Check out our next interview with both Peter and Leah from the wonderful July Talk – we talk new material, the history of the band, and more.
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S] Hey guys, we last saw you play on a tiny stage in the city of York, it was a mega show! How have you been?
Peter: We’ve been busy, and happy for the most part! We just finished our new album, Touch, that’s coming out in September and we’re making all the videos and whatnot while playing festivals this summer. Because we make our own videos, it’s taken some planning to shoot as much content as possible before we leave on tour in the fall. It’s been nice to be around home a fair amount this summer, Toronto is the best at this time of year.
S] Talk us through the biggest challenges over the last few years?
Leah: This probably sounds cliché but the greatest challenges have all provided the greatest learning experiences. It’s like working any job where there are highs, promotions and successes; and lows, fights, and bad days where you don’t want to get out of bed. For me personally, playing shows when it feels like the world is about to break is a huge challenge. When we’re in the van, it’s pretty easy to go into phone holes and follow every aspect of the latest heartbreaking news story. Sometimes it’s something going on at home, other times in a place we’ve never been and sometimes it’s less than 100 miles from where we played two nights before. I’m interested in learning to channel the sadness or anger or confusion and allow that to propel me on those dismal nights because otherwise I’ll just shut down. When I get into the thought pattern of “How on earth am I supposed to entertain a crowd when every cell in my body wants to breakdown and cry and hide?” it doesn’t do any good. When I’m able to say “Okay, we’re all in this together. It’s a mess but what can I do.” it’s way easier to tap into how to make it okay for all the humans in the room, as well as ourselves on the stage, even if it only eases the grief for one song or one moment.
S] How do you look back on the success of tracks like ‘Summer Dress’ now?
P: Summer Dress was one of the first songs we wrote as a band and always just felt like a quintessential example of what the band was about. I try not to focus on the success or failure of any particular song, because I would like our band to be perceived as a complete project and not just a vessel for a successful single or two, but I guess I’m happy that Summer Dress was one of the songs that floated to the top, because it’s one of our favourite songs to play live and we really feel like ourselves when we play it.
S] What about ‘Push + Pull’ – I like the inspirations, I think a lot of people have that issue with excess – where were you, and what personal experiences went into the writing?
L: We started working on “Push + Pull” during our first round of writing for album two when we were staying at a cabin in the woods a few hours northeast of where we live in Toronto. The dark disco-y vibe came from a song Josh had and the original chorus used the words “push and pull”. When we started talking about what the song should be about it made sense to explore being controlled by some other force, like an addiction or a little voice inside that is never satisfied and always wants more. That darkness is in all of us and we’d be hypocrites is we expressed an opinion about it either way so we wanted to keep the voice neutral when broaching the subjects of partying, consuming, indulging and overindulging; never stating whether it’s “good” or “bad”. Of course, in the western world it’s engrained in us from a very young age that what we have isn’t good enough and that we need more. When you’re a kid it means you cry if you can’t have the truck from the toy store but when you’re an adult can mean you party ’til you puke (or worse) or you buy a house you can’t afford. There are countless ways to fill the voids we’ve been raised to believe are inside us. It’s no one’s fault which is why it’s so complicated.
S] Plans for a UK tour soon?
P: We’ll be playing in Glasgow, Manchester and London in September right around the release of the record. Really excited to play King Tut’s in Glasgow again, I love that venue and that city so much. Doesn’t surprise me at all how many incredible bands come from there. We’ll then come back and do a longer run through the UK in the spring.
