m k.co do r read 19 May 20
Everybody loves
Lewis
Chart-topping singles. Sold out tours. A social sensation.
How Lewis Capaldi became the most unlikely ruler of Planet Pop.
*BZZZZZT* IF YOU LIKE... RADIOHEAD... YOU’LL LOVE... THE HUNNA? *BZZZZZT*
Discover new music, as recommended by Dork writers. No boundaries. No algorithms. Down with boring.
Dork radio.
readdork.com
This Month “It feels like this is happening to someone else and I’m just watching it.” - Lewis Capaldi p40
40
LEWIS CAPALDI
He’s dominated the UK charts, now he’s on the cover of Dork. There’s something about Lewis.
50
TEN TONNES
With a debut album finally here, Ethan’s anything but snookered.
54
F ONTAINES D.C. They’re gonna be big.
58
LIT TLE SIMZ
Simz isn’t letting anything hold her back now.
16
INDEX
** SUBSCRIBE TO DORK AND SAVE MORE THAN 30% A YEAR ** Subscribe at readdork.com now
May 2019 | readdork.com | Down With Boring
Frank Carter & the Rattlesnakes Real talk and the End of Suffering.
2Ø
Ø8 Update 4Ø Features 32 Festivals 6Ø Incoming 34 Hype Ø8
Ed’s letter. King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard
They’re back, and they’ve broughty the boogie.
26
Soak
Returning more confident than ever before, Birdie’s flying high.
34
Jade Bird
Twenty-one years old, and about to make a big splash.
If you’re a regular reader of Dork, you’ll know we refer to absolutely every musician as a pop star - even the ones making a din so unholy it’d scare small children. But this month’s cover star probably qualifies even without our enthusiastic billing. Lewis Capaldi is a genuine sensation. At the time of writing, he’s camped at the top of the UK Singles Chart, selling out huge shows in seconds and generally being an absolute ledge on ‘social media’. Seems only fitting we’d complete the set and stick him on a magazine cover, right? As festival season starts to kick into gear, there’s loads of exciting stuff to get your teeth into. To celebrate, you can grab a print copy of the 2019 Dork Festival Guide from all our usual stockists or online at readdork. com. It’s packed with all the essential info on the events you need to be at over the next few months. You might also notice we’ve had a bit of a shuffle round ‘design wise’ this month, too. We’ve found a way to cram in even more brilliant bands, amazing artists and dubious jokes. And a psychic potato. Only in Dork.
Billie Eilish
As Billie hits London, we get down the front with the biggest new noise on planet pop.
12
SPINN
New kids on the indie block, SPINN aren’t trying to be cool.
24
Foals
The Oxford bunch get intimate at Hackney’s EartH
3Ø
Twenty One Pilots
Tyler and Josh light up Wembley Arena.
66
Vampire Weekend
The official verdict on ‘Father of the Bride’.
7Ø
Waterparks
Awsten tells us the greatest ‘most embarrassing moment’ story of all time.
Editor / @stephenackroyd
On the Dork stereo this month...
MAY 2019
DORK
37
Lewis Capaldi
ALASKALASKA
65
Animal House
36
Band of Skulls
61
Billie Eilish
8
Billie Marten
65
Blur
26
Body Type
38
Bombay Bicycle Club
18
Cage the Elephant
62
Carly Rae Jepsen
19
Cate Le Bon
S tephen
BILLIE EILISH WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO? We weren’t able to review this last issue, because of ‘embargo’ related stuff, and by the time this one out it’s already dropped, but in case you were wondering, Dear Reader,
** BAND INDEX ** BAND INDEX ** A. Swayze & the Ghosts
we are firmly obsessed with Billie Eilish’s debut album and ‘bad guy’ is an absolute banger. VAMPIRE WEEKEND SYMPATHY You’ll find this Latinflavoured banger on Vampy Weekend’s new album ‘Father of the Bride’. It’ll have you
Catfish & The Bottlemen
11, 64
Cautious Clay
37
CLT DRP
36
Dan D’Lion
39
Dave
10
Drahla
11, 67
Dumb
36
Dylan Cartlidge
35
Easy Life
37
EUT
33
Ezra Collective
64
Famous
36
Fat White Family
62
Flikka
36
Flume
8
Foals
24
THE AMAZONS FUTURE DUST If you’ve spied our Festival Guide, which is ‘out’ now, you’ll know that we’ve been delving into the musky world of The Amazons. It’s great.
Liily
36
Little Simz
59
Local Natives
65
Lucy Dacus
17
Mac DeMarco
14
Marina
64
Middle Kids
17
Mike Shinoda
19
Mitski
14
Nasty Cherry
39
On Video
36
Panic! At The Disco
18
Petrol Girls
10
Phoebe Green
36
Sacred Paws
10
Shura
28
Sky Ferreira
10, 31
slowthai
23
SOAK
26, 64
SPINN
12, 67
Sports Team
37
Superfood
23
Tacocat
67
Tame Impala Ten Tonnes
11, 31 50, 67
The Chemical Brothers
61
The Japanese House
18
Fontaines D.C. 54, 60
The Killers
23
Frank Carter & the Rattlesnakes 16,67
The Magic Gang
18
The National
19
The Ninth Wave
37
The Regrettes
19
17
Those Dancing Days
14
Grimes
14
Tierra Whack
14
Gus Dapperton
62
Tusks
10
Honeyblood
31
Isaac Dunbar
31
Twenty One Pilots
30
Two Door Cinema Club
31
Frank Iero
8
Friendly Fires
23
Girls in Synthesis
36
Gossip
flamenco dancing down the street before tea time. Promise.
8
40
Italia 90 Jade Bird Johnny Lloyd
36 34, 62 66
King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard 20, 65, 70
Vampire Weekend 66 Waterparks
70
Wooze
38
Yungblud
19
UPDATE If it’s not in here, it’s not happening. Or we forgot. One or the other.
‘FYI’ Frank Iero and the Future Violents have shared their first single, ‘Young and Doomed’. It’s a track from Frank’s third solo album ‘Barriers’, due out on 31st May via UNFD. The band will be hitting the road this summer for a headline tour that kicks off on 29th May in Philadelphia, arriving in the UK for 2000trees on Saturday 13th July.
Cate Le Bon has announced her new album, ‘Reward’. The record features a collab with Stella Mozgawa of Warpaint, amongst others, and it’s due on 24th May via Mexican Summer. It’s also preceded by lead single ‘Daylight Matter’, which you can check out on readdork.com now.
Flume has dropped a brand new mixtape, ‘Hi This Is Flume’. The first music since most recent album ‘Skin’, the 38 minute long effort is accompanied by a visualiser directed by Jonathan Zawada. Coming in at 17 tracks, it also features contributions from the likes of SOPHIE and slowthai, amongst others.
MAY 2019
DORK
Keep up with the latest music news 24/7 at R E A DD O RK .C OM
UPDATE
9
Billie Eilish proves she’s a force to believe in at Shepherd’s Bush Empire. Words: Ali Shutler. Photos: Frances Beach.
F
soaked wood, the fire burns bright and eternal. or the past couple of years, Billie Eilish has been building a following. The swaying roll of ‘Idontwannabeyouanymore’ continues the charge with Billie dictating the pace, Tentative, careful but fearless, she’s spoken through her music and never relishing the control and enjoying the ride before shouted for attention. Tonight is first the poignant slow burn of ‘Lovely’ sees her hands entwined with the audience, a of three incredibly sold-out shows at Shepherd’s Bush Empire, and before she’s ramshackle conductor with the whole room even taken to the stage, there’s an electric burst following her every move. of anticipation and the Setlist ‘bitches knowing excitement that Billie has already grown far broken My Boy beyond rooms this small. hearts’ hangs Idontwannabeyouanymore And yet, Billie attacks in the air, Lovely mesmerising tonight like it’s the only show WHEN I WAS OLDER and soaked in that’s ever mattered. Never Bored demanding, never craving beauty while Party Favor the spotlight, she takes to the ‘Party Favour’ Wish You Were Gay stage (via a giant spider with dances under Bitches Broken Hearts a purple haze mirror ball eyes and roaring Six Feet Under screams that never quite fade and ‘I Wish You Watch / &burn Were Gay’ carries a gleeful weight, away) with the confidence of You Should See Me in a every word already scratched someone who’s been doing Crown this half her life, and the across hearts despite the fact it Hostage excitement of someone who’s was only released a few hours ago. Bury a Friend wanted it for even longer. It’s all surprisingly tender. Except Bellyache when it’s not. Despite the churning hype, When the Party’s Over ‘WHEN I WAS OLDER’ twists and ‘My Boy’ instantly unites the Ocean Eyes room. A lit match on gasoline warps, a haunted party anthem Copycat
with a lust for glorious release that the room feasts upon while the drop of ‘Bored’ sees kids scale seats for a better view. The room moves as one during the rampant, unforgiving ‘Bury A Friend’ and Billie plays air guitar while ‘bellyache’ causes chaos and turbulent joy. Her music might be inspired by isolation, let down and loneliness but tonight, she’s never alone. In giving a voice to her own fears, insecurities and anxieties, she’s also given a voice to countless others. Billie spends the set constantly, almost being drowned out by the choir of the room who live her words but she never does battle. They’re all in this together. There’s a moment of ‘Watch /&burn’ where she leans so far forward, she almost topples into the crowd and during ‘You Should See Me In A Crown’ she’s coronetted by the audience, a plastic crown declaring her our highness of hope. Every moment of tonight is backed by full-bodied belief and soulful want. It’s an amazing thing to watch. It’s even better to be a part of it. P
In giving a voice to her own fears, insecurities and anxieties, she’s also given a voice to countless others.
READDORK.COM
UPDATE
BOOGIE WONDER LAND INTERVIEW
King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard are back after a year off to recover from 2017’s epic album streak, with a new record in tow and their biggest ever UK headliner…
20
Words: Jessica Goodman.
UPDATE
A
new and getting it down.” Music is something brightening blue sky. Calm King Gizzard live and breathe – it has to ocean waves. A wooden be, considering the band have released a water raft drifting with the seemingly countless number of records over breeze. This is the setting for ‘Fishing For the past seven years (by Wikipedia’s count, the Fishes’, the title track from King Gizzard tally is at 13, but ask Stu, and he responds with and The Lizard Wizard’s new album. As a hesitant “I… I don’t know”). light, breezy, and whimsical as the music “To be honest, it was a little bit scary, video that accompanies it, the song is a or daunting,” Stu reflects on their release breath of fresh air from a band who, just schedule two years ago. “The whole play was over two years ago, set themselves the always to make four albums. astounding challenge Somehow, somewhere of releasing five along the line, it became albums in the space of five. I don’t actually know just twelve months. how that happened.” But “It was a pretty crazy happen it did, and over year,” frontman Stu the course of 2017, King Mackenzie recalls. “I Gizzard offered the world don’t know if we’d ever five different worlds to delve do it again,” he laughs. into and explore. “For me, From an album written it was a selfish endeavour,” using custom-modified the frontman states. “This STU MACKENZIE microtonal instruments, is what I like to do. If you like through a narrativeit, cool.” He shrugs, then driven concept album pauses, thinking over his words. “Is that a good about the end of the universe, a collaboration answer?” with Mild High Club, and beyond, each release Which brings us to today: talking on an early was distinctly Gizzard, and distinctly different. morning in Melbourne before heading to their “I love touring, and I love playing shows, studio to record with fellow Flightless band and I love performing and all that stuff, but Stonefield, the energy is high. After a year for me, I love making records the most,” Stu spent recharging their creative batteries and enthuses. “I love experimenting with sounds, touring around the world – including a headline thinking about music and making stuff and the performance at Green Man (“My mum and dad architecture of songs, or just trying something were there, which was cool,” Stu grins, “what a
“We were trying to make this blues record, but it just kept sliding off”
21
y d o b y r e v E loves
s i Lew
g singles. Chart-toppin s. Sold out tour tion. ci A so al sensa e the most apaldi becam How Lewis C . of Planet Pop unlikely ruler
40
Muir. ett. Words: Jamie h Louise Benn Photos: Sara
MAY 2019
DORK
I
READDORK.COM
41
t’s Saturday night, and The Jonathan Ross Show is once again being beamed into front rooms up and down the country. It’s fair to say that it’s quite a big deal. Take tonight’s guests: there’s Danny DeVito and Colin Farrell promoting the big-screen remake of Dumbo, actual Olympic Gold medallist Nicola Adams, household comedy favourite Jimmy Carr, and recent Alan Partridge star Lolly Adefope. As Jonathan Ross kick-starts the show, they pan to another face… “I tend to sweat quite a bit when I go on those TV things,” admits Lewis Capaldi. In a new world, he’s concerned that the basics might go awry. “I’m always like - do I smell weird? Danny DeVito just shook my hand, but did he smell like, an arsey smell while shaking it? “I hope I don’t smell of piss. You don’t want sweaty palms or sweaty bollocks. It’s a family show, y’know what I mean? Nobody wants to be a stinking fucking bastard with sweaty balls.” This is the life of Lewis Capaldi in 2019. Caught in the eye of a storm sweeping across the world, he’s become the most talked-about new artist in the country in the space of weeks, and beyond that, stands as one of music’s undeniable new entertainers. Red carpets, big-time
MAY 2019
DORK
“What do you want to do for a shoot, Ethan?” we asked. “Snooker!” he replied. So here’s a feature with Ten Tonnes including snooker-based photos, but with no mention of snooker at all. Enjoy! Words + photos: Jamie MacMillan. (Oh yeah. And he has a debut album out. It’s great.)
51
S
o sunny is his disposition, it’s hard to imagine Ethan Barnett, a.k.a. Ten Tonnes, existing anywhere outside of spring and summer. New life is blooming all around, with pretty scenes of blossom making for a picturesque view as he chats about his forthcoming debut album basking in a warm glow of almost-summer sunshine. For those who prefer to hibernate during the winter months, it’s time to wake up and get in touch with an early candidate for this year’s Banger Central.
His self-titled debut is the soundtrack of a young man growing up. Written over four years, it captures those major milestones in late teenage life; falling in and out of love, and a desire to escape the small town that has grown to be overly familiar. Admitting that at times he felt “antsy” with wanting to release a record earlier, the long gestation period brought with it problems of its own. “I wrote ‘Lucy’ when I was 18, and I’m 23 this year, so it’s a big gap now,” explains Ethan. “Now, well, I don’t know who I was five years ago or remember what I was fucking doing!” Conscious that he wanted the whole record to feel ‘young’, he
kept pulling himself back to the bangers. “Sometimes you end up writing old ballad-y love songs that could be sung by Engelbert Van Humperdinck or whatever the fuck his name is. Proper old crooner songs. They’re great, but if they were on the same record as ‘Lucy’, it would have felt weird. I wanted to make sure it still felt young, and naive, very tongue in cheek.” Reworking some of those older singles to make sure they fit with his current sound, Ethan and his close-knit team of writers and producers have taken their time to get things right, and it shows. Some of the last songs to be written could well prove to be the longest-lasting,
moments like ‘Counting Down’ - originally written as a surf rock tune, but tweaked and perfected into perhaps the standout, feelgood track on the record. ‘Look What You Started’ and ‘Wake Up’ also came quickly. “If you have all the time in the world you think you’ll just do it whenever, but I was like, fuck I’ve got two weeks to get a bunch of stuff done!” And what a bunch of stuff. Constructed like a gig, this is forty minutes of non-stop bangers with one slow number almost appearing as an encore at the end in ‘Missing You’. “I just wanted my first record to be as exciting as I can make it really; it was definitely a conscious
READDORK.COM
THE G O N B E
MAY 2019
DORK
Following months of hype, fast-rising Dublin newcomers Fontaines D.C. have nailed their debut. Words: Jamie MacMillan.
T
he noise that hype makes is deafening. That cumulative build-up of magazines and mates repeatedly talking about that next big band, all saying the same thing: you’re going to love this band. Scenes pop up. Like-minded artists get thrown in together, genres and eras defined and named in a brief but heady explosion of style and hype. It’s a story as old as music itself, tribes gathering as punks or Britpoppers. It’s on the outskirts of any scene that the most interesting things usually happen, and so it is with Fontaines D.C.. While their early singles seemed to signal the Dublin band as obvious counterparts to the likes of Shame and IDLES, their debut album ‘Dogrel’ marks them as something else completely. As evocative as you would imagine from a band who came together
over a shared love of poetry, it is the work of a group who are as much aficionados of Yeats and Joyce as they are Ramone and Reed. Fontaines D.C. are their own scene, and there ain’t a box big enough to put them in. With a huge tour confirmed for the end of the year even before their debut album ‘Dogrel’ was announced, the noise surrounding the band has become so all-encompassing that you could hear it from the moon. Chatting to Dork as the band wind their way the French countryside following the end of yet another whirlwind tour, guitarist Carlos O’Connell has had time to reflect on the madness - though it hasn’t really sunk in yet. Life on the road has kept the band separated from the boom of anticipation back home. “The album was a dream to write and record. I was expecting that announcing it would be this big thing, but it’s kinda hard to feel
anything because you’re just so far from it,” Carlos starts. “Anything you get is just this load of social media likes and comments, maybe some messages, and it’s hard to get anything from that.” It was only when talking to their promoter that the band realised just how big the reaction to the tour and album announcement had been. “It gave us a bit of confidence that it might actually be okay in the end, y’know?” ‘Dogrel’ exists entirely in its own time and place, yet equally could be based in any big city at any time. Dripping with Dublin life, it shows a city far removed from Temple Bar pub crawls, and it is only frontman Grian’s heavily-accented vocals that give the game away at points. Still entirely relatable with its depictions of needle-strewn areas (‘The Lotts’), a city pregnant with possibility (current single ‘Big’), as well as inner-city violence (‘Liberty Belle’), it brings a specificity that
makes it stand out from the current crop. “If you live in a city like Dublin, you either reject it or you accept it. You have to try and understand how it affects you,” explains Carlos. “When we were writing, we were all in a very similar state of mind towards the city.” Being born into a city renowned the world over for its musical heritage brought its own ups and down. “In its own way, Ireland really embraces music and the culture of music even though there’s not an industry for it. There was just more going on in London, more independent companies doing what they do because they love music.” Being largely self-sufficient at home, putting on and promoting their own shows, the band even struggled to find suitable support bands in their earliest days getting a local poet to open for their ‘Liberty Belle’ single launch. Times
55
Y’R E N A BI G
INCOMING Your New Music Fridays, sorted
FONTAINES D.C. Dogrel
60
eeeee
F
Their music may have a harsh, punk-edged surface, but there’s genuine depth and emotion to be found on Fontaines D.C.’s debut full-length.
rom playing in dodgy South London pubs to announcing a headline tour that takes in 1000 capacity venues in just under a year, you can’t fault Fontaines D.C.’s ambition. But can the shouty Irish punks break out of
Dublin? With their debut album ‘Dogrel’, the band make clear that even if they could, they have no intention of shedding their links with the city that birthed them. References to the Irish capital abound – the first word on the entire album is ‘Dublin’ – and Irish traditions run deep in their approach to storytelling, especially evident on tracks ‘Liberty Belle’ and ‘The Lotts’. That’s without mentioning singer Grian Chatten’s unashamedly thick accent, which acts as a middle finger to anyone who says regional accents don’t play well if you want to be successful. The album itself is a mix of previously released singles (re-recorded for the album and sounding better than ever) and new material. ‘Hurricane Laughter’ and ‘Too Real’ remain as powerful as ever, the audio equivalent of a brick through your window, but it’s not all snarling violence. ‘Roy’s Tune’ and ‘Dublin City Sky’ are beautiful and nostalgic, at times even genuinely moving, no mean feat for a band more well known for mosh pits than emotions. Despite the changes in tone and pace, ‘Dogrel’ is tied together by the theme of working-class life in a city that’s rapidly gentrifying, the last gasp of traditions that have existed since the industrial revolution, and sometimes even before. The characters and camaraderie evoked by the band are deeply nostalgic, and while there are more openly political moments to be found (the opening of ‘Chequeless Reckless’ attacks sell-outs, phonies and the money-obsessed) the overriding aim of the album seems to be to capture a culture that might not exist for much longer. People going into ‘Dogrel’ may well be expecting punk-infused posturing on the state of society, and they certainly won’t be disappointed. But alongside this, there’s genuine heart in Fontaines D.C’s music – it’s a love letter to Dublin, and if we were Dublin, we’d be head over heels at the sentiment. P Jake Hawkes MAY 2019
DORK
INCOMING
12th April 2019
BAND OF SKULLS
LOVE IS ALL YOU LOVE (SO RECORDINGS) eeee
THE CHEMICAL BROTHERS NO GEOGRAPHY (VIRGIN EMI) ee On their ninth studio outing, The Chemical Brothers recycle their roots for an album that’s as akin in sound to the breakbeats and synth pyrotechnics of their debut ‘Exit Planet Dust’ as The Prodigy’s ‘No Tourists’ was to their underground rave days. ‘No Geography’ is a roadmap of acid house basslines, nineties trip-hop vocals in the form of Norwegian singersongwriter AURORA, and techno-tuned synthesisers that whizz around your mind and blur the lines between the past and present. It’s not that ‘No Geography’ is a misstep, it’s not even that it’s a bad album, in fact, it’s quite good. It’s that it neither adds nor takes away from their revolutionary discography; instead, it simply exists. P Jack Press
Inside the album
BAND OF SKULLS Russell Marsden and Emma Richardson reflect on the band’s shift from bluesy guitars to upbeat pop as a vehicle for change. “It was a risk,” they explain. Words: Dillon Eastoe
“I
t’s our future so like you’ve been sold a bit of a don’t you get in our raw deal. Whether it’s having way.” to pay for your education or not Statements of being able to move at the same intent don’t come much clearer pace as your parents did in than the clarion terms of what they call from mega achieved at your single ‘We’re age, and that not Also out this Alive’, the second being as easy for taster from you. week... Band of Skulls’ “It’s that adventurous new frustration coming ALL TVVINS Just To record, ‘Love is out with that song. Exist All You Love’. Although it seems Anderson .Paak “It goes back on the surface Ventura to that general very upbeat and Andy Black The Ghost feeling, that poppy, underneath of Ohio powerlessness the sentiment Bibio Ribbons that everyone has is a lot more Bloc Party Silent Alarm felt sometime frustration. We like (Live) in their life, the counterpoint of Broken Social Scene especially our those two things.” Let’s Try the After (Vol 2) age or younger,” At a time when BTS Map of the Soul: reveals guitarist older generations Persona Russell Marsden are imposing Dave Hause Kick of the band’s regressive ideas Jess Ribeiro Love most invigorating upon millennials Hate track to date. and children are The Leisure Society “Where you want going on strike to Arrivals & Departures to move on in point out that the Lowly Hifalutin life, but there is planet becoming LSD Labrinth, Sia & so much in the uninhabitable Diplo Present… LSD way, you feel might be a cause Yours Truly Afterglow
b Read more from Band of Skulls online at READDORK.COM now
READDORK.COM
61
They’re perhaps best known for bluesy rock riffs, but on new album ‘Love is All You Love’, Southampton’s Band of Skulls embrace change with a bunch of direct songs that lock into a groove and don’t let go. Working with pop producer Richard X, the duo have tested the strictures of their sound with fantastic results. There’s still plenty of room for dirty guitars and rock’n’roll ticks, but there’s a new-found emphasis on electronic beats and more anthemic vocals. The best tracks are where Band of Skulls push themselves furthest as on lead single ‘Cool Your Battles’, a hopeful plea for everyone to be nice to each other. After a ponderous few years, that’s seen their drummer depart and the rock scene morph into something far more future facing, Band of Skulls have found a way forward. P Dillon Eastoe
for concern, that feeling of frustration and pushing back resonates powerfully through ‘We’re Alive’ in a way few of the band’s songs have cut through in the past. That they put it across in a defiant sing-along jam is all the more impressive. The sentiment of owning your future rather than being held captive by the past speaks to the musical approach on the duo’s fifth album as well as its lyrical content. After four albums of blues-indebted rock’n’roll, Southampton’s Band of Skulls have taken a risk, switched up their sound and come up with some summer festival bangers-in-waiting. Having parted ways with long-time drummer Matt Hayward in 2017, the band was at a creative crossroads. “We started talking about pushing what was possible with a band like ourselves. What’s possible, what’s impossible? That’s how this record started,” Russell explains. To help them stretch their boundaries, they teamed up with super-producer Richard X, known for his work with Sugababes, Goldfrapp and M.I.A, amongst many others. “It was mainly wanting to change up who we worked with, and Richard works more in the electronic and dance world,” explains bassist and visual artist Emma Richardson. “It was exciting for us to work with a new producer where rock music wasn’t his first love-” “Or any kind of love,” Russell chimes in. “It was quickly obvious that we had quite a different record and we went with it,” Emma continues. “It was a risk, we didn’t know if it was going to work or not, but as soon as we started working with him, it moved in a direction that was exciting. This mixture of electronic and live, and how far we could push our sound and still get away with it as Band of Skulls.” That positivity and idea of burning light in the growing darkness is core to the ethos of ‘Love is All You Love’. “There’s so much energy being spent on the negative factors of the climate we’re living in, and I think we were expressing that with [lead single, ‘Cool Your Battles’],” says Russell. “And that’s how we feel at the moment, we want to take the energy from the negative stuff, and put it into something constructive, and remember what it feels like to have a good time! It all gets a bit much in the end, the bombardment of everything being so gloomy.” “That was the driving force, and we wanted to make a strong record and a positive record,” Emma affirms. “It’s kind of tough and tender at the same time.” “And [what we want] for people when they’ve got the record is to get a kick out of the sentiment,” Russell offers. “That kind of uplifting, positive thing which is important for us at the moment, and the music has definitely done that for ourselves,” he admits. “If it can do that for other people, that’s mission complete.” P
LOCAL NATIVES
26.04.19
FEAT. CAFÉ AMARILLO & WHEN AM I GONNA LOSE YOU
LP4