One Day We Will Be The Trees Interview
Q: Can you talk about your musical history?
A: Weirdly enough, I wasn't really interested in music until my mid-teens, I think it was Foo Fighters' In Your Honor that first got to me.
After that I went back to fill in the gaps in my missed musical childhood and started going to as many gigs as I could.
I learned to play guitar at school, inspired by my older brother. I started with classical, then moved on to acoustic and electric soon after. Then I was in a couple of bands at university and since then it's mostly been open mics with a friend.
I've been writing music since my teens, but a lot of it died at the demo stage which is probably for the best! I can't remember exactly what led me to think I could do such a thing, I think a few of my mates started writing their own stuff and I wanted to jump on the bandwagon. Then life got in the way and I put songwriting to the side for a few years to focus on my career.
Some years ago I started getting more into bands like Oceansize and Maybeshewill, and I really loved their wonky rhythms and swooping soundscapes, and just how different they were from the bands I was used to.
It also gave me the idea that you could make truly transcendental instrumental music. My voice has always been weaker than I'd like, even with some singing lessons, so learning to write without lyrics front of mind opened up so many doors for me.
When it came to recording as One Day We Will Be The Trees I watched hours and hours of videos on recording, mixing and mastering and decided I needed to have full control of my early projects. I first tried my hand at self-production when I recorded music in my teens and early twenties and one of the many benefits of the digital age was being able to go back and hear how much I'd truly improved! Or at least how little I knew what I was doing back then.
I learned so much through that process, though for my sanity I'll probably try and get some more help on the next project!
Q: What are some topics and themes you explore on some of your recent release Brink?
A: As cheery as it is, the album is broadly about death. It's something I get really anxious about if I don't keep busy. I'm secretly hoping the album will act as a sort of catharsis and keep it away for a bit. Tracks like "A Vacancy, A Void" and "These Cursed, Mottled Hands" are more literal and were somewhat influenced by the deaths of friends and family. Tracks like "Disengage" and "Wanderlust" are a bit more metaphorical, the death of a relationship or the idea of death as a transformation.
A few of them are a bit lighter, "What A Way To Fall Apart" and "I Used To Have An Anger Problem, Now I Have An Anger Solution" were trying to evoke a feeling more than talking about a particular subject.
Q: How do you approach songwriting?
A: I'm very much a "notebook by the bed" kind of songwriter, sometimes I'll be driving or trying to get to sleep and suddenly a hook or lyric idea or even just a song name will strike me and I have to write it down asap or I'll forget it. I recently heard Yvette Young talk about how she would record voice notes in the car when she thought of something, so I've now got a lot of out of tune ideas on my phone too.
Once I've got a start I'll usually try and fill out the other instruments for that section and then see where I think that would fit in an overall track. Sometimes I might have other phrases and riffs I've written before that I can try and thread together, sometimes I'll have to noodle around on a guitar or bass for a bit and see what comes out, and sometimes I have to start recording before I realize what else I need.
As an example, I got super lucky on "Anger Solution" when I had a riff I'd written a year or two before and thought "that's fun to play but I can't see it going anywhere" and when I had written most of that track I realized it fit perfectly! So write everything down, you never know when you might need it!
I also highly recommend sharing things with friends as you go, it took me way too long to start doing that but once I did I got some great feedback that helped shape some of the tracks.
Q: Have you played this music live and if so how does it translate with an audience?
A: Not yet, but it's something I'm keen to try! I'm a fairly anxious person, so I keep darting between "I need to find a full band before I even think about this" and "I can start with a backing track and go from there". I'm hoping I can make my mind up before the year is over. Some of the tracks are pretty straightforward but a couple of them are going to need some creativity, so I'm excited to see if I can come up with something!
Q: What else should we know about your music?
A: I made a conscious effort in this album to not stick too tightly to one genre, and that's something I hope to keep up. I want to surprise people and surprise myself, and I want to experiment and explore what I can create and how. So I guess what I'm saying is, if you hear a track or two and don't think it's for you, give the album an honest try. There'll probably be something out there you like!
Q: Can you talk about your musical history?
A: Weirdly enough, I wasn't really interested in music until my mid-teens, I think it was Foo Fighters' In Your Honor that first got to me.
After that I went back to fill in the gaps in my missed musical childhood and started going to as many gigs as I could.
I learned to play guitar at school, inspired by my older brother. I started with classical, then moved on to acoustic and electric soon after. Then I was in a couple of bands at university and since then it's mostly been open mics with a friend.
I've been writing music since my teens, but a lot of it died at the demo stage which is probably for the best! I can't remember exactly what led me to think I could do such a thing, I think a few of my mates started writing their own stuff and I wanted to jump on the bandwagon. Then life got in the way and I put songwriting to the side for a few years to focus on my career.
Some years ago I started getting more into bands like Oceansize and Maybeshewill, and I really loved their wonky rhythms and swooping soundscapes, and just how different they were from the bands I was used to.
It also gave me the idea that you could make truly transcendental instrumental music. My voice has always been weaker than I'd like, even with some singing lessons, so learning to write without lyrics front of mind opened up so many doors for me.
When it came to recording as One Day We Will Be The Trees I watched hours and hours of videos on recording, mixing and mastering and decided I needed to have full control of my early projects. I first tried my hand at self-production when I recorded music in my teens and early twenties and one of the many benefits of the digital age was being able to go back and hear how much I'd truly improved! Or at least how little I knew what I was doing back then.
I learned so much through that process, though for my sanity I'll probably try and get some more help on the next project!
Q: What are some topics and themes you explore on some of your recent release Brink?
A: As cheery as it is, the album is broadly about death. It's something I get really anxious about if I don't keep busy. I'm secretly hoping the album will act as a sort of catharsis and keep it away for a bit. Tracks like "A Vacancy, A Void" and "These Cursed, Mottled Hands" are more literal and were somewhat influenced by the deaths of friends and family. Tracks like "Disengage" and "Wanderlust" are a bit more metaphorical, the death of a relationship or the idea of death as a transformation.
A few of them are a bit lighter, "What A Way To Fall Apart" and "I Used To Have An Anger Problem, Now I Have An Anger Solution" were trying to evoke a feeling more than talking about a particular subject.
Q: How do you approach songwriting?
A: I'm very much a "notebook by the bed" kind of songwriter, sometimes I'll be driving or trying to get to sleep and suddenly a hook or lyric idea or even just a song name will strike me and I have to write it down asap or I'll forget it. I recently heard Yvette Young talk about how she would record voice notes in the car when she thought of something, so I've now got a lot of out of tune ideas on my phone too.
Once I've got a start I'll usually try and fill out the other instruments for that section and then see where I think that would fit in an overall track. Sometimes I might have other phrases and riffs I've written before that I can try and thread together, sometimes I'll have to noodle around on a guitar or bass for a bit and see what comes out, and sometimes I have to start recording before I realize what else I need.
As an example, I got super lucky on "Anger Solution" when I had a riff I'd written a year or two before and thought "that's fun to play but I can't see it going anywhere" and when I had written most of that track I realized it fit perfectly! So write everything down, you never know when you might need it!
I also highly recommend sharing things with friends as you go, it took me way too long to start doing that but once I did I got some great feedback that helped shape some of the tracks.
Q: Have you played this music live and if so how does it translate with an audience?
A: Not yet, but it's something I'm keen to try! I'm a fairly anxious person, so I keep darting between "I need to find a full band before I even think about this" and "I can start with a backing track and go from there". I'm hoping I can make my mind up before the year is over. Some of the tracks are pretty straightforward but a couple of them are going to need some creativity, so I'm excited to see if I can come up with something!
Q: What else should we know about your music?
A: I made a conscious effort in this album to not stick too tightly to one genre, and that's something I hope to keep up. I want to surprise people and surprise myself, and I want to experiment and explore what I can create and how. So I guess what I'm saying is, if you hear a track or two and don't think it's for you, give the album an honest try. There'll probably be something out there you like!