Okay so here is the story about the double-interview with Oli from Lime Cordiale: I called up Oli to do the interview and there’s a programme I use to record phone interviews. The first time around I used my headphones and thought nothing of it. Turns out the programme records the audio from the speaker to the mic, so the headphone dynamic didn’t work. When I realised the recording didn’t work, Oli was lovely and let me call him again. So we just did the interview again which was quite funny in itself. I was a bit bummed because the first chat was just honestly a great chat. But this one was good too. Also chatting with Oli was more like catching up with a friend so that was nice. You really gotta love these guys and if you don’t know who they are, I suggest you get into them.
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Lime Cordiale have released a handful of tracks from their upcoming album ’14 Steps to a Better You’ but the full album comes out July 10th. The album is incredible and you can read our review of that next week, but in the mean time, you can listen to their new single ‘Screw Loose’ and check out the video below.
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You guys have been quite busy during lockdown with the album build-ups and livestreams. How is lockdown treating you guys?
It’s been good. Louis is off having a tennis game right now with one of our roommates. But yeah we’re just been writing music and getting ready for this album. We decided not to push it back so when you don’t have live shows to help promote it, you need to get pretty creative with other things. So that’s why we’ve been doing livestreams but we try to do it different to others. I’m a bit over seeing acoustic sessions.
Because you guys were touring like crazy prior to lockdown. Has it been somewhat of a good break?
It’s restful because last year we payed 103 shows and then this year, it was looking like it was going to be more than that. So there was a lot of anxiety involved in looking at 2020. But when everything got cancelled it was a massive bummer because we had a huge European tour and 2 American tours booked in but there was also like a small bit of relief as well. We’ve been living in this house for about a year and we’ve never spent more than 2 weeks here. So just the quarantine alone and not being able to leave the house, we haven’t done that before. So the vege garden is looking pretty amazing, we have some chickens (a few have been named but there are now too many) and just have a life that’s a bit more normal.
Did lockdown create any changes around the album? Like obviously some artists delayed releases and I know you guys considered it too. What made you decide to stick it out?
We’ve been sitting this album for a little while now. It was meant to get released earlier but we delayed it due to the co-management deal we did in the states. So we didn’t want to push it back any further because we’re already working on album 3 as well. Also the ball has been rolling pretty well for us. In the past if we had a break from playing shows and recording, people think you need to create exclusivity and not over-expose yourself to get people craving something. I don’t believe in that theory at all. I think you should just be playing as much as possible and releasing as much good music as you can. So yeah we just didn’t want to lose momentum. Covid is already a nuisance already so we didn’t want it to delay anything else for us.
The new album! I am lucky to have been sent it to review and I love it! Do you guys have a favourite track?
Mine is probably ‘Elephant in the room’ just because of instrumentation, the elephant plugging along and the visuals of that. It feels weird and wacky, I love that about it. I think Louis is probably ‘No Plans To Make Plans’ because there’s a kazoo solo at the end of it and it’s unusual. The meaning of both of those songs feel complete and artistic in our opinion. They’re not something for radio. They’re something we wanted to create. Kind of keen to get all the ones that haven’t been released, the album tracks, out there because they’re good expressions of ourselves.
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‘No Plans…’ is definitely one of my faves. It’s catchy and I find it a bit sassy in a way.
It’s just about, I feel like people our age, you’d have it as well, having people say “you need to get a real job”. As a musician you almost feel, when people say “Oh what do you do?” and you say “I play in a band” they go “Oh yeah whatever”. You kind of think well you’re the one that’s gone and got some shitty job that you hate because that’s what you felt you needed to do for some reason. It’s all about getting a pay rise next year, that’s the only thing you care about. Platinum flyers and 5 star hotel stays, those people aren’t always happier. Their just chasing something that doesn’t really exist. That’s where the whole self-help thing came from. Us getting stuck into people. You need to think about what the important things are in life as apposed to just going down the beaten path and taking the same steps as everyone else.
Vocally and instrumentally there is quite a range of different elements. What was the process like in creating this album? Were there any influences or things where you were like, I want to try that?
We didn’t really have many influences with this one. We were trying not to listen to too much. With the sounds of instruments, instead of trying to replicate a sound or do something similar we just played around until we got a sound we really liked. I think that’s what confidence and a bit more knowledge does. We were trying to find a sound last time. This one is a bit more that we know what we’re like and that confidence. We just did everything we wanted to do. I think it worked well for us and we’ve come out of it with something that’s a bit more unique. This album is just pushing it a bit further.
Also your pre-orders. I love the merch! I already know the bundle I want. How do you guys decide on merch because I feel like everyone does you know album, shirts and hoodies but you guys have pins which I love and socks, hats, totes.
We like to create what we want to wear ourselves. Like the hoodies, I’ve been wearing one around a lot. It doesn’t look brand new, I hate that. Most of our stuff looks aged. Louis artwork is all over the merch which I think people enjoy, it’s not just a t-shirt with a brand name on it. It’s a bit more of an art piece. It’s also just what we see. I saw a drawstring hat at Laneway Festival in Sydney and I just wanted to recreate that. We just try recreate what we would want in our own cupboards really.
Shows – Last time you guys played here was crazy fun! If this Trans-Tasman bubble happens can we expect some NZ shows?
So we’ve got a September tour pencilled in and we’re just waiting. We’ve got all these different plans and we’re just waiting to hit the green button. In Australia it’s a bit more complicated. We have a tour that’s pencilled for 50 people, 500 people and our original dates on hold. But for New Zealand it’s just a matter of being able to get a flight over there. We’ve got these dates on hold for September, so if we can make that happen then we’ll be there.
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