In 2010, two people found each other on the outskirts of Cologne and not only fell in love with each other, but also with making music together. While he is a professional audio engineer and musician, she has always been interested in writing and singing. About Gorillas and Vampires every now and then the two worked together on different demos in their cozy little apartment. What began with a simple idea soon became a serious project. Now they released their 2nd single "Working Like A Robot". This electro pop song is about feeling overworked and being stuck in your everyday life.
By Kamil Bobin
Discovered via Musosoup
Hello About Gorillas and Vampires. Can you introduce us to how you met and how the founding of the musical duo happened?
Gorilla: Hi there! We're a husband and wife synth pop duo from Cologne/Germany. We met in 2010. We started making music together in 2012. I've been making music for over 25 years and used to work with bands in professional studios. In 2012 on a lazy sunday I showed my wife one of my many demos I had sitting on my hard drive. She immediately had a lyric idea and started humming a melody and we put together "Small Town Blues", our debut single, in a couple of hours. It just took us ten years to re-record it professionally and finally releasing it. :-)
What is the biggest challenge of being an artist?
Vampire: While working on a song text, a lyrical idea or a simple tune, it all comes down to the question: Is it good enough? And after that: Will people listen to it? will they get the idea of the song? And then you start questioning everything. Is this even a good idea? Maybe they will laugh about it, find it silly or plain... For me, as an introverted and really self-aware person, it was really hard to silence these voices in my head. In the end I just stopped overthinking. This is our project, we're doing it for us and this is something to remember and something we can be proud of. It's just impossible to create something everybody likes. The most important thing is that you like what you do.
Gorilla: And the problem of actually getting heard as in getting listeners/fans. When you release your first single nobody knows you're out there and you just get very little streams/clicks. This can be very frustrating because you put so much hard work into creating these songs and then nobody listens to them. You really have to level up your marketing/social media skills and imho creative people are not very good at self-marketing. It kills your creativity. And yes, the fight against self-doubt too. I remember that right before the release of our first single I was about to cancel the release because I was afraid of people hating the song and making fun of it. Self-doubt can be such a vicious demon.
Your latest track is 'Working Like A Robot'. Can you share with us the background of its creation and did any unusual things happen during its creation?
Gorilla: I remember that we put the demo together rather quickly but I wasn't quite happy with the main piano sound in the verse. So I put it thru one of my guitar fuzz pedals and all of a sudden the song came to life. I showed it to my wife and she said it sounds quite "robotic" and that's how the whole Robot theme started. And I remember that I overdubbed some little synth lines one day before we sent it to our Mixing engineer. It's usually a really bad idea to add things last minute. I've been down that road a couple of times and it always ended up being something I regretted but I think this time it turned out quite well.
Are you in agreement about your tracks? Does there come to a difference of opinion on how they should sound?
Vampire: We always come together and discuss song ideas, showing each other some tunes and lyrics, humming melodies. If there is an disagreement it's really important that you talk about it. Sometimes a different idea/approach or even constructive criticism is vital for the outcome of the song.
Gorilla: Soundwise I always try to make it sound as "final" as possible using good audio equipment, audio converters and printing the sounds with the effects turned on and things like that. So my wife actually has never complained about how stuff sounds yet. :-) And I got a good advice (Hopefully..) for all you artist out there: Don't mix your own music! It's so important to have another set of ears finalizing your music. Mixing engineers always come up with creative mixing ideas and they give you valuable feedback about the quality of your recordings.
What is the most surprising fact you’ve learnt about yourself?
Vampire: For me, singing is something really intimate and private. I always loved to sing, but never sang for others and the introvert in me never thought I could. Putting my singing and my lyrics out there was a big step out of my comfort zone and in the end felt really liberating.
Gorilla: That I can write electro/synth pop songs. I have more of a rock music background and I was surprised that I can write somewhat catchy pop tunes. I honestly have know idea how that happened.
Do you think that education is important?
Gorilla&Vampire: Education is always important. And I don't mean especially school education. Staying informed about what's going on in the world, staying interested and open for new perspectives is quintessential. In this fast pacing world, you can get sucked into a vortex of misinformation. Stay open minded, stay curious and don't believe the first post, or hashtag that pops up on your screen.
What would you be doing right now, if it wasn’t for your music career?
Gorilla&Vampire: Probably sitting in a log cabin in Canada or doing an endless road trip in the USA.
How do you structure your week?
Gorilla&Vampire: Structure is essential, especially for creative people. You can easily get lost in the world of creativity. We usually do social media/marketing related things in the evening and songwriting at the weekend. Since we can't make a living making music, we work in other jobs during daytime to pay the bills.
What do you think is the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen or experienced?
Gorilla&Vampire: We once did a road trip and drove through death valley national park, heading to a scenic view called 'Dantes View'. Looking down into the valley from this spot makes you feel so small and insignificant and at the same time leaves you in awe for the beauty of the world. We've never felt anything similar to this since.
What are your plans for the future?
Gorilla&Vampire: We are currently working on new songs and hopefully gonna release them soon. There is a remix of our debut single "Small Town Blues" coming out on August 29th. And we already set the ground for a collaboration with another Artist.