I had the chance to quickly catch up with two-thirds of Brooklyn-based trio Little Daylight before they played a show in Atlanta last week; currently on tour, they’ll be making a stop-off in DC tonight at Sixth & I, and also in NYC on April 2nd at Santos Party House. (Needless to say, we are SUPER PUMPED.) First, feel free to grab tickets to the show(s), and THEN internet-eavesdrop on my conversation with Eric and Matt below in which we cover everything from touring routines to the band’s highly personal new record that’s due out this summer. HERE WE GO:
Photo by Eliot Lee Hazel
So how’s it going?
Eric: Good! We just got to our hotel in Atlanta; we’re playing here tonight.
And have you had any time to recover from SXSW?
Eric: Well, the idea of recovery is funny when we had one day off, so nope, we’ve not recovered, but SX was amazing; we played seven shows, so it was very busy, but it felt manageable, not insane. We ate a lot of good food.
That’s great! I didn’t get down there this year, but I heard it was a nice time for the most part. Now, is there anything in particular that you do to actually kind of get ready for and/or stay for shows, especially when you’ve got so many back-to-back? Is there anything regimental that you try to do?
Matt: Well, we do thirty minutes on the elliptical, and then 150 crunches right as we’re going on stage.
Eric: And then we all take a shower…
Matt: And we carbo-load. You know how right before a marathon people will eat 1800 calories? It’s like that. But at SX we did seven shows, so that ended up being a ton of calories. No, but the honest truth is that we’re often rushing right up until the gig, so we don’t really have enough time to do anything. I think in an ideal world we’d retreat to a quiet place before the show. We definitely all try to do that, just to get in the right head space and relax, but we don’t often get to do that, so we have to power through it. What’s nice is that we’ve now been playing together live for exactly a year, and it’s starting to be a more natural thing; it’s a little more physical, a little more muscle memory, so even though the show changes, things are sort of starting to settle in as part of our lifestyle.
Cool. And tell me a little bit about the upcoming record; you’ll launch that this summer, but it looks like you’ve finished writing and recording it at this point?Â
Eric: Yeah, it’s probably going to come out in July, and it’s called Hello Memory. We’re extremely excited about it and happy we’ve finished recording, and now we’re just going to be getting into the stage where we’ll be touring a lot.
Matt: And the album is very personal for us; I think the EP was a primer, but the album is getting really deep into stories from our lives about heartbreak, friendships we had, people who are near and dear to us…it’s much more soul-baring than anything we’ve done before, which is partly why it took us so long and we were in retreat mode while we did it.
So is that scary for you, then? To have it be so honest and out in the open?
Eric: It feels really good, actually. I think that was the goal; as music fans and listeners, we know that those are the sort of songs where you tap right into somebody’s blood flow, so we knew we wanted to get really into depth. Looking back on it and seeing that we were able to get that stuff all out there and really craft songs around it…I think we’re really proud, rather than scared.
Good! And in terms of how you write together, it seems to be fairly collaborative. Are there set roles for everyone, or is it more organic?
Matt: Yeah, it’s extremely collaborative, I think more-so than most bands. That collaborative spirit kind of carries through to the recording process, too; we all play a bunch of different instruments, so it really just switches around song by song.
And did you have any major creative differences with this record? I’m sure the main goal is always to have the music sound its best, and to kind of uphold that, but how do you generally resolve things like that?
Matt: Absolutely, we have creative differences on every track, always. But we also have a lot of harmony, and we have more agreement than differences. The differences are very much a part of making music. Because we’re so collaborative, I think the idea of a Venn diagram often comes up; we cross over in a lot of areas, but we also have distinct musical tastes that don’t always resonate with the other members. We’re pretty good about the differences, though; we hash it out, feelings get out there, it can get emotional sometimes if someone really cares about something…if someone cares SO MUCH, if they’re going to live and die by a part, then that means something to the other members. But we just take each thing as it comes. We often ask, “Would you die without this part?”
Eric: Or, “Do you get musical chills from this?” And the differences could be about very minor things, too, but at the end of the day, we’re all super psyched about the finished songs.
So are you guys chomping at the bit to get the record out? Summer’s still a ways off!
Matt: Yeah, definitely. And we’ve also got so many songs to write…it’s like immediate studio withdrawal. Of course, we love being on the road and being able to play shows and see friends and family, but we also got very used to having the studio setup where we’d walk in every day at the same time, stay very late, and were very regimented about it. So I want to put this one out and start working on the next one as soon as possible.
Well for NOW, I think we should all just be glad at the opportunities we’ve got to see the band live; again, they’ll be at Sixth & I tonight and Santos Party House on 4/2. And in the MEANTIME, be sure to follow Little Daylight on Facebook and Twitter for all the latest updates.
