British band Everything Everything just released their third album “Get To Heaven”, which debuted TOP-10 in the UK Charts’. We met with the guys to talk about many subjects from social media and streaming, to Taylor Swift and the best albums of 2015. The guys also gave awesome advice for young musicians (which you can use as life advice as well). Check it out!
You just released the video “Spring / Sun / Winter / Dread” and it has a lot of positive comments on YouTube? Do you read feedback from your fans?
I don’t personally look at YouTube because it tends to be where the real nutters are, in my experience. But Jon I think is quite aware of it. I do look at Twitter and sometimes Facebook as well, but I stay away from YouTube as it tends to be a hotbed of infighting and bickering. I don’t know why people feel like they have to be so critical of everything all the time, its just pointless. I’m not talking about us now I’m just talking generally, the Internet has given voice to everybody, its true.. but I think a lot of people say things that they wouldn’t necessarily say face to face.
I definitely agree with you. Do you think it’s important for artists these days to use all the social media as a tool to promote music on the internet?
Yes it is important and really a band existing within the age of social media we have a MySpace page, we have a Facebook page, and a Twitter account. You kind of can’t avoid those things. Actually, as long as you manage it in a tasteful way and you keep control of it yourself, then I think it can be a really useful tool. I mean we were able to announce a European tour at 9am this morning and I was actually in bed. I couldn’t have done that 10 years ago. It would have been a lot more complicated. I think it’s a good thing and I think it is important, but I think it’s also useful to retain a certain distance as well. Not a distance between you and the fans but there’s also the degree of familiarity that’s spread by social media that maybe makes the whole thing less special. I mean very young artists tweet all the time about absolutely everything they do, every second of the day, and that actually starts to get boring and removes the mystery of it somewhat. We want people to unpacking the meaning of the songs and discover them by themselves at least while they are still new and fresh to us, rather than tell them what to look for, you know?
Do all the members of Everything, Everything have a password for the band accounts?
Yes so we all contribute to the social media.
Five years ago you described your sound as pop. Do you think your last record “Get To Heaven” still follows pop roots?
Yeah I think so, if anything probably more than ever. I think the sound of the record is kind of bright and hard and vital, exactly the way we want it to be which is maybe more akin to pop music in terms of production. But we’ve also honed the song writing a little bit I think. Hopefully, without losing what made us remarkable in the first place. But we use that word in a very broad sense, I think the fact that we prioritise melody is a pop value. I would call the Beatles a pop band, even Radiohead, it really depends what you mean. I mean pop doesn’t have to mean One Direction, its not that narrow. In the broadest sense, it means everything that isn’t classical music and we’d certainly fit into that category. We’ve said in the past that we are a pop band because it is the easiest, broadest label, and describing ourselves as an art rock band or whatever, that’s for other people to do really. I’ve never known how to describe our sound, so if people as we say ‘yeh, we are a pop band’.
That is actually very interesting, that you never say about yourselves that you are an art rock band.
I don’t mind that label, as labels go, it’s not a bad one, but I feel like it’s for other people to say about us. I couldn’t with a straight face say “yeh we are an art rock band”, that sounds elitist in a way. But I don’t mind that label, I don’t mind any of the labels that we get. I think people find it hard to categorise what we do, including ourselves (laughs), so we just say we are a pop band.
As a band who was created at college, right now you call each other colleagues or friends?
We call each other both. I mean we started as friends obviously, that’s how every band starts I think. Everybody’s lives have changed, and we’ve spent so much time together that it’s not really comparable to normal friendships. So when we aren’t touring, rehearsing, recording or working together in some way we probably don’t see as much of each other as we would have done at one time. It’s good to spend time apart from each other and to also spend time with other people. But I don’t think that’s particularly rare these days. We spend about 85% of our time together and obviously we are friends, and it’s not the same as when you are 19. We are all 30ish now and we’ve been doing it for a long time, and when we are not working we tend to leave each other alone for a bit.
What is the best part about being with each other as a band?
We have a good time. The band and the crew travelling around the world together have a lot of laughs. I think making each other laugh and the camaraderie is the most important thing actually, outside the music itself. The best part of being in a band is obviously playing the gigs and making music together. The way we put up with all the travel is that we are still capable of having the best time together.
What are your favourite albums of 2015 so far?
I was actually trying to think about this before. I quite like Lianne La Havas, Natalie Imbruglia, Outfit, and Jamie xx. I loved Blur. It was a huge surprise for everybody having such a nice happy ending to their whole story I think.. who knows maybe its not ending. I really like that record. It could have been half as good and I would have been quite satisfied with it as a bookend to their career. It’s a genuinely great record.
Are streaming services are good or bad for music industry?
I think we are moving into it being good for the music industry, after it being bad for the industry. I think the record industry is finally catching on to streaming and it’s starting to make it work for itself. The big issue is making sure that the artist is properly rewarded for it. And that’s partly an industry thing. The parameters need to be reset so that the artists get more benefit. And that will probably all happen. The cultural problem of people regarding music as if it should be free or very very cheap, as in 10 pounds a month along with your TV and broadband… that’s not going to go away either. So people have to try to find a way to make that work. I also think that it’s going to change the way people feel about and experience music because everything is available instantly. When we were growing up and we wanted to know what a record sounded like we had no way of finding out, so we saved up money and bought the record and brought it home. That involves a certain amount of risk and investment. I don’t mean financial investment necessarily, you have gambled in a way on whether or not you’ll like it, whether or not you will like the album or the artist and as a result you probably pay more attention to the record when you put it on. Whereas if its something that requires no effort I don’t feel people will absorb it in the same way, or absorb full albums in the same way. It’s definitely bred a single track culture already.
I actually agree with everything you said. Do you remember all of those headlines about Apple Music and Taylor Swift. You think that was really important for indie music?
I think she did, whether or not she meant to, or whether or not it was contrived I can’t say, but it can’t have done any harm.
And what do you think personally about her music?
I like her actually. I think its enjoyable pop music really. I was actually given her latest album for Christmas last year and I really enjoy it.
When you are touring in the other countries what do you usually try to see or do with your band mates?
Wherever we are, less so in the UK, I like to try and find something to go and see or do, whether it be a local landmark or galleries. Just wandering around the streets a little bit and absorbing the culture in some way. Otherwise it’s a wasted opportunity, otherwise its just sitting in hotel rooms, you may as well be anywhere, so we do try and get out and about, especially when we are in exciting places like New Zealand and Australia, and around Europe as well. Quite often it won’t be all of us, but I’m usually out there pretty much straight away. I hate sitting around doing nothing and waiting, I can’t bear that. So much of touring is sitting around and waiting, on trains or whatever so when you are actually on the ground and have an hour to spare you’ve got to use it or it’s just a wasted opportunity.
Sounds awesome what you said. Can you give any advice to the new generation of musicians?
The only thing we really have to say even though it sounds really vague and really cheesy is just ‘be yourself’ basically, stick to your guns. Do what you think is right and don’t follow other trends. I think that’s the only thing you can say to anybody. Because you could quickly achieve some success if you jump on the latest bandwagon, but its not going to last very long and it you won’t be yourself. If you do what you feel is right and you have some success then you’ll be very happy. If you do what you think is right and you don’t have success then you haven’t sold out. If you try and play the game and try to be an imitator and have some success then it’s going to be a hollow victory. So the only thing we have to say to other people is – do what you think you should be doing, don’t do what other people think you should be doing.
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