We always had a vision of mixing acid house with indie rock, and we managed to rent a space and build our own studio in London's Shoreditch area, long before it got trendy. I had a little vocal booth called Hattie Jacques, in honour of the Carry On films but also because it's Cockney rhyming slang [for shakes]. We spent all our money rewiring it, and that's where we wrote, recorded and produced Ready to Go – 100 mixes later!
We were perfectionists and wanted to do it all ourselves. Every sonic element had to be special up to the point where we ended up arguing. Like at a rave when you stand and dance by the speakers, everything was done with the listener in mind.
It was a collaborative effort, but Johnny Male and I wrote most of the song's lyrics and the melody. We had a really good camaraderie, finishing each other's sentences, him on an acoustic guitar and me scribbling things down. Tim Dorney and Andy Todd worked more on the technology and synth sounds. We pooled our skills, resources and dreams.
The song is all about daily life and things that happened to us. We didn't write anything too existential – I don't really like singing about myself – but I've always believed in language and the power of the pen. I think it was Johnny who came up with the line, "Ready to go." It had an anthemic feel and we wanted it to be a bit of a battlecry: "It's a crack, I'm back!" That line was inspired by the Irish slang, craic. Writing lyrics and big choruses over electronic beats was one of the most difficult things because of the BPM, but I've always had a sort of punky voice that suits it.
It was as much about the delivery as it was the words. My personality was becoming feistier and I think the song came from that, but also it's about being positive, making good out of bad, and coming together as one. That's what the vibe is like in the acid-house scene.
It was an exciting time. Zeke Manyika, who was the drummer in Orange Juice, lived across the way and I used to shimmy across the roof and go down a ladder where he and his wife would make me sandwiches. Every Tuesday night we would go to Matt Johnson's house [from the The] to play table football with Paul Webb from Talk Talk. Me being a lot younger, I was like, "Oh my God, these are my idols!" They treated me with respect and it really gave me a sense of confidence. And I got quite good at table football.
One day, a girl at my hairdressers said to me: "Saff, do you fancy being dangerous?" I went "All right then," and they dyed my hair blood red like a London bus. Jarvis Cocker always said: "If you've got a hook and a great hairdo, you'll be a pop star." Visually, it really helped us, and people seemed to like it.
At the time it was hard to get gigs as a girl: it was important to be in one of the few female-led bands. There are some fantastic female artists today, but I still wish we had more women in bands. Last year Olivia Rodrigo invited me backstage because she had been singing Ready to Go on her world tour – such a lovely lady and so talented. She said that Republica were one of her favourite bands and that growing up she had a poster of me because she's of Asian heritage, too. I gave her a big hug.
When Sunderland beat Chelsea in the Premier League in May 2026, the whole stadium was singing Ready to Go and it brought a tear to my eye. I was asked to sing on the pitch at the 2022 Fifa World Cup – I turned around and Lionel Messi was standing there.
We had some good songs but we hadn't had a hit yet. I remember the day Saff came in the studio with red hair. I said: "We're gonna be massive!" It was the missing link.
Ready to Go's music came first. Toddy found these great chords which became the chorus. They were simple but effective, so we thought we'd better write a verse.
We sampled all the guitars into an Akai S1000 out of necessity, as in those days we were using an Atari ST computer which only had MIDI. The vocals were recorded on an 8-track digital recorder. Computer music was still in its infancy, we were learning as we went along. Any money we earned from gigs was spent on studio equipment and outboard gear.
Lyrically, we were trying to talk about the things surrounding us at the time. Going out and staying up late, witnessing the world in the middle of the night, then reporting back. We tried to create something that incorporated all the things we loved about the house scene in a song with an alternative edge.
Touring America, we started to get picked up on MTV and we noticed it in the hotels at night. It was on heavy rotation and you could see by the crowds that the monster was unleashed. It was fantastic, but we still wanted to be on Top of the Pops. Then we came back and it all happened in the UK and Europe. There was a lot of goodwill behind us and we often said that with a title like Ready to Go you could probably sell anything.
I'm always slightly disappointed that on one of the last vocal takes, the line was: "Went home, stayed in bed all day / In your T-shirt", which I thought was really good, but because I wasn't concentrating as I should have been, the other line – "Your T-shirt's dish dirt" – got in.
The funny thing about playing the song live is that it always feels like it's building towards the next bit, even when it drops down. Especially when an audience is responding to it. It's a trick I wish I could do every time I write a song, but there's a kind of magic alchemy that somehow appears then vanishes again.