
It came together really organically, to be honest. I started out gigging solo, just me and my guitar, but I began craving a bigger sound and that “band dynamic” on stage. Jordan (who’s now our lead guitarist, and also happens to be my partner) was the first to join me. He’s a ridiculously good guitarist, and we already had a great chemistry from playing together informally, so it just clicked. From there, it was like a chain reaction of “I know a guy…” Jordan had played in a band with our drummer, Cal, a while back, so we stole Cal for The Locals! Then we joked about how cool it would be to have a saxophone for that Bruce Springsteen vibe we love. We found Dan – a sax player who is as big a Springsteen fan as we are – and once he jammed with us it was like, yes, this is exactly what we needed! Finally, we rounded it out with Tadhg on bass. Tadhg was the last puzzle piece; he’s got great energy (and legs for arms) and he locked in the low end perfectly.

What I love is that we didn’t assemble the band through some clinical audition process or anything. It was more like finding kindred spirits. One by one, friends of friends or people from the local music circuit came in and it felt right. Somehow it all gels into the sound we call “Kernowfornia”. I couldn’t ask for a better group of musicians and friends. It’s like a family that formed itself.

Cornwall is renowned for being one of the UK’s artistic hubs. What is the best part of the local music scene that people may not know about, and how did growing up there shape you?
The Cornish music scene is honestly amazing – and massively underrated, if you ask me. I think one of the best parts about it, which people outside Cornwall might not realise, is how community-oriented and cross-generational it is. I grew up as a teenager playing in open mic nights and pub jam sessions with people three or four times my age, which is not something you hear about everywhere! Picture 13-year-old me sitting in a circle at the pub with a bunch of seasoned local musicians in their 60s and 70s, all of us trading songs by The Beatles and Neil Young. That’s how I learned my craft. Every night in St Ives, you can find live music somewhere – whether it’s a pub, a cafe, or a street corner – and the whole town really listens and supports you. It gave me so much confidence as a young artist to have this built-in supportive audience and older musicians guiding me.

The music industry has traditionally been a difficult space for women. What are your thoughts on gender inequality in the industry?
This is a big one. I have lots of thoughts. Unfortunately, even in 2025, the music industry isn’t as equal as it should be. I’ve felt it firsthand. Sometimes it’s subtle, like people assuming I don’t know how to set up my own amp, and sometimes it’s pretty blatant. One thing that really bothers me is this unspoken bias where a woman with an acoustic guitar is often treated as just the “opener” to warm up the crowd, and then the real (male) rock acts are expected to come on and wow everyone. There’s this outdated idea that women can’t “rock” as hard or aren’t as technical, which is absolute rubbish. I’ve been shoved into that token opening slot enough times to recognise it, and it only made me more determined to prove people wrong. Part of why I formed a full band was to shatter those preconceptions – like, yes, I can lead a band, yes, I write my songs, and yes, we can blow the roof off just as well as any guys out there. I remember thinking, ‘I’m not having that – I can rock just as hard as anyone’ and I carry that attitude with me every time I step on stage.

It’s slowly changing, but we have to keep pushing. I’m definitely committed to rocking those stages and making sure the next generation of women knows that they can too.

‘Supermoon’ is out now, you have some live shows coming up in September. What else do you have planned for 2025?
So much! 2025 is shaping up to be a massively exciting year for us. The immediate thing on the horizon is a string of live shows in September – we’ll be playing a couple of festivals, including one down here in Cornwall which I’m really looking forward to, and some UK dates. I love performing live more than anything, so I’m counting down the days. Beyond that, we’re working towards releasing a new EP later in the year, likely by the autumn. ‘Supermoon’ is actually a taste of that EP, and there will be a few more new songs on it that I’m dying to share. I’ve been writing tons, and I feel like this EP will really capture where the band and I are at right now – it’s going to have those big folk-rock anthems and some heartfelt, folky moments too. I want to bring our Kernowfornia sound to everyone who’s been supporting us from afar.

This year has already been crazy in terms of milestones. We were named among BBC Introducing’s Ones To Watch for 2025, which was such an honour and confidence boost. We also got to play at the English Riviera Airshow – performing literally on an airfield with planes overhead. On the live side, we’re going to really ramp things up. I have a theory that in an AI age where everything you see and hear is so utterly fake, from the news, to social media to fake bands on social media that it’s going to make people are going to crave real, authentic experience. And we’re totally here to deliver that!

I can’t wait for all of it, and I’m so grateful to have people interested and listening – it means we get to keep doing what we love. So yeah, keep your eyes peeled for the EP release date and tour announcements. Lots to come!

‘Supermoon’ is out now. You can download and stream here.
Follow Bailey Tomkinson & The Locals on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube and their website.