It could be considered a double-edged sword being compared to one of the most prevalent bands of the last 20+ years, but Phoria remain humble about any comparisons. Nonetheless, what is an obvious and unshakeable similarity between this Brighton quintet and their highly influential predecessors is their knack for innovative and extremely polished music.
Their latest single sent the online music community ablaze with acclaim reviews this year, in addition to their landmark 360 degree show at the Weymouth Cultural Olympiad in 2012, which was viewed by over two million people on BBC World News. Tim, Jeb and Ed from Brighton’s post-rock/down-tempo/alternative outfit Phoria discuss their new EP, Bloodworks, the methods used to achieve their refined sound, and the public's fascination with Red.
It almost seems a little trivial to simplify your music to just electronic when it is seemingly very complex. Would you agree?
Whenever you tell someone, "I'm in a band", the next question is invariably, "What kind of music do you play?". It's never easy to answer, and I always get it wrong. I don't know. Some of the tracks are all synthesizers, and other tracks have this dense orchestral feel that's just guitar effects and a drumbeat. They're vocally-lead, too. There’s also an element of pop in there. Even the synths veer from calming, organic sounds to these big trance-y bliss outs. People say that categorising us is very difficult, and we're no better at it than they are.
What are the most predominant themes explored in your ethereal soundscapes?
Love, consciousness, language, mortality, awe, our evolutionary heritage, people we've met or know of and the ways in which they interact, sex, anger, and compassion. We tend to skitter around these ideas until they find their own more specific subject matter to focus in on. It's usually quite an obscure facet of people's behaviour or our own, and will grow back through most of these themes by the time it's done.
The reaction to your latest single, Red, has been compelling. We’ll use music site Beard Rock as an example: “I want to have sex with this song, I want it for my breakfast, I want to wear it, I want for it to never end". What is it about this song that’s romancing new audiences?
I think if you're in a certain mood the minimal production gives you exactly what you want and nothing that you don't. It's a particularly special song for us, with a sentiment I couldn't avoid at the time. It was written as it was recorded so nearly every vocal is a first take and every decision is just what happened there and then. Maybe that's why people connect with it so easily? Lyrically it gives away just enough to provoke, and inevitably casts your mind to someone who intoxicates you.
There is so much going on texturally with Phoria. Can you break down the recording process and how much instrumentation is involved?
I think that meticulous quality comes from us recording a demo before we learn to play the song as a group so that it can sound very refined with the particular textures and structures we want to convey. We learn how to perform it, we then re-record it, so I think that's why we have quite a focused sound. It's also a good way of avoiding the traps some bands get into when writing and rehearsing at the same time.
Tell us about your new EP, Bloodworks?
Bloodworks was a long time in the making. For our first EP we pretty much rushed into the studio with the only songs we had under our fingers at the time - that was how excited we were to have something on a record! Listening back to the EP now makes us realise we hadn't found our unique sound. In the two years since then we've pretty much been non-stop writing, gigging, writing, gigging, writing, and gigging. So many versions of Bloodworks came and went. We couldn't decide on the best playlist. As soon as one song seemed right we wrote another banger. Eventually the perfect quintet emerged to form what you now hear.
How does it feel to be compared to the likes of Radiohead?
It's a bit of a double-edged sword really. On one hand, it's amazing to be compared to one of the most culturally important bands of the last 25 years, and we respect them immensely, but at the same time we don't feel our work is derivative of theirs in any way, and worry that the comparison may be enough to discourage people from giving us a chance.
Explain the concept behind the 360 degree visual show at the Weymouth Cultural Olympiad, which received a staggering viewership of over 2.2 million people. Will you do something like this again given its response?
We would love to be involved in something like this in the future. Another Olympic event seems unlikely, but I found creating videos for a 360 format really exciting and I think the immersive nature of the show lent itself very well to our music. It was incredibly hard not to spend the whole performance just watching the projections.
Famous last words...
“Look Mum, no hands!”
