knead to know – Page 2 – Bread Records

Knead to Know: Hayden J Barlow 🎸

20th Oct 202220th Oct 2022artist, bread, knead to know, local scene, new music, review1 Comment

we’ve got our next Knead To Know interview for you all, with the supremely talented singer-songwriter Hayden J Barlow! 🥖

Hayden’s been making waves on the scene over the past year or so, putting out a slew of releases and singles like there’s no tomorrow, performing across the North and we’ve even had him play a bunch for us – his live performances are so well-honed and intricate, it’s a joy to catch him play. we’ve been massive fans of his music for a while now and his new single “Stockholm Syndrome” is yet another in a long line of incredible tunes from him!

find the full interview below! ⬇️

Hey mate, nice one for doing this interview here with us! Tell us a bit more about yourself.

Hey bud! You’re absolutely welcome. I’m Hayden! I make video game boss music and then sing on it.

We’re massive fans of the new single “Stockholm Syndrome” – give us a bit more of a lowdown on the track!

‘Stockholm Syndrome’ is a tune I wrote a while ago about how much I both love and resent having a career in music. It takes a huge toll on me at times despite how much I love doing what I do. This song is an expression of that.

How did you start doing music?

I started singing and writing my own songs at about 10. It’s just something that has always existed simultaneously alongside my life. It’s only around 16 that I actually considered it to be a possible career. At about 22, I actually started actively chasing that. It’s had its ups and downs but it’s been pretty sick so far.

What are the processes involved in creating your music? Do you home record, or use a studio?

Everything I record is done all at home with a minimal home studio. It’s how I get that ‘D.I.Y’, glitchy sound that I’m starting to become known for.

We already know you produce your music yourself – what led you into self-production?

Honestly? Stubbornness. I am mad difficult to work with (trust me, I do it all the time) because of how unbelievably stubborn I can be when it comes to the sound of my music.

What are your main inspirations for your songs? What artists influence your sound?

It’s an eclectic bunch. James Blake is a big one production wise. In terms of writing, Kings of Leon are a big one as I grew up on them.

When you’re writing, do you focus on a melody first or is it lyrics, or some other way?

I don’t have a set approach, I tend to just go with my gut.

Over the past few years, how have you been spending your time musically? (recording, writing etc)

I’ve been heavily focused on recording these last few years. It’s become one of my biggest passions. Production is a whole other beast and I’ve learned a whole lot by using very little. I’ve had a lot of absolute beginners who have no idea what they’re talking about critique my recording methods. I’ve been honing it for years and these dudes with one set of cheap HS-5s and an ego think they can comment on it. One of my biggest motivations has been sticking it to them by proving you can make high quality, successful records with minimal equipment.

We’ve seen that you’ve been covered on radio a bunch of times now, how are you finding your music is being received?

It’s very validating. We’re slowly but surely getting there.

How are your gigs going? What kinda set up do you take to them nowadays?

To be honest, it’s not my biggest focus these days! I get the most dopamine from recording and making records. If I’m gigging, I want it to be a spectacle or a celebratory, wholesome event. Quality over quantity.

When you’re performing live, what do you enjoy the most about it?

I love translating my songs to a live setting. Whether that be to track, showing off my production skills or reinventing and rearranging my tracks for guitar.

Have you got anything else planned for the rest of the year?

I’ve a whole EP dropping in November! Then it’s onto planning the next batch of releases. Next year is going to be big.

it’s real lovely to put these interviews together and get a more personal and down-to-earth conversation with each artist, find out their motivations, inspirations and what their aims for the future are – seeing Hayden’s approach to music here is super uplifting, taking a much more DIY approach and focusing on the quality of his music is something that we can relate to here at the label. it’s well worth checking out his new tune, it sounds fantastic and if you enjoy it, his back catalogue is full of a bunch of gems as well! big love to him for participating in this and we hope you liked it as much as we did! 🍞

Our Knead To Know interview with Days Are Done was fantastic 🤘

30th Sep 2022artist, bread, knead to know, local scene, new music, reviewLeave a Comment

in case you missed it, our interview with Days Are Done for last week’s Knead To Know was fantastic

their new single “I’ve Tried” sounds sublime, with huge harmonies, uplifting production and their usual lovely songwriting that we’ve come to see with every single one of their releases. it was super lush to chat to them and get insights into their recording process, their influences and more!

you can find the full interview over on our website at https://breadrecords.co.uk/…/knead-to-know-days-are-done/ – have a look and let us know what you think!

Knead To Know: Days Are Done ☀️

Knead To Know: Days Are Done ☀️

22nd Sep 202222nd Sep 2022artist, bread, knead to know, local scene, new music, review1 Comment

here’s our next Knead To Know interview, with the amazing Days Are Done! 🤘

over the past year or so, they’ve been doing loads across Manchester, performing at various venues across the city and releasing tunes – we love their 80s-inspired feel with so many vocal harmonies lacing the soundscape and so much passion put into their music. ⚡️ their newest single “I’ve Tried” sounds absolutely gorgeous and we thought we’d get em for an interview! Find it in full below! 😎

Hey guys, thanks so much for doing the interview with us here. Tell us a bit more about yourselves!

Heya, we’re Emmy Kay – I’m a songwriter, singer, composer and actor originally from Manchester and Adam Lewis- singer, songwriter and BAFTA-winning composer originally from Wales.

The new single sounds superb, can you tell us a bit more about it?

Adam – It’s called “I’ve Tried” and it came out a couple of weeks ago. It’s a stream of consciousness really, thoughts about relationships and love. It’s half of a person’s conversation. Some things are hard to say but easier to say in a song. The last single ‘Say You Might’ was the other side of the conversation! It’s stuff one of us has really said for the most part. Musically it’s Pop- Classic Soul but with our own flavour. Influenced by a lot of our favourite artists like George Michael and Luther Vandross but it’s very much us. We’re creating our own sound and pushing it further every track we release.

What inspired you guys to start making music together?

Emmy – It sort of happened by accident. We knew each other through mutual friends and we just sat down with a “let’s see what happens” attitude which pretty much sums us up as a band. Adam was already in a band at that point and as that folded we just ran with this.

How do you go about creating your music? Do you home record, or use a studio?

We record everything at home – we have a very tiny home studio so we really are self-contained. We tend to slip into our own little world. But yeah everything’s done by us. We occasionally will get drums or a few other bits recorded remotely if we feel the track needs it but “I’ve Tried” is all us.

We’ve seen you take a little break from gigging – what have you been up to in the meantime?

We have! We’ve been writing, recording and much like everyone else, having the odd extentensial crisis. You know how it goes! We try and lean into remembering why we’re doing this now and again. So we don’t get caught on the music industry treadmill. Also living life, so we’ve got stuff to write about obviously.

Your previous singles sound absolutely brilliant, we love the harmonies and orchestral-sounding production on them. Who produces the music and what do you look for when producing?

Thankyou. We do is the short answer. It’s the both of us and it’s taken a long time to find a sound we were happy with and work out the journey we want to go on with the music. We started off doing acoustic stuff and we’re proud of those early singles but as our sounds developed and our writing has matured we wanted to move on. Embrace all our influences. For us it’s all about finding the right sounds so we do spend a decent amount of time on that. We love harmonies, like you said. Stacked vocals and making just the two of us sound like an entire choir is our jam. We’re lucky in that we have an amazing mix engineer – Steve Power ( Robbie Williams, Womack and Womack) and he really gets what we’re trying to do. We’ll send him the finished track and he’ll add this amazing shine to it. He really fills out the tracks and understands us.

What are your main inspirations for your songs?

Lyrically – life . We have the joke that all our songs are based on a true story but it’s really true. Whatever happens, whatever we experience or we see other people experience we write about. A lot of it is “ I’ve felt like this, have you?”. We try not to censor or edit in the sense that we try to be as honest as possible. Musically – a mash of a lot of our favourite artists. We both love D’Angelo and 90s r and b but we also love Hall and Oates, George Michael, Crosby, Stills and Nash. In terms of modern artists – we love H.E.R, Leon Bridges, Snoh Allegra, Marina Diamandis. We’re Pop, Classic Soul but in our own way. You can still hear our Americana influences if you listen carefully too. But we also take influences from other stuff – fashion, movies, architecture. We try an absorb vibes from as much stuff as possible.

How do you write? Do you write together, or do you bring lyrics and melodies to the table separately?

Emmy – Musically we always write together. Adam will come up with some chords or I’ll hum a melody. Then we’ll see where it goes. We usually decide fairly quickly if it’s going in the bin or not. Lyrically – it’s me. I’ll run lyric ideas by Adam now and again but I write them.

Over the past few years, how have you been spending your time musically? (recording, writing etc)

Lockdown had the biggest influence on us. We really went into a ‘burn it down and start again’ moment with the band. Adam lost his Dad during that period and just being inside, everything was very emotionally overwhelming. It made us stop and take stock. Why are we doing this? What do we want out of it? We wrote a crazy amount of songs while everything was shut and our sound started to evolve.

When you’re performing live, what do you each find best about it?

Emmy – We both love being on stage. In fact that’s where you really find the songs cause you can feel them evolving. It’s funny cause the old more acoustic version of the band we were gigging sometimes 5 times a week but with this version we’re still tryna navigate our way through how to best convey these songs as best we can to an audience cause at the moment there’s still just the two of us.

What music do you listen to? Which artists inspire you to make music?

Adam – that’s a complicated question because we both have different tastes but overlap in the middle somewhere. I love Leon Bridges, disco (I’m a big Donna Summer fan), but I’m also a huge Guns and Roses fan, I love Metallica. But also Crosby Stills and Nash, 90s r and b…

Emmy – I also love Guns and Roses! I maybe have a bit more of a pop lean than Adam- I’m a long term Marina Diamandis fan, I love Ariana Grande, I listen to a lot of Jorja Smith but we’re named after a Nick Drake song (Day Is Done) cause we both love him, I’m a huge Joni Mitchell fan. I love Kate Bush. I love 90s r& b too. TLC is my jam and I think Babyface is one of our greatest living songwriters. It’s definitely complicated!

Have you got anything else planned for the rest of the year?

Writing and writing. We’re not sure if we’re gonna release anything else this year yet. But certainly, there’ll be new music soon and gigs. We may do a launch gig in Manchester next year for some new music. Stay tuned.

we love doing these interviews, it’s so great to have an insight into each act’s writing processes, their inspirations and the such – fantastic to see what makes each act unique! we also really enjoy the fact that they do the production themselves, being able to have that creative control is something we often enjoy here at the label so it’s nice to see artists taking a more personal approach! it’s well worth checking out their new tune as well, another incredible release under their belt! a big thank you to them for partaking in this interview, we hope you enjoyed it as much as we did! 🍞

Knead To Know: Luna Marble 🎸

25th Aug 202225th Aug 2022artist, bread, knead to know, local scene, new music, reviewLeave a Comment

we’ve got our next Knead To Know interview for you all with the amazing up-and-coming Manchester rock outfit Luna Marble! ⚡️

over the past year or so, they’ve been making waves performing across the city and dazzling audiences with their huge sound, belting riffs and incredible stage presence – we love their debut single “Running” and their latest tune “All of My Love” only shows off their talent and prowess even more!

you can find our full interview below! ⬇️

Hey guys! Thanks for doing this interview for us. Tell us a bit about yourselves!

We are Luna Marble, a 4 piece hard rock 70s-inspired band from Manchester! We have often been described to have anthemic, stadium-ready songs with big choruses, relentless riffs and hard-hitting grooves, although that is for you to decide!

How did you start the band?

Believe it or not Maria, our lead singer, had many of our songs already written and she was always in the hunt of the perfect band to bring them to life. David (bass) and Sean (Drums) went to the same university as Maria, and they had previously participated in different sessions recording/ performing ensembles together prior to our band. However it wasn’t until we met Dragos, our guitarist, that this formation happened to be. Maria and Dragos started hanging out at the beginning of the first lockdown and their shared passion for music led them to start jamming out and writing songs together. Eventually we asked David and Sean to have a jam with us and the rest is history….

We’ve seen you performing all across Manchester, what have been your favourite gigs?

We have to say that every time we have performed at Gullivers or Castle Hotel, it has been great! We are lucky as well to have very supportive friends and fan base that always bring a good party to our shows and it’s great to see how little by little our following keeps on growing making each gig very special for us!

What do you enjoy most about performing live? Is it the atmosphere, the crowd, getting to play some tunes?

Many things! It’s a combination of the excitement of finally sharing what we have been working on and the feedback from the crowd making us play harder and louder! It’s such a unique atmosphere, unique to the moment, and we are out there living out our dreams, we wouldn’t want to do anything else.

You’ve just released your second single “All Of My Love” – we love it, and your first one was also an absolute banger. Tell us a bit more about the tune!

As previously mentioned Maria had some of our songs written prior to the band. The riff came to her back when she was 17 and has been through so many arrangements and bands until our current formation. Dragos definitely took the riff and made it his own, combined with Sean and David’s solid grooves gave the song the right energy it needed.

The song is supposed to be empowering, with raging vocals and a playful instrumental releasing into big choruses, giving the perfect supercharged rock and roll anthem.

What are your main inspirations for your songs?

70s music from bands like Led Zeppelin, Fleetwood Mac or Pink Floyd definitely play a big influence on us, especially in Maria’s approach to melodies, songwriting and arrangement. However, we all come from different backgrounds. Dragos coming from a more Prog-rock background makes his solos and rhythm playing up to virtuoso standards. Davids brings a lot of solid groovy bass lines and fills from bands like Royal Blood or Muse. And finally Sean’s hard-hitting drumming approach, from bands like Metallica.

…

How do you write? Do you take a group approach to it, or is it mostly one person who writes the songs?

Our writing dynamic has changed a lot during the time we have been a band. Maria had many unfinished ideas which she developed with Dragos, or Maria would pick on riff idea from Dragos and we would both sit and make a rough demo on Cubase, that we would later workshop in our band rehearsals. However as time has gone by we definitely jam together more and try to build a song from scratch all together, which makes the process more enjoyable and makes us closer as a band!

Where do you record? Have you got a home studio?

We were lucky that Maria was in the recording and production degree in uni, so we made most of our recording at uni, engineered by herself. However we are branching out to try different things and recently started working with Alex Miller who helps us in the process!

What do you think is the main thing that each of the band members bring to the table?

Each member brings their own unique qualities to the band. Maria is a very creative person, she comes up with all sorts of ideas for songs, arrangements, decorations for gigs, recording techniques and many more. More often than not the dynamic in the band is the boys putting together the ‘crazy frenzy’ of Maria’s ideas.

Where does the name “Luna Marble” come from?

Funnily enough it took us a good half a year to settle on a name… Dragos had in mind something to do with ‘marble’ because of it being a white rock he thought it would be appropriate for our rock style. Also its white colour suited a female fronted band he thought as well. Maria wanted to have some sort of cosmic reference in there as well and it was David who came up with the idea of using ‘luna’ (moon) as part of the name. We finally settled on Luna Marble after a long process of trial and error.

There’s a lot of classic rock within your tracks, but what kinds of other music inspire you?

Many more, as we said above Dragos grew up listening to a lot of prog and metal so there’s that influence (even if more subtle) and Sean loves his metal as well especially Metallica. There’s certainly a more modern influence as well coming from the big 4 grunge bands up until modern-day Muse and Royal Blood.

How was the single launch on the 17th August?

It was great, thank you! It was nice to put our own event at Gullivers again, and bring everyone together to celebrate a night full of great music! The support bands were incredible, we had a new set and a surprise guest on the organ. We couldn’t have asked for a better night and we got a bit creative with the stage, which looked amazing!

Is there anything else in the works?

There is always something else in the works! We have many songs already written and we are working on releasing as much of them as we can. However we have been toying with the idea of an Ep for a while… All I can stay is stay tuned into what we are up to because we are always pushing our creativity further and further….

it was brilliant to chat to the band here, we’ve been huge fans of their music since we heard their debut single, and their set for us over at The Grafton Arms during the summer for our Toasted night was absolutely breathtaking. ☀️ we’re sure that they’ll be making huge movements with the release of new music and more gigs – if you’re able to catch them live, it’s well worth it. a big thank you to them for partaking in this interview, we hope you enjoyed it as much as we did! 🍞

ICYMI: Our Knead To Know interview with The Distance! ☀️

20th Aug 2022artist, bread, knead to know, local scene, new music, reviewLeave a Comment

in case you missed it, we had a real lovely time chatting to The Distance for our Knead To Know feature last week!

the lads are a force to be reckoned with on the Manchester scene, having gone from strength to strength and really making a name for themselves – they’ve got some proper bangers under their belt.

check it out on our website at https://breadrecords.co.uk/…/knead-to-know-the-distance/ – let us know what you think!

Knead To Know: The Distance ⚡️

Knead To Know: The Distance ⚡️

12th Aug 202212th Aug 2022artist, bread, knead to know, local scene, new music, review1 Comment

we’re back with our next Knead To Know interview, this time with the fantastic Manchester-based band The Distance! 🤘

we’ve known these lads for a while now, they’ve been making waves on the music scene, performing and coming down to gigs each week – real lovely chaps with a proper determination to get involved and play their tunes. they’ve got some proper bangers under their belt as well, we can’t wait to see what they’ve got in store and this interview has been lovely way to find out more about their plans! 😊

you can find the full interview below! ⬇️

You’ve been all over the Manchester music scene for the past year or so – how have you found it? What have you been up to?

Everything started from playing Manchester open mics. We’ve seen so many great musicians and bands who’ve pushed and inspired us to write more music for our band. Many of these open mics have given us further gig opportunities, allowing us to play at venues such as Lions Den, Aatma, and The Empire in Rochdale, as well as multiple independent festivals.

We’ve seen you go from predominantly a two-piece to a full band, how different is it performing with a band and what’s the best thing about it?

The Distance originally existed as a three piece, before Sam joined as the lead guitarist. It was then when we started playing local open mics to help promote our band’s music. Having a lead guitarist in the band gave us more options to include guitar parts, melodies and guitar solos in our songs. We prefer playing as a full band whenever possible, because the energy a full band creates can never fully be replicated as an acoustic duo.

What are your main inspirations for your songs?

We’ve all got different personal influences as musicians, but when these influences are combined as a band, we feel it helps to create a unique sound for our songs. If we were to give one band that has influenced us the most it would be The Stereophonics – who have really helped to shape our sound as a band.

How do you write? Do you take a group approach to it, or is it mostly one person who writes the songs?

We have tried multiple different methods of song writing, which we feel helps to really keep us inspired creatively. Most recently, Jack and Sam have found a song idea, recorded a demo, and brought it into a band rehearsal for Rhys and Aaron to help complete the song.

Over the past few years, how have you been spending your time musically? (recording, writing etc)

The band originally started when Jack met Rhys at college. When they moved to University in Manchester, Jack asked Rhys to dep for a gig and Rhys joined The Distance full time shortly after. Jack and Sam then met at an open mic night in Manchester, and Sam completed the line-up in 2021. Regarding music outside of the band, Rhys releases his own music under the name ‘Serene’ and Sam released an album during Lockdown followed by a number of singles. As a full band we have been writing new songs together, as well as working on new covers to add to our setlist. We have recently recorded a new single which will be released in the near future.

We’ve seen you popping up on bills all across Manchester and beyond now – whereabouts have you been gigging?

We have played many venues in Manchester over the past 6 months, and have started to venture outside of the city to venues in places such as Leeds and North Wales. More recently, we have been talking to promoters in London and Liverpool in order to expand our fanbase around the UK.

When you’re performing live, what do you each find best about it?

Sam – The thing I like the most about performing live is the adrenaline rush you get from seeing the audience’s reaction.

Jack – The thing I like most about performing on stage is being able to bring to life songs that both I and the band have written. We thrive off the positive feedback but also the constructive criticism helps to push us further.

Aaron – I get to play my drums.

Rhys – The best thing about performing live is getting to play gigs at new venues and getting out with the rest of the band in new places. (Also having a drummer deafen me every weekend before we’ve even started playing).

Where do you record? Have you got a home studio?

We record demos at each others houses and sometimes send files or record our parts remotely. We just recorded our upcoming single at Through The Roof Recording Studio.

You guys have got some real bangers, we’ve heard your tunes so many times now and they never get old. What kinds of music inspire you?

The thing about writing your own music is that it’s difficult to imagine people actually wanting to hear your band’s songs again and again (no pun intended). It’s hard to believe that so many people like yourself back our music and what we do as a band – and we appreciate everyone who comes down to our gigs (we never forget a face or a name). We’ve worked so hard to constantly be present in the music scene so it’s no surprise why people have heard our songs so many times. As far as influences go, we all have our own different inspirations such as Punk, Indie and Rock, which as mentioned before, we aim to merge these to create our own unique sound as a band.

Have you got any plans for new music at any point soon?

We have just finished recording our new single ‘Falling’, which we are in the final process of announcing. Our plans after this are to release another single, which will hopefully be followed by an EP.

Have you got anything else planned for 2022?

We have several gigs already booked for the rest of 2022, including The Royal George in Todmorden (20th August), Gulliver’s (27th August), Off The Square (8th October) and of course at Lion’s Den with Bread Records on the 12th of November. Any new gig dates will be announced on our Facebook or Instagram, along with the release of our new single ‘Falling’.

it’s fantastic to be able to chat with these guys here, learn more about their influences and what they’ve got planned – we can’t wait to see what’s in store for them! it’s been fantastic to see them grow over the past year, performing at bigger and more places across the country. well worth catching them live! a big thank you to Jack, Sam, Rhys and Aaron for this interview – let us know what you think! 🍞

All of our features! 👊

27th Jul 2022artist, bread, fresh batch, grain radio, just the crust, knead to know, local loaf, local scene, new music, playlist, review, The WrapLeave a Comment

just a quick reminder that you can find all of our features, reviews, music and more over on our website!

there’s a whole bunch of features, including our weekly Just The Crust reviews and our end-of-month The Wrap – plus plenty more! lots to sink your teeth into.

find it all on our website here at www.breadrecords.co.uk to find it all, we’ve got over 2 years’ worth of music covered now which is insane to think!

We put out our latest Knead To Know interview last week! 🥪

21st Jul 2022artist, bread, knead to know, local scene, new musicLeave a Comment

in case you missed it, we put out our latest Knead To Know interview last week, this time with the amazing Emily Mercer Music!

we chatted about a whole bunch, including her latest single “Maybe Then”, her inspirations for creativity, the work she does with Manchester Women Songwriters and even old school emo and rock genres of music

head on over to our website at https://breadrecords.co.uk/…/knead-to-know-emily-mercer/ to find it in full – give it a read and let us know what you think!

Knead To Know: Emily Mercer 💥

Knead To Know: Emily Mercer 💥

14th Jul 202214th Jul 2022artist, bread, knead to know, local scene, new music1 Comment

after a short break we’re back with our next Knead To Know feature with the fantastic Emily Mercer! ⚡️

we love writing up these interviews, it’s a super special way to connect with an artist and find out a bit more about them, their influences, and what they’ve got coming up. Emily’s a singer-songwriter here in Manchester whose been on the scene for a good while now – we’ve caught her performing a bunch of times now and every single time she only gets better and better!

She’s recently released her single “Maybe Then” – another single in a great discography of music for her, sounding fantastic with intricate melodies, huge production and her band only give the song even more strength to its sound. We’ve been big fans of Emily’s music for a while now and this only solidifies her songwriting ability – find our interview below! ⬇️

Emily, it’s brilliant to get you here for our Knead to Know interview – let’s start by talking a little about your music, and what you’ve been doing lately!

I’m a singer-songwriter and pianist on the Manchester scene. My music fuses indie, jazz, soul and folk so I usually just say ‘alternative/indie’ to save on characters. Lately I have been recording new music and working on building a new full band sound with my amazing band members!

When did you start doing music and what was the main reason for it?

I started playing music when I was around 12 or 13, playing guitar in an emo band believe it or not! As a painfully shy kid I enjoyed the outlet that allowed me to be as dramatic as I felt. I was absolutely obsessed with bands like Green Day and My Chemical Romance and I just wanted to be like them. My reasons are slightly different now haha!

What inspires your sound? Who are some of your favourite artists?

After the emo era my absolute favourite band was The Dresden Dolls, and they are what made me switch to piano and were hugely influential on my writing. I also love Jazz and would listen to singers like Billie Holiday as a teenager. I became obsessed with Fiona Apple’s music while I was at uni and she remains a huge influence along with other fairly experimental songwriters like Weyes Blood and Cate Le Bon. More recently I’m into a lot of R&B and Soul. There’s an artist called Baby Rose who I can’t get enough of and she has really inspired some of my recent writing.

You’ve recently released your single “Maybe Then” – tell us a little bit about it, inspirations and how it came to be about 🙂

Maybe Then started as a really simple, 3 chord demo. I usually go really full on with my chord structures so it was kind of a stripping back, it’s a really simple song. I was then approached by producer Andy Raphael who was up for producing the track and it became the cinematic track it is now! The song is about letting go of perfectionism as an artist, the main hook is ‘I’ve been waiting on a work of art but there’s no such thing’, and I actually ended up finding this to be a really helpful mantra. It’s about how we wait around for things to be perfect but nothing ever will be, the timing will never be ideal so just get out and do what you want to do! My friend Philippa Oliver filmed an amazing music video for the track too. It’s very dramatic!

What would you say are your main inspirations for creating and writing?

Lots of my songs are about the quirks of human behaviour. Whether this is something I’ve observed in someone else or myself. A lot of it is quite self-exploratory at the moment, questioning why I do certain things and think in certain ways.

What’s your process for creating or writing music?

All of my songs start as a little phrase or melody at the piano. It usually takes a long time between an idea appearing and finishing the song, it can be months. I don’t have a set approach other than building on a tiny snippet of an idea over time. I’ll record my ideas in logic and build harmonies over them. Then I send them to my band members and they add their ideas. Since I’ve been working with a band I’ve left a lot more space in my songs. They used to be very dense with piano melodies but now I leave some breathing room for the others. I am loving working with a band, they elevate the music so much and add things I never would have thought of! It’s much more collaborative now.

How did the lockdowns impact you as a musician, or even in general? It’s been nearly two years but they still have a lasting impression on everyone, we find!

The lockdowns are kind of a blur. It did give a lot of writing time and I think I wrote some of my favourite songs to date! What it has done is to make me appreciate everything much more. I hadn’t done loads of collaboration before and now it’s my favourite thing. I feel more a part of the Manchester scene now than I did before actually, and some of the remote collaborations I did have turned into lovely friendships!

We’ve seen you’ve been doing regular nights over at the Art of Tea, and working much more frequently with Manchester Women Songwriters’ Collective – how have you found all of these?

I love running these nights. Above all it’s been a great way to connect with loads of new musicians, and hosting a night where people come especially to listen to great music has been really rewarding. With Manchester Women Songwriters Heidi and I are trying to do a showcase every quarter or so and we’ve been loving it. The reception has been amazing, we sold out our last show and we have another in the pipeline at the end of July so watch this space!

You’ve been performing a whole load with other musicians as well – we’ve seen a lot on the socials! How has this come about?

A lot of this started out as remote lockdown collaborations. That was the case with Canter Semper, Tom Welsh, Tom Poggi (all amazing artists) who have since become regular collaborators and friends. It’s always the case that one thing leads to another so it all started with those and has snowballed into playing with lots of lovely people.

How have your releases been going lately – what response have you got from audiences and fans?

I released Maybe Then back in March and the reception was lovely. It’s always really hard trying to self-market everything, it’s a full-time job in itself really! But everyone has been lovely about it. I learn so much from every release so on to the next!

Do you record in a studio or do you have a personal home studio?

A bit of both. I have recorded in professional studios and friends’ home studios in the past but I was lucky enough to get a grant from the Arts Council last year to build my own home studio. I am loving having the space and equipment to experiment and I am working on improving my production skills.

Have you got anything coming up in 2022 we should know about?

I’m currently working on a couple of singles and a new EP with the band, which is coming along really nicely. I hope to start releasing tracks from it in the Autumn! There will be a full band EP launch show too, date TBC! Aside from that we have filmed some exciting live sessions that will be released soon and I just want to play more shows with the band and keep putting on local nights. It can be easy to get disheartened being an independent musician so I am just trying to appreciate what is in front of me and enjoy the ride!

it’s great to be able to chat with Emily here, talking about her unique experiences and influences that help her to create music – we love finding out about the backstory of songs, their journey and how they came to be. I think we’ve all had the emo phase at some point too, it seems that a lot of musicians came to be through a love of that genre of music – personally I think that the acceptance that the genre gave people actually helped a lot of people figure out where they wanted to be and who they were! We can’t wait to hear more from her and her band, and we’ll definitely have to get down to one of their gigs soon. 😊

a big thank you to Emily for answering these questions for us – you can find all of her music on Spotify at https://open.spotify.com/artist/6hFZOemdEu434rD35fYjPG, it’s well worth checking out her tunes! 🌛 we hope that you enjoyed this feature as much as we did – let us know what you think! 🥪

So much stuff here on the website now! 🤘

22nd Jun 2022artist, bread, fresh batch, grain radio, just the crust, knead to know, local loaf, local scene, new music, review, The WrapLeave a Comment

Grain Radio

just a lil post today to remind you all about all of the features and reviews over on our website – it’s not all just gigs (even though looking through our calendar it looks like it!)

we’ve got so many lovely regular features, we’re planning to update a few of them over the new few weeks and make them even cooler. there’s over TWO YEARS of posts on our website now, today marks our 784th day of posting in a row.. madness but so much so have a gander at.

you can find it all over on our website at www.breadrecords.co.uk – there’s a whole bunch of stuff to sink your teeth into. so many incredible releases from up North, we love writing about them all!