When did the initial idea for your latest single come together?
It was actually the very last song I wrote for the album. It didn’t exist when I had the 9 songs I was going to originally record. I was still fiddling around with one song because there was something I wasn’t quite happy with. One day I was on the guitar, playing around with some old 90’s songs, and I hit a 7th chord in an unusual inversion that suddenly triggered the verse melody in my head. I started playing along to the melody in my head and before I knew it, I had the verses and the chorus. The whole song was finished that afternoon. I knew then that I was better off replacing the song I wasn’t completely happy with. As a result, “Down” became the last song to be added to the album.
How would you describe the track, to a reader that is unfamiliar with the band?
It’s a song of two different feels. The verses have a mellow vibe compared to the loud and aggressive chorus, but it still sounds like the same song. My influences come from 90’s grunge as well as 60’s and 70’s rock. It’s probably a combination of those influences in the one song, which I haven’t really done anywhere else.
Can you tell us a bit more about the meaning behind the track?
The lyrics ended up being about growing up in a family where I was told what I was allowed to do when I grew up and what I wasn’t. I ended up going to uni and having a career I didn’t really want. I can’t say I regret it though, because a lot of good things have come of it. I still pursued music at the same time, even though I was told I wasn’t allowed to. I would actually jam with bands in secret for years. It’s about doing what you love even though there are forces trying to stop you.
How would you say that the track compares to anything you’ve done before?
It’s very different, particularly because of the difference between the verses and chorus. It can be hard to get to different sounding feels to sound as though they belong to the same song, and in this case, it’s not simply because one has cleaner guitars and one doesn’t. They genuinely do sound like separate genres in a way.
What was the hardest part about putting it together, and why?
The trickiest bit was the transition between verse and chorus, then back to verse again. It had to feel natural, not like two different songs were being forced together. It was a matter of finding the right chords, and in this case it turned out being certain suspensions.
Why should a reader check out the track?
For the last 20 years, everything has sounded so electronic. Even stuff that’s released as “rock” music is auto-tuned like crazy and sounds like something done by AI. I still get my inspiration from groups like Foo Fighters, Queens of the Stone Age (I’m so hooked on their new album), Pearl Jam, Soundgarden and Radiohead. If anyone else is also completely sick of how music has been sounding for some time now, I’m hoping this will be something of a remedy.
https://music.apple.com/us/album/down/1663981713?i=1663981939