Following up the enormous love for their previously shared single ‘Slide’ near the end of last year, London-based outfit Volleyball recently returned with their latest effort ‘Paradisco’.
Channeling more of that fresh and vibrant psych-pop sound, ‘Paradisco’ sees the group grow even further into their sound. Jam-packed with a warm and inviting atmosphere throughout, this new delight keeps us dreaming for those long and breezy summer nights.
So with the new track available now, we sat down with them to find out more about the release and what they have planned for the rest of the year.
Words by Chris Bound
Discovered via http://musosoup.com
Chris) Hi guys, how are you today?
Volleyball) Very well thanks.
For those that haven’t heard of you yet, how would you best describe your sound and who have been your biggest influences so far?
Our sound definitely stems from deep in the world of psychedelia, with a modern twist. There are so many influences, maybe ‘Men I Trust’ on the more laid back side of things, to ‘King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard’ on the more gritty side of things. Someone described it to us as that it seems to have a ‘mellow but energetic quality’. So imagine that channel through chorusey effect guitars and floaty melodic vocals.
You are also from London, can you tell us how the music scene there has influenced your sound?
London is great for being an intense mixing pot of many different influences all the time. If you are talking about music, putting on different songs there’s always someone who pops up who plays something you’ve forgotten about or never have heard before. The variety of different genres you can hear just being out and about is massive, trickling out of open windows, speakers singing songs in the park, playlists in cafes etc etc.
You have just released your new single ‘Paradisco’. Can you tell us how that track came about? What is the story behind it?
This song was one of the first we wrote as Volleyball, we’d gone to spend a few weeks writing in a scout hut out in a forest in Kent. We had the doors open, looking out to some autumn rain coming down and had just been jamming out ideas. This one came together really naturally, we were deep in the flow of things by that point.
Lyrically, Paradisco focuses on human relationships and how they can be so good and so bad. It was written as a reminder to forgive and forget, and that inner peace is something that is almost always available - like a sanctuary you can go to.
The themes play off that bouncy beat and then wind into this big moment of letting go. It takes on a more driving pace and balances that inner calm with an outward burst of energy.
And how would you say it differs from your previous single ‘Slide’?
Paradisco shows a more introspective, calmer side to the Volleyball sound, well the verses do at least, this is balanced with the energy and more erratic feel of the bigger sections which perhaps tie it to our first release.
We want our songs to feel like an adventure and an escape from the every day, both Paradisco & Slide reflect this in their dynamic structure and production. So even though they can feel different, the running themes provide the link. We keep coming back to this idea of how to deal with the ups and downs of life, how we can retreat from them or sit with them. It’s kind of fascinating that both approaches can be useful. Our culture often provides answers to these problems as - drink something, buy something, like or follow something. We are dipping our toes in the water of some other ways of thinking.
Do you have plans for an EP or even an album in the months to come?
We have a string of singles coming over the next few months to take us into the summer. A lot is happening around this, from live ‘isolation style’ versions, to sample packs made from the songs and remixes. We are hoping to get back in the studio together as soon as it’s possible.
The pandemic has obviously affected so much recently, but what have you got in store for the year ahead?
Over the most recent lockdown we have been all over the place, geographically speaking, Rudi in Guernsey, Hugh in York and Thom & Tom back in London, so our plans to record in January have been pushed back a bit!
We have a lot of exciting new material and live plans we want to finish & experiment with, although what we are going to do with it is yet to be decided. Hugh has plans this summer to go skydiving with sharks, so we will have to fit it around that.
And finally, what do you hope to have achieved over the next five years?
To survive the global pandemic. Make more music. Stroke more dogs. Play one gig maybe. Write a song that is 167.67bpm. Win Wimbledon.
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