The British band Everything Everything is set to release their new record Re-Animator on September 11th this year.
We had the chance to sent some questions to Everything Everything Drummer Michael „Mike“ Spearman.
Read the answers below:
About Musïc: How are you guys doing and how does it feel to be releasing a new album at times like these?
Mike: We’re well thanks. It’s been a very strange time in lots of ways but I’m glad we’re managing to release an album with all that’s going on in the world. In some ways it would have been easier to not have a record out this year but personally I’m glad that we’re facing it head on, dealing with the challenges rather than sitting on the sidelines. It kind of suits our band to be in amongst it during an apocalypse.
About Musïc: You had to push back the release of “Re-Animator” because of the pandemic…what was it like making such a decision and have you ever had the thought of holding it all back until everything is over?
Mike: It did cross our minds to delay until next year and we definitely considered it but ultimately we wanted the record to be out and thought other people would too. It might not sell as many copies but we make music for people to enjoy and engage with so that’s the most important thing to us. In the end having to move the record back three weeks was, while a bit of a shame, not too bad considering the state of the world and certainly nothing compared to what some people have had to go through as a result of this pandemic.
About Musïc: You did some YouTube live performances – how did you record that? Was it recorded in one take? Everybody playing in one room together?
Mike: We each recorded them at home just as lockdown was announced and no-one knew the scale of what was going to happen. I was actually due to record my drums in a small studio with an engineer friend but we decided against it for the sake of safety. In the end I used a soundcard the band were throwing out a few years ago that I retrieved from a bin and that was so old I had to use my laptop from 2004 to speak to it. So it was all a bit ‘make do’ and a bit of a scramble but kind of fun as well. We talked about trying to record all together at the same time but it wouldn’t have worked so we built the songs up one by one in the usual way, sending them to eachother – first drums, then bass, guitar, keys, vocals, all remotely.
About Musïc: You wrote that you will have something exciting for around the new release date – can you reveal something?
Mike: Not really but I will say no-one’s ever quite done anything like it before…
About Musïc: People are really looking forward to “real” live gigs. You released UK Tourdates and also added a small club gig to support “the Passport. Back to your Roots” playing at Esquires Bedford – as soon as it is safe to do so, to support the struggling clubs. You chose Esquires Bedford – why this location?
Mike: Well there was a choice of a few but we’ve never played Esquires, or Bedford at all. The chance never came our way when we were at that stage of our career but it’s a legendary venue so we thought this is a good opportunity to play it, once the time is right.
About Musïc: Do you also have a plan to tour the rest of the world? Like Germany? We saw some fan comments like the famous ones as “come to Mexico” or “come to Brasil”.
Mike: We’d love to but it’s going to be harder than ever now. We’ll certainly try our best as we’d love to play to fans in places we haven’t played before like Mexico and Brasil. We always love playing in Germany and love our fanbase there.
About Musïc: How did you came up with the Idea for your “Violent Sun” Video? Like to use your Equipment for a final time and scatter ash from the fire on the floor…
Mike: That was part of it yes. We always go round in circles with video ideas but I think this one started off with me thinking about the energy of the song and I was living near a forest at the time so thought it would cool to run through the forest with some ‘important’ object, then we do a camera trick and that object is passed on to Alex, then Jeremy, then Jon – a sort of lockdown relay race where at the finish the object’s significance becomes clear. We couldn’t do that in the end but we kept the idea of running as it suits the feeling of the song, plus we knew we’d have to film ourselves due to lockdown so filming ourselves running made sense. Then we said we should have a performance element since we hadn’t done that on the videos yet on this album and we thought the burnt instruments would work as we were pulling them out of our burnt up studio. That was a depressing day but the idea of using the instruments to make something out of that destruction made us feel a bit better about what had happened. It was kind of a middle finger to the fire.
About Musïc: We read that “Violent Sun is about desperately holding on to the moment before it passes forever”. Is there a moment or a feeling / inspiration during the pandemic that you want to hold on – forever?
Mike: For me I was in lockdown for two months with my pregnant wife, young child and parents in the countryside and although it was stressful in some ways and we were finishing the record and organising its release it was also kind of a magical time that I knew wouldn’t happen again. My daughter spent a lot of time with her grandparents whom she doesn’t normally see often and although she’s too young to remember it I’ll remember those times very fondly on her behalf and my parents got a huge amount out of taking her to see lambs, cows and chickens on bright spring mornings in lush green fields. The pandemic has been dreadful in so many ways but I think a lot of people have found beauty in the time gifted to us this year.
About Musïc: What is an unknown fact about Everything Everything?
Mike: Jonathan and Jeremy both have the same middle name. I can’t tell you what it is.
About Musïc: Thank you for the Interview! We can’t wait to see you live on stage!
Mike: Thanks!
You can Pre-order / Pre-save Re-Animator here
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