Album Stream / Track by Track : Sleep Party People – We Were Drifting On A Sad Song

Denmark’s Sleep Party People are set to release their highly anticipated second album We Were Drifting On A Sad Song on 9 April through Blood & Biscuits. The Line of Best Fit spoke to main Sleep Party Person Brian Batz ahead of the album’s release to find out about the inspiration and origins driving his latest selection of songs. Here’s what he had to say, and here’s a stream of the superb We Were Drifting On A Sad Song, available to hear in its entirety exclusively here at The Line of Best Fit.

The Line Of Best Fit & Ja Ja Ja present Sleep Party People with support from Pale Seas, live at London’s Buffalo Bar on April 19. Tickets are on sale now.

I feel satisfaction and excitement . I’m really pleased with the final result and the fact that I’ve, in my opinion, succeeded making the second album rather different and more organic than the first album. That was my plan from the very beginning, but I wasn’t sure if it would turn out as I wanted. But it did and that’s indeed satisfying. If the album won’t be well-received I’ll still be very proud and I will still love it. That’s the most important thing to me.

When I’m in the process it’s my one and only love. My art needs all my attention and if I’m not capable of giving it all my attention it’ll die and vanish and I’m not interested in that. But sometimes it’s hard to give it all the attention it needs. Some days are just more impulsive and creative than others, but also if there are days where nothing works I will still be working in my head. You know… figuring things out and use my inner MacGyver to find the best solutions.

My current favorite songs have to be ‘Chin’, ‘Melancholic Fog’, ‘Heaven Is Above Us’ and ‘Gazing At The Moon’. Maybe that’s just because I’ve played some of the other songs on the album live throughout 2011 and these four songs are just brand new… maybe that’s why they compel me more than the rest of the album. But that’s totally understandable if you ask me. At this moment the record is still so new to me so I can’t really think of any things I wished I’d done differently, but I’m sure when I listen to the album a half year from now, I’ll have tons of things I wished I did differently. Isn’t it always like that? That’s how I experience it every time I listen to a record I’ve done after some time.

On this record, had a massive influence and I also wanted it to have this great impact on how the final result would turn out. But yet again, I wrote everything myself and recorded most of the things as well, but when I was finished doing my thing I pulled the guys in from the live band and then they colored the tracks with their instruments. After touring a lot I felt that it was a natural move for me to write songs which were in a more upbeat and uplifting mood. When we play live I often feel more compelled by playing the rock-ish stuff than the more quiet songs.

I love that fact that the live versions of the songs are way different than the album versions. That’s very charming. If we were to play the songs exactly as they are on the album it would be very boring in the long run. I love the fact that we can interpret the songs as we like and play them how we feel like. Sometimes we love to play them more noisy and other times we like them more mellow and dreamy. It all depends on how we feel that very day and how the audience are responding. Nothing should be easy and I love the fact that I have to struggle to get things my way and adapt the songs. It would be horrible if everything was easy-peasy and you didn’t have to struggle. That’s what makes it more uplifting when it actually turns out working after the struggle.

I started to write some of the songs right after my debut album was released in 2010, but it was just sketches at that moment. The recording process really began in September/October 2011 and it took about 3-4 month to finish it. The recording process was very intense and at some points, lonely. I used a lot of time by myself. Like the first album, this album is also mainly recorded in my apartment and the mixing process also happened in my apartment and all by myself. I’m not complaining. I like being alone but after spending almost 3-4 months inside my apartment I really needed to get out and see my friends and family again. It was both enjoyable and challenging, but not easy. But as I mentioned earlier I don’t like it when everything becomes too easy. I appreciate when things are challenging and you have to struggle to get the result you’re looking for.

I don’t have any specific references. First of all I don’t have any schooled recording and mixing techniques. I use my ears and I’m sure I have a fucked up approach when I mix and produce stuff. I have no idea what I’m doing. I just use my ears and my intuition. I worked with a very well-known producer two years ago and when he saw how I EQ’ed the tracks he laughed and pointed his finger at me. He thought it was pretty funny to see how I worked, but yet again he agreed that it all depends on how it all sounds all-together. I can’t agree more! I don’t have a clue of what I’m doing but I know what I want. Second of all I listen to a lot of different genres so I think my background music catalogue is pretty mixed up and schizophrenic.

In that specific period I didn’t really listen to anything else than my own songs and sketches. But I think I’ll always be subconsciously influenced by dreamy, old, electronic, ambient and dark stuff. The last few years I’ve been listening a lot to the early Brian Eno recordings, Scott Walker and the 80′s shoegazer scene, but also more classical piano parts by Arvo Pärt, Erik Satie and Yann Tiersen. I’m sure they haunt me in my way of writing songs and produce them. But the visual impulse also influences me in my writing. I love being back home on my birth island Bornholm. The nature there has a certain impact on me and I often imaging being there when I’m playing the piano or guitar in my apartment in Copenhagen. That’s in a way more important to me than music. Or just as important.

“Ok here goes…”

A Dark God Heart

“It’s actually a track which earlier has been released as a b-side, but this version is modified and brand new and the feeling is more grand and bombastic. I remember while re-arranging it, that I wanted it to sound like a four piece chamber orchestra played it and then I wanted everything to be ruined and fall apart in the noisy and heavy ending of the song.”

Chin

“I’ve always been accused of writing a lot of quiet materiel and therefore I was seeking some music that could inspire me to write an upbeat track. A friend of mine introduced me to the new Little Dragon album and it instantly hit me, that I just needed a simple beat all the way through the track. Some say it’s similar to ‘Billie Jean’ by Michael Jackson and I really agree. It’s pretty similar, but I wasn’t inspired by him but Little Dragon.”

We Were Drifting On A Sad Song

“This track was written after releasing my debut album. Actually I played it for the first time at Roskilde Festival in 2010 and I’ve played it ever since. Yet again I wanted to create a track you actually could dance to. But the funny thing is that it was originally written on an acoustic guitar and it was in the beginning a very folk-ish track. I recorded that version as well, but I didn’t feel that it should be so quiet, so I changed the feeling of it and went for the more uplifting and party-ish mood.”

Melancholic Fog

“I don’t know exactly why I’ve always been inspired and drawn to Chinese melodies, but this song is my attempt to write a blend between the Nordic and Chinese mood. Actually I was looking for at more Chinese sounding instrument to play the piano part on, but I couldn’t find anything.”

Heavy Burden

“This track was actually an attempt to write a hip hop beat. It’s not a typical beat I would create but I felt that I wanted the groove of this song to be different than the other tracks on the album. So this is my attempt to write something very groovy and camouflage it with a lot of dreamy soundscapes.”

Gazing At The Moon

“This specific track has been through a lot of makeovers and at a point I was really close to give up on it, but then one late night I played these drums upon the recording and the feel took a different turn, and all of a sudden I found the calm and creativity again to finish it. It became a bouncy dream-rock track instead of a quiet and simplified track with a lot of piano and stings and no vocals. Everything changed when I recorded the drum parts. It’s funny how things surprise you sometimes. I didn’t expect it to be this kind of a track and that’s what I love in the process of making music.”

Heaven Is Above Us

“One early morning after no sleep at all I recorded this song. I think I must have been in this very sleepy kind of mode, because when I listened to it later that same day I couldn’t remember how I played the song or how I arranged it. Very weird feeling but I think it captures the mood of the song very nicely.”

Things Will Disappear Like Tears In The Rain

“This song was also written shortly after I finished my debut album and I’ve played this song a lot on tours. The sketch was very much inspired by Suicide, but after playing it live I could see that it needed a full-band to back it up and to make it more powerful. In the recording process I took my live-bunny-members in the rehearsal room and recorded a way more violent version.”

The City Light Died

“This is my lullaby track and ever since I wrote it I thought it would be the perfect closer on the next album. It’s also my hymn to Mercury Rev and their album “All Is Dream”. I don’t recall what their last track on that album is called, but I wanted my song to have the same feel.”

We Were Drifting On A Sad Song will be released through Blood & Biscuits on the 9 April.

The Line Of Best Fit & Ja Ja Ja present Sleep Party People with support from Pale Seas, live at London’s Buffalo Bar on April 19. Tickets are on sale now.