The 1975 bassist Ross MacDonald has spoken to NME about his upcoming 1,000 mile charity bike ride, cycling the length of the UK from Land’s End to John O’Groats to raise money for music therapy charity, Nordoff & Robbins.
Taking place this April, the challenge will see Ross along with PVRIS bassist Brian MacDonald and two friends, Matt and Darren, taking on the iconic Land’s End to John O’Groats across the course of 16 days. Fans can head here to donate.
Since 1958, Nordoff & Robbins have offered creative music therapy for people with psychological, physical, and/or developmental disabilities. MacDonald has discovered first-hand how it “changes and saves lives”.
“Having been in therapy and various states of mental health myself, and having been around various people who have also experienced that, what I’ve learned about music therapy is that it’s such a viable way of administering treatment and helping people with real problems,” Ross MacDonald told NME.
“When we decided to do this ride, it was a real no-brainer to do it for those guys”.
After attending their fundraising Silver Clef Awards in 2024 where The 1975 won Best Group, he met Ruby who told him about how music therapy has helped her mental health and finding a safe space to thrive.
“I was there recently and met Ruby, who’s in her late teens,” MacDonald recalled. “She’s got autism and ADHD and she’s been going to Nordoff & Robbins since she was 14. She’d been sectioned, held in a psychiatric hospital, was suicidal and having a really hard time of it.”
He continued: “Nordoff & Robbins came in and introduced her to playing the bass guitar. Since then, she’s flourished. I was talking to her mum a little bit after the session and she was saying how this has genuinely saved her life on numerous occasions.”
“Honestly, she’s incredible. Everyone should spend time with her because she’s really engaging, confident and funny. She really ripped me apart for a little bit.”
Saying what exactly?
“Just that I was old! She didn’t know if I had the internet when I was learning how to play the bass. I was allowed on for half an hour a night as long as no one needed to use the phone.”
At Ruby’s request, MacDonald helped teach her a personal favourite bassline of his: ‘Bombtrack’ by Rage Against The Machine.
“I love that song, so I took her through it,” he said. “Her therapist was there as well and had put together a chord progression and a riff. It’s just about engaging them in a practice and a formula where it’s really focussed and all that they can think about for the session. It’s why I still play football, even though my knees are creaking and I’m too old to do anything. For that hour, it’s that moment where you’re not thinking about everything else and you can focus on one thing.”
The bassist said that the need for a charity like Nordoff & Robbins was now greater than ever, especially with the increasing mental health pressures put upon young people by a digital lifestyle pulling their attention in so many different directions. That’s why he’s doing this to raise awareness, as well as raise much-needed money.
“Where they would like to develop is recognition among the wider community and having music therapy become part of fundamental mental health treatment,” said MacDonald. “At the moment, I think it’s seen as a little bit of a privilege and fun on top of the treatments that are already there, but there are a lot of people who are of the belief that it can be a great way of treating these things just on its own.”
After COVID, the charity lost two-years of funding from not being able to host their Silver Clef awards ceremony – losing around £5million. MacDonald added: “Every charity is struggling for money in this climate, but I want to help make music therapy more of a recognised treatment as it’s been so successful in the cases I’ve seen.”
For now, MacDonald said that he needs to get to grips with the intimidating task of training and building up his stamina.
“It’s between 140-160km per day and ends up being around 1,000 miles,” he said, fearfully. “Trainingwise, I’m probably a little bit behind where I want to be, but that’s life. My stamina is not necessarily the problem at this point, it’s getting a bike to fit so that I’m not in pain after a couple of hours.
“I’ve got my bike on this virtual trainer in the living room so I just stick the TV on and pedal. The longest I’ve done so far is 50k in for a couple of hours, and now I’ve got to do three times that every day for two weeks. We’re a way off yet, but we’ve got a couple of months.”
He added: “There are four of us doing it and the other three are well-versed in bikes and have been doing it for a really long time. I struggle to blow the tyres up, so there’s a gulf in class of where I’m up to both in terms of knowledge and ability. They’ll hopefully keep me right.”
Fans may be wondering what’ll be on his playlist for the challenge, with MacDonald revealing that he tends to opt for podcasts, movies or football matches while training – or a mix of “‘70s, country and Americana swampy stuff”.
“It’s nice to have that 110BPM pattern to just power through it,” he went on. “It’s an intense time on a bike, so the podcasts help with conversation more than music – but if I need it then I whack on ‘Eye Of The Tiger’. Glassjaw is going to creep in there at some point, plus me and a friend I’m doing it with are big fans of Hundred Reasons. I hope we can get a four-way playlist going so we can all feel the impact of the tunes.”
Asked why he wasn’t able to rope The 1975 frontman Matty Healy into the challenge, MacDonald replied: “I can’t remember when the last time I saw him on a bike was.”
“He’s more martial arts and gym-going at the moment than intense cardio,” he continued. “I played football with him a few years ago, but that will probably be the first and last time he’ll do that in his life! He’s quite a thin person so him doing anything to burn calories he doesn’t have is probably ill-advised.”
The 1975 have been hiding away working on new material since their huge Glastonbury 2025 headline performance, with two albums in the works – and one reportedly titled ‘DOGS‘ – as fans eagerly await news of the follow-up to 2022’s ‘Being Funny In A Foreign Language‘.
Quizzed about the band’s activity, MacDonald revealed: “Everyone has stuff going on outside of The 1975 at the moment. We’re obviously working towards getting an album ready, but George [Daniel, drummer] is doing a bunch of stuff with his label DH2, plus Adam [Hann, guitarist] and I are doing stuff outside of the band. It’s always a juggling act with being in the band, working towards where we need to be and the rest of life, but we’re well-versed in that now.”
And what about these reports of two albums incoming?
“Mate, if I knew!,” the bassist replied. “We lay out a foundation for stuff and we see how it goes, so we’ll put something out at some point. There will be music.”
For now, MacDonald is getting back to his exercise bike to get his daily miles up – but more expeditions could be coming in the years ahead. “Getting to the end of this ride will dictate if I never want to see a bike again or if we do another expedition,” he admitted. “Bring it on.”
Maybe The 1975 could be like Kraftwerk and cycle everywhere on their next tour?
“Maybe,” ended MacDonald. “I don’t know if Matty, George and Adam would be up for getting on a bike with me. Maybe I’ll get one of those trailers for babies and stick Matty in there.”
Brian MacDonald of PVRIS added: “The motivation to fundraise for Nordoff and Robbins came from a WhatsApp from Ross. I was on tour and he messaged me saying, ‘do you want to do a big cycle ride? I know you cycle.’ I’m like, ‘barely, but, yeah!’ He explained about Nordoff and Robbins and then I did my own research, and, I just fell right into it and saw how amazing the music therapy work they do is. I’m grateful to be playing a small part in fundraising for this great cause. I’m going to be doing it for the people that will benefit so much from what we can get in terms of donations. That’s going to fuel me more than all the electrolytes, gels and carbs combined.”
Ross MacDonald will be cycling from Lands’ End to John O’Groats from April 5-21, 2026 in support of Nordoff & Robbins. Visit here to donate and to keep track of progress. Visit here for more information on Nordoff & Robbins.
Meanwhile, The 1975 release the 10th anniversary vinyl reissue of ‘I like it when you sleep, for you are so beautiful yet so unaware of it’ this Friday (February 27).