Liverpool's Finest Modern Indie Export: An Interview with Keyside

Words: Tom Gensler

PHOTO CREDIT : Ewan Ogden

Keyside are Liverpool’s finest modern indie export. Noted for catchy riffs, huge, sing-along choruses and lived-in, drawn-from-experience songwriting, they’ve been making waves on the UK indie scene for a while now. They’re taking things up a notch though, with their much-anticipated self-titled debut album coming out soon. We caught up with the quartet, to chat about the album, their influences and what's next.

What’s your latest single, Cocodamol, about?

DANI: Cocodamol, that’s kind of about situationships and, you know, just about being young and trying to find your feet in love and all that, but the sentiment is that Cocodamol’s a pain killer, and a metaphor for that world. It's a bit more of an indie sort we wrote, but it turned out alright didn’t it. Anyone else?

BEN: Started life as a new song, a long long time ago, and then Dani changed it and came back, and I said “Is that Hold Back The Line?”. So that’s what it used to be called, Hold Back The Line, but this was like, three years ago, four years ago, and we didn’t do anything with it. Actually, we played it live, in Glasgow, supporting Jamie Webster, which I think was one of our first gigs outside of Liverpool as well, and then, we didn’t do much with it until Dani was playing the chords and I said “Is that Hold Back The Line” and he said “Yeah, but it's a new song, I’ve changed it.” And then, wasn’t it when we, in typical Keyside fashion, it was all the night before we were going to the studio?

D: Yeah, it was last minute.

B: I remember being in the studio, when we were doing it, and Chris, the producer, sat us down and said “play this tune,” and I was still figuring my own bits out for it, but it turned out good, I like it, it’s one of my favourites on the album. Sounds a bit different to your average Keyside song as well, I think.

How do you, as a band, write a song?

B: Dani brings them in to the practice room, and then we jam it, as a band, so it all stems from the acoustic and the lyrics, and then we know quite quickly whether it's going to stick about or not, sometimes. Sometimes some songs need a lot of work and sometimes they pay off, but most of the time the songs that come together as the band’s tune come together quite quickly, I think they take the amount of work.

D: Yeah, I’ll get a song, and I’ll just bring an idea into the room and it becomes a Keyside song. That’s how it works, usually. But, Angeline, we wrote that and the verse was just jam-packed together, you know, and that’s one of our fan-favourite tunes, but yeah. We do have different processes, but that’s it mainly.

What song is your favourite to play?

D: Probably Angeline, isn’t it?

B: That a good question, you know, it changes all the time for me, Rhianna. We’ve not played that for ages.

MAX: It's Angeline for me as well.

OISIN: I’d say Turn Back The Time. I really like playing that one live.

B: Keyside B-cut, that.

D: Angeline, for me, that live.

M: High to High, probably.

D: I didn’t know that.

What’s on your summer playlist?

B: You know, I’ve been listening to loads of house music, lately. Yeah, got back into a bit of that. I think because I’m just so bored of listening to the same indie tunes, and there’s not much new to listen to, I’ve been listening to loads of house music.

D: Yeah, CamelPhat. I don’t know, but Fontaines, all that. There’s loads of inspiration I quite like Blossoms, their new album’s coming out soon isn’t it? What about you?

M: I’ve been listening to a lot of Wet Leg, and The World Cup’s been on, I’ve been listening to loads of Spanish tunes over the summer.

What influences you outside of music?

B: Football culture. The way that you’d go to a match and all that type of culture, that’s what led me to the music I’m into.

D: I quite like films, Pulp Fiction and things like that. I like movies, like movie soundtracks and all. This is music, but you know what I mean.

M: I’m into movies as well, just renewed my Odeon, so I’ve been going to the cinema quite a lot. 

Who would be your dream band to support?

B: The Doors.

D: The La’s. Big inspiration for us, them.

M: The Beatles.

What influences your sound, as a band?

B: I think, for me personally, playing guitar, it often sounds opposite to the tunes, if you know what I mean. The guitar actually sounds quite happy when the songs about something quite sad, I think. It's like a feeling, isn’t it. Each song gives you a different colour.

What colour is Rock My Love?

B: Blue.

What colour is Runaway?

B: Red.

What colour is Nikita?

D: I’d say red, because of the artwork, it's ingrained, isn’t it. Rock My Love is an Autumn song, to be fair.

Your self-titled album releases very soon. How do you feel about it?

D: I can’t wait, man. We’ve been on it for years, haven’t we, it's a collection of old songs and new songs. Buzzing man. Got the in-stores in the next few weeks. Can’t wait to meet all the fans, and see them again.

B: I’m made up to have done a whole body of work that gels together and sits together, because, I’ve spent a long time as a musician, I could say I’ve been a musician my whole life, and not many people actually get to do what we’ve done, go to the studio, got to work with one of the best producers in the country, whose got countless number ones. We spent a lot of the time in the studio last year, making the album. 

What’s next for Keyside, after the album?

B: There may or may not be a tour.