Carl Pemberton was once a plumber. Now, partly thanks to British reality talent show 'The X Factor', he's half of acoustic rock duo Journey South with his brother Andy — a former electrician. We talk to the guitarist and singer about the long, hard climb to the top, actually getting a compliment from Simon Cowell, and wedding singers.

We'd been gigging for about 10 years before 'The X Factor' happened, just basically trying to make it. We've always written our own songs and we were sending them off to various record companies.

At first I was an apprentice plumber and my brother an electrician. I was just coming to the end of my apprenticeship and we got the green light to go to London to try and make it. So we quit our jobs and moved down south and tried that for two years. We got into a lot of debt trying to make it — paying for rehearsal space, buying equipment, and we didn't actually hold down jobs while we were there because we were trying to make it as full-time musicians. So it was quite a struggle.

It was really, really disheartening. But there came a time when we just had to admit defeat and move back home because it was costing us so much money. It's just the way it goes in the music industry — one minute you can be on top, and the next you can fall flat on your face, or vice versa.

Back home we found a niche playing weddings. We were working our jobs as well so we were earning a bit of money. But that's not really what we wanted to do — we wanted to be songwriters, recognised for our work and playing to big audiences. Like the dreams you have as a kid.

We still wanted to make it, but when 'The X Factor' happened, we saw it as a bit of fun at first. We didn't think we were going to be the right sort of act to be on the show and we were surprised when we started to get further and further in the competition. Simon Cowell even said we were two of the best singers he'd ever heard — that, coming from him, was really something.

It all happened so fast, so quickly. It was hard to actually sit back and appreciate it — it was going on around you. We didn't actually get the chance to appreciate it. Being in front of the TV cameras and dealing with the media was brand new to us — that was a big learning curve. But every Saturday night when we got up on that stage all we thought about was just performing and that's what we know what to do best, and we just loved every performance on the show. We just really lapped it up.

We tried to do songs that hadn't really been done by males before — we did 'The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face'. People usually play to a backing track on these shows, but we decided to try and be brave and just did it with one acoustic guitar and vocals. I think that week we got the highest vote, it went insanely well for us. We just chose songs we'd performed for years — songs that were challenging, nothing too obvious, nothing too easy.

When we didn't win, we were obviously disappointed. We thought it was all over for us, we really did. The winner walks away with a record deal and a single to release, so we'd come so far and were left thinking: 'Is it all for nothing?' But Simon Cowell said to us: 'Look, don't worry, I'll make it happen.'

Going into the studio to record our debut album, our past experience really helped us. We were already musicians, we were already songwriters and singers but working with these people was working at a different level of songwriting skill. And the musicians who played on our album were just unbelievable.

It was challenging stepping out with original songs. Our hardcore fans have stuck with us, people are still coming to see us in droves so our own stuff is going down really well. But the second album, as expected really, didn't do as well as the first with the 'X Factor' hype. I think you've just got to go out there and just take the risks because at the end of the day we don't want to be playing covers for the rest of our lives. We want to be playing our own songs.

We were writing a lot of material for the second album and taking it to our people at Simon Cowell's record company but they were saying: 'It's good but we don't think you've got it yet'. And we really believed we had and time was really of the essence so we thought: 'We're going to have to do something about this, really'. And so we ended up parting company with Simon. He gave us a really good payoff to start our record company and invest in the album. So it was all sweet.

Of our original songs, I'm most proud of 'What I Love About Home'. We're really proud of that because we tried to write a song about missing home. A lot of people go through that, especially people in our industry — I've got a family and when I'm in a hotel room on my own I'm really thinking about it.

My brother and I don't really argue much and that's the God's honest truth. If we do have a debate about something it will be constructive and it will be about our work. But surprisingly although we spend a lot of time together we get on really well. Usually if we do have a little disagreement it's resolved in 30 minutes at the most.