THE LAST year has been such a whirlwind for Blossoms that singer Tom Ogden can barely recall the moment the band’s debut album clinched the number one spot in the UK charts.

“Someone asked me that the other day and I had trouble remembering” laughs the lank-haired frontman. “We were so busy – it all felt like a blur.” The exact date was August 12, when the Stockport five-piece were in the midst of a frenzied festival schedule. At that point Ogden knew his heartfelt lyrics and pop hooks had struck a chord with a vast amount of music fans – not just indie rock lovers – but he still sounds surprised at hitting the chart heights.

As he points out, “not many bands like us get a number one. That’s why we were so made up about it – nine songs out of 10 in the charts are co-written and have amazing production. This was just us five pulling together making music. We were under the impression that guitar bands don’t get into the charts anymore.”

Blossoms’ success harks back to a the mid-2000s, when guitar bands like The Strokes, The Libertines and The Arctic Monkeys were all wildly popular. Alex Turner, frontman of the latter band, was and is an inspiration for Ogden.

The latter musician shares the former’s knack for writing observational tunes that move large swathes of the public, but Ogden says that he only learned to write emotional songs relatively recently. When he was messing around with a guitar at the age of 15, he would write “songs about nothing”. It took a virtual intervention from a late British musical icon to convince him that he had to speak from a personal perspective.

“I used to be quite anxious about writing like that, but then I watched that Amy Winehouse documentary [Amy]. The lyrics were flashing up on the screen and I realised how honest they were. I was going through something at the time and I thought, 'you know what, I’ll try and channel that'. Some great songs came off the back of that. It feels natural to put myself into songs now – if you wear your heart on your sleeve people can’t deny your honesty."

Romantic relationships are, broadly speaking, Ogden’s thematic topic of choice. While he “cloaks some of the songs in metaphor”, he is pretty direct in others. Getaway, for instance, “is literally word for word quotes from a past relationship”. Anguished lines from the track include: “you say ‘can we try?’, I say ‘it’s a waste of time loving.’”

“Nine times out of ten, people have been through a break-up,” says Ogden. “A song can help people feel better about themselves or to think more positively. Talking about relationships is something universal and it’s what feels natural for me to write about.” It’s more difficult, adds the frontman, when things are going well romantically. “It can sound cheesy to talk about that, when you’re happy – that’s when the metaphors have to come in.”

When I speak to the singer, the band are in the studio demoing tracks for the early stages of a new album. They are not quite at the point where Blossoms can blast them out on the NME tour, though – a run of dates featuring post-punks Cabbage and fellow Stockport musician Rory Wynne.

Headlining the Brighton Dome is a pretty big deal for a band who only gave up their day jobs in 2014. While Ogden says it wasn’t as simple as leaving old careers to live the music dream, Blossoms had the “self-belief to know our songs would take us far – without meaning to sound arrogant. I worked part-time in a hotel, so I knew I was never going to do that for my whole life. You do have to give up some things when you go on tour, though – friendships and things like that can suffer a bit.”

Stockport was good for Blossoms in the sense that they were able to sculpt their craft in local pubs, but Ogden admits “there isn’t much of a scene” in his hometown. Then again, he rather “fell into being in a band”, so he wasn’t unduly bothered. There was always nearby Manchester to visit, too – as Ogden did when he saw his heroes Oasis and The Stone Roses in action in the late 2000s.

While Blossoms might not quite be on the level as those indie heavyweights just yet, you wouldn’t bet against them capitalising on the success they’ve already experienced. Not that they’re getting carried away. “We’ve never really thought music is going to be our career now,” says Ogden. “We still don’t feel like we’ve made it.”