Rangleklods: “It's often through mistakes that something new and interesting happens…”

As the rain lashes Britain during what seems like an endless winter, we catch up with Denmark’s electro extraordinaires Rangleklods, ahead of their set at London’s Ja Ja Ja club night on 30 May.

They’re destined to deliver a phenomenal performance this coming Thursday, showcasing their electronic soundscapes that range from synthpop masterpieces to subtle bouts of ambiance. Though Danish Rangleklods spent a considerable amount of time shaping their sound in Berlin, soaking in the musical heritage and variety of culture, they headed back to Copenhagen to record and release their debut LP Beekeeper early last year.

‘Control’ dropped recently, a new track from the now-scrapped EP of the same name. It serves to tease us, engaging our salivary glands for the sophomore full-length that’s due towards the back end of 2013/early 2014. The cut is a flickering sliver of chilled electro-pop, dripping with piercing vocals from Pernille Smith-Sivertsen and pitch-shifts. The synth work is masterful, with low post-dubstep percussion and haunting midnight keys lurking beneath a poppier sheen. However, they’re keen to stress that it’s not necessarily an indicator of what the new album will be like.

The group have just got back after a ‘cursed’ tour around Europe, where everything that could go wrong, did. Deadlines were missed, baggage vanished into the ether and reservations were lost – shoes were swallowed by mud. We speak to Esben Anderson (the man behind the synths and vocals) about how they’ve changed since the debut, what to expect from the follow-up and touring.

You’ve just returned from a European tour. How did it go?

Last weekend we were on a horrendous trip around the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Spain. The weather was fucked up in all three places. Meanwhile it was 25 degrees in Denmark with blue skies and no wind. That’s the worst isn’t it? Going away to places where the weather should be better and then the tables turn on you. I hate that. The other way around is cool. Going on a summer holiday where it’s warm and nice and reporting back to friends in Denmark who tell you it’s awful there.

How’s the weather now?

Sorry to say this but the weather in Copenhagen is fantastic! I’ve been sitting in the sun with a cup of coffee for the last hour or so. As a Dane I know the art of not being able to trust the weather, so who knows, it might be pouring down here as well an hour from now.

Where are your favourite places to travel and why?

Some of the highlights on our tour so far have been Budapest, Bucharest, our old home Berlin, Hamburg and Ljublana. Four years or so back we were on a two month roadtrip in America. That was an amazing trip. Britain is still uncharted territory for us. So far we’ve only played there once, which was last year’s Great Escape. So we are pretty psyched about going to London this week!

Have you got anything special planned for Ja Ja Ja?

We are currently working on adding some extra stuff to the live set before the festival season kicks in. If we manage to get it done prior to Ja Ja Ja, many of those things could be tried out there for the first time. The setup is me and Pernille. Sometimes we bring extra musicians but that’s not possible this time around.

What can people expect at a Rangleklods show?

We have a very different way of approaching our live shows than our studio work (where we are very perfectionistic about every single detail). Live it is more about creating a one off experience both for us on stage and the audience. We take on as much as we can, often too much, in order to increase the chance of mistakes because it’s often through the mistakes that something new and interesting happens. In other words, we aren’t afraid to fuck things up live. We bring along a bunch of electronics and mangle them in order to separate the live performance from the studio versions. People can always hear those at home so we want to give them something else live.

How do you think your sound has evolved since the debut?

What we do now is different from the first EP, first and foremost because we’ve gone from mostly a solo project to more of a duo thing where Pernille and I write just about everything in collaboration. The first song we did that with was ‘Clouds’ (which Pernille sings the chorus to)… it was a quick thing. Finished in maybe 3-4 days which is very, very fast for a Rangleklods track. It was one of the last songs we finished before Beekeeper was finished. I felt like there were melodies that we missed out on with only my vocal because it sounds good on some things and not good with others. So adding Pernille and sharing the vocal parts almost 50/50 has expanded our melodic universe a lot.

Was it a conscious decision to become more of a duo?

It was very much a natural thing. Pernille has always been involved in Rangleklods. For the first few years she was my main go-to person whenever I wanted someone to listen to demos and bring ideas to the table. We love the same music and she understands the way I make music better than anybody. I often call her my second pair of ears. When I’ve been working on something for too long and have lost touch with it, playing it for Pernille is almost like seeing myself listen to it for the first time. She’s amazing at arranging. She can tell what’s unnecessary and what’s missing. So in conclusion, she’s always been a part of Rangleklods, and without her it would have been somewhat different and definitely not as good.

What do you think has been the biggest change since Beekeeper?

The last month of working with Beekeeper was a 20 hour a day thing in the studio. It was too much. I made it through and love the result. But it took so much energy out of me that I really couldn’t be in the studio half a year after that.

What was the process like for the new EP? Was it more relaxed?

Actually, we recently decided to not release the EP as we said we would. The reason wasn’t that we disliked what we’d made. On the contrary. We wanted to keep it up and bring them along to the next album which we in turn hope to finish within this year. So ‘Control’ will instead work as an early preview of the album to come (although people should not think it’s going to be 10 tracks like ‘Control’ at all). That being said I felt like it was the right decision to skip the EP because we still needed to figure out the last twenty percent of what we wanted to do after Beekeeper. So right now we’re working on the next album and we have a plan with it that I’m ridiculously excited about!

How’s it coming along?

We’ve been contemplating about it a lot. And we’ve been testing out different things. The closest I can come to an explanation (although it’s very clear to us) is that it’ll continue some of the elements of Home and Beekeeper but also introduce new territories. Some of our key terms while working on them is transcendent, experimental, highly melodic, garage club feelings and dreamy.

What sort of things (musically and non-musically) are influencing it?

Bowie, Cocteau Twins, Blawan, The Clash, Suicide, Jai Paul, The Police, constant travelling, the rather depressing political times we’re in, loss, and guilty pleasure TV shows.

What do you think you’ve gleaned from the past year?

I’ve learned to work more continuously (although I’m still not a master at it). What I want to be able to do in time is to just make music all the time, and at a pace that I can keep up with. We have so many ideas, so many songs we want to make, that I hope we can keep our level of releases up. Musically and production-wise I’ve learned a lot since Beekeeper as well. And that’s how it should be. In short, we’ve learned to enjoy making music even more and we’ve become better instrumentalists and singers by playing a shit load of live shows. If I ever stop learning new stuff then it’s probably time to quit.

Ja Ja Ja will take place at The Lexington in London on 30 May 2013. Tickets are £5 in advance and available via this link. To find out more about the event, head to the Ja Ja Ja Facebook event page.