"Although I didn't write this song, it spoke to me in a way that made me feel as if it was my own story,” Brandon said. “I found myself playing it over and over again in my bedroom, remembering situations that I've been through.”
Check out the video for yourself below.
Last week, office sat down with the band to talk about the single and being in a band with your romantic partner. Read our interview and listen to “Smell You,” below.
How did you get into music?
Jens: I grew up playing classical violin. When I was 12, I switched to the saxophone and started studying jazz. Later, after I graduated from the Rhythmic Music Conservatory in Copenhagen and The New School for Music, I started producing a lot of records for other bands. Eventually, my record label split up, and that was when I met Katherine, and we fell in love. Literally, when we met, Katherine was going to move to LA and I decided to just come along.
Katherine: I never used to do music before I met Jens. I was graduating from the Stella Adler Actor Conservatory when we met. Then my dad died and I knew that if I left the US, I couldn’t get back in, but I had to leave, anyway. Then our European adventure started, and we started making music. So, this whole thing—the last six years—are my only experience with music.
Did you ever sing when you were younger?
Katherine: If you had asked me in my whole life, if I ever thought about being a singer and being in a band—it wouldn’t even have crossed my consciousness; it wouldn’t have even been a thing that I had thought, ‘Oh this could be fun.’ Life is weird in that way.
So, how did you actually start doing it?
Jens: Back then, I was basically just making my own instrumental stuff. But then I had written a song, and I asked Katherine if she wanted to try sing on it, and at first, she was like, ‘Hmm...nah.’
Katherine: I thought it was the most embarrassing thing that a girl could do. I was so embarrassed about the whole idea of it, but I did it anyway.
Jens: Yeah, and I was amazed by her voice and how good it was. So, we kept doing more work together and made the rest of the songs for our first album. Our skill set is really different—I have a crazy, very particular musical training since the age of four, and I have basically studied every genre of music from 500 years ago until now. And Katherine had no training, but was just a natural talent.
You two are married. How do you separate your personal and work life when you’re making music? Or do you not?
Katherine: We don’t. It’s quite an extreme lifestyle, I’d say.
Jens: Well, all the work that we put into this band is something we do together. Of course, we have different tasks in terms of that. Like, right now, we are finishing the video for “Smell You,” which is supposed to be out shortly after the single. We are color-grading at the moment, and that’s Katherine’s job, because she’s really good at that stuff.
Katherine: In some ways, it’s really helpful to be in a partnership, because it’s very lonely being a creative person, and being your own boss all the time. To always have to motivate yourself to make creative choices on your own is hard. In that way, it’s definitely a plus being two. I guess the downside, in general, is that you can never switch it off because it just continues. You wake up at six and think, ‘Well I may as well start to work,’ and other days you wake up with no ideas. It can cause a whole lot of anxiety.
Jens: Also, what we’re doing with our music, our songwriting, production, the mixing of genres and all the imagery—in everything, we are trying to do something that no one else is doing and find a way to filter the insanity of this whole society of culture and art we are living in. We want to try to make something that no one else can. We have our own little niche of whatever that is. So, I think being together in that sense, makes it a lot easier. If you want to make something very good and special, you want to see if it holds up after a while—to put it away and then take it back out and see what you feel and what the other person feels before showing it to anyone else. Being two in that situation is very helpful—to get a better view of what it is that you are actually doing.
What was behind your choice to mix so many different layers and genres?
Jens: It’s basically about digging into yourself and finding out what it is that speaks to you—what is it that I have that is special to this world and that no one else can? For me, in particular, I decided to play classical music, jazz and later on, electronic music. I have been through all genres, and I like to try to push boundaries. Since I know how to write symphony music, and I know jazz, and I also love stuff like Radiohead, the best way for me to do that is to mix it all together.
Katherine: We kind of live in a nostalgic machine. People don’t mind if they hear a band that they like sounding like a ‘60s band or an ‘80s band—no one will judge you for enjoying that. But I think that Jens and I have a problem with it. It’s like, why would you make something again, if it has already been made, and if the original is better? That’s why, for us, the blending of genres or the blending of music, is the only way to try to make something that is completely new.
How would you describe your style in three words?
Jens: Endingly mixing genres
Katherine: I would say: cinematic, avant-garde, terrifying, pop—that’s probably the most pretentious thing I have ever said.
Jens: Yeah, and you used four words.
What’s the story behind the new single, “Smell You?”
Katherine: It’s about desire. But it’s also about deep, heavy flirting—the kind where both people know what’s going on. There comes a point when the flirting either stops or crosses the line into actually getting physical. That moment—just before you have to do something about it because if you don’t, it’s more awkward than doing nothing; that moment where the unsaid attraction between two people is going on.
What feeling do you want the listener to take away from the song?
Katherine: Anticipation, that flushed feeling you get in your cheek. There’s a line in the song, ‘I will never be bored when I am near you.’ When you have a crush, every time you are around that person, you are going to feel a bit more alive, like, ‘I am alive! Are you?’ It’s intoxicating.
What’s your collaborative process like when it comes to actual songwriting?
Jens: How we make most of our songs is that I start making some kind of beat and then I will send it to Katherine in an email. She will basically be sitting in our bedroom listening to it, then she will try to make some melodies and we’ll discuss it together afterwards. Eventually, that will turn into a song. We do spend a lot of time on the production, to make it exactly how we want it to sound. With “Smell You,” we wanted it to be a mixture of disco, techno and Earth, Wind & Fire.
If you could choose anyone—alive or dead—who would you want to collaborate with, other than each other, of course?
Katherine: Thom Yorke—or Prince.
Jens: I would probably choose Mozart.
If I say sacrifice, you say:
Jens: Being an artist. There are so many sacrifices. First of all, you don’t have real jobs, so you don’t always know where the money is coming from. You have to understand how to maneuver your life in terms of the insecurity of not having a job that pays the bills every month.
Katherine: Yeah, and you sacrifice stability. I am from South Africa and I have lived in America for seven years now, which means I don’t get to see my family except for once every year, and sometimes not even then. Also, we don’t put money into a mortgage, we put them into various artsy things. On good days that feels very glamorous, but on bad days it’s like, ‘Why did I ever decide to be an artist?’
Complete this sentence: Never have I ever…
Katherine: Shaved any part of my body—and that is the truth! My mother never would allow me a razor. She used to say, ‘If you ever have to remove your hair, you have to get it waxed.’ So, I don’t even know how to use a razor—I have never shaved in my entire life.
What would you do right now if you knew that the world was going to end tomorrow?
Katherine: First, I would go buy a dozen of donuts. I am a huge fan of donuts—I really like the crème brûlée donut from Donut King—oh my god. Then I would eat that and spend all the money I have by jumping on a plane to Hawaii. We would fly first class, stay at a five-star hotel, smoke a joint watching the sunset, and then we would all die.
Jens: I was going to say that we would get together with friends and have our last meal together—but now I’d rather go to Hawaii.
What’s next for O Future?
Jens: We are going to release our next album, but in a bunch of different drops. “Stay” was our first single and now “Smell You.” We have other tracks in the making and a video for “Smell You” coming out soon, as well. Other than that, we have some shows to play.
'Smell You' is out now.
Really, the cover art seems like a perfect representation of the EP’s contents: it’s a bit humorous and a bit serious, bright with dark undertones. Laner’s blue stare both intimidating and inviting. It’s about contrasting emotions and striking imagery—blue acting as the “essential color of the hyper-emotional world,” she says, in which her music lives. And it’s a bright blue—a wading pool reflecting the big, cloudless Texas skies she saw for the first time on tour when she playing bass for Porches.
During performances, Laner always dons the blue contacts because, as she puts it, they allow her to “create a character and remove myself from the space,” subverting the audience’s expectations. By becoming a hyperbolic version of herself, by making a spectacle, she “sneaks you in” to the ultra-curated world she wants you to experience on your own.
This is True Blue. And after a couple of years spent touring under someone else’s name, Laner is ready to branch off on her own. But Edge Of, released earlier this year, is unlike most freshman releases. Finished in July 2017, it’s a sonic amalgam of past and future, varied influences and multiple genres. Honestly, it’s a sound I have never encountered before, and when I try to describe it as whimsical, Laner rejects the notion. She’s heard that description a few too many times—but doesn’t blame listeners for any of their reactions to, or relationship with, her music.
And of course, she’s right. While Edge Of is layered with ricocheting, twanging samples that evoke Ariel Pink’s Pom Pom or the production of Cole M.G.N, it manages not to be cartoonish or cutesy. It’s bass-driven, dark, sometimes intentionally saccharine; it’s Laner’s effort to establish her own brand—it’s a bit of world-making, just like the little world she created in her basement studio where she writes and records all of her songs. By covering the walls in satin and turning the closet into a private sound booth, Laner has built a space where she can go to really hone into the deeply personal, “empathic” world from which the EP sprung.
But Laner’s not too worried about how “clean” the early drafts of tracks come out, as long as they capture the feeling she needs to convey. And that feeling is only further embodied by her insanely inventive, imaginative lyrics: “Was it tears in his eyes/Or just a Visine lie,” she croons on standout track "Tell Me Texas."
I try to uncover the inspiration or meaning behind some of the songs, asking Laner pointed questions about specific phrases and rhymes. However, she tells me “There’s really no narrative, no story” written into the music. “Each song has its own world that it lives in,” she explains—a world usually built on some feeling that has consumed Laner’s thoughts. The lyrics may come to her as pure language, but are borne, all the same, of moments when Laner feels particularly empathetic. “I think I’ve always felt things a bit deeper than most,” she tells me. “I often feel extremely empathetic—I tap into people’s emotional state quite easily.”
While Laner has tons of experience performing live, she’s only been onstage as True Blue a handful of times. But that’s changing, as she’s recently been booked more and more across America, and even in the U.K., playing with acts like Girlpool, Unknown Mortal Orchestra and Shamir. “I love to play with my onstage choreography,” she says, “and mess with the way that the audience sees me,” her experience as a visual artist always informing her stage choices.
Above all, though, “I just give something to the audience while also receiving something,” says Laner. Through her music, and performances, she wants to form a relationship with the listener so that something’s at stake besides her own career, or music, or ideas. For her, it has to be a dialogue if it’s going to be meaningful—which, clearly, it is.
'Edge Of' is out now.
office got the chance to chat with Styrke about her latest album and the endless ways to express passion in pop. Read our interview, below.
You grew up in Sweden. Could you tell me a bit about how that shaped your sound while growing up?
Well, I mean, I have basically always been singing. When I was a kid, I would spend hours and hours a day just singing because I loved it that much. One of the first artists that I found was Björke and I loved “Human Behavior.” I think I found it on YouTube and that was the first time where I was like, ‘Oh my god, I can listen to this and feel like I’m somewhere else.’ She changed my perception of music a lot in terms of production and how she manipulates sound. I feel like my whole childhood I was listening to this amazing pop music. On one hand I had Britney, Gwen Stefani, Madonna and Beyoncé; on the other hand, I listened to almost everything else, like Bob Dylan—he was one of the first artists I loved.
I feel like there was a lull between Madonna and Beyoncé when it comes to the pop world. What prompted you to choose pop in a time where it wasn’t widely conceived as great?
For me, it wasn’t like I chose it—it was almost like it chose me. Throughout the years I’ve been working on writing and making music and my relation to pop has grown only stronger. I’m falling more and more in love with it as a tool to communicate. It’s just a great way to be direct. With my music, I almost want to find a shortcut to people’s feelings and I think pop is just great for that. Maybe someone will only listen to my song once, or only hear the chorus, but they will feel it and know what it’s about, and I love that.
Absolutely. You just released Sway back in May. What’s one thing you learned about yourself while you were recording the album?
What I wanted to do with this album was completely strip it down. I wanted it to be realistic, while still being interesting. That turned out to be the biggest challenge with this whole project because when you remove stuff, everything that you leave matters even more. Every word counts because you can hear everything so clearly. It was the most difficult process and the most rewarding—it’s what made this experience so fun. I need to always challenge myself, that’s how I move forward. I think I’ve gotten to know myself better through writing this album because I put so much though behind each word like, ‘What do I really mean with this? What is it that I want to say and why do I want to say it?’
It’s one thing to go through the writing process, another to actually record an album and then something entirely different to go on tour and perform it for an audience. What has that transition been like for you?
Oh my god, this whole year has been so crazy. I feel like I’m pinching myself in the arm every night! It’s insane to me that I can sit in a tiny basement studio for one and a half years and just make things that are so personal to me and that I think is cool. Then I put it out, it reaches so many people and they’ve loved it. So, now I’m here. I’m midway through a headline tour in the U.S. So, I get to walk up on that stage every night to people screaming every word of every song back to me. That’s so mind blowing to me. It’s just the best feeling and I’m so grateful that people are loving the album and that it actually matters to others besides myself.
It’s such a personal album. What do you think is the most challenging song to perform?
I feel like all of these particular songs are the ones that, throughout my album, have been easiest to sing. The voice that I use on this album and that I found in the process of making this album, is the closest to my own speaking voice. I don’t have to push it when I sing the songs. I just have to walk up there and tell the stories the way I naturally would to one of my friends.
So, if you feel like you’ve almost reached the rawest form of yourself with this album, what’s next for you?
I don’t know yet. I’m going to start writing the next album in the beginning of next year, so that will be like a new chapter, and we’ll see if I have more digging to do. I’m actually super excited because I’m releasing a new song and I’m totally thrilled—I’ve been working on it for a while now, and I love it so much. I feel like it’s very much in the same world as Sway in that it’s the same person telling the story, but, in a way, it’s also like a fresh beginning. It’s a bit sadder, a bit more heartbreak, and I’m so excited for people to hear this one.
'Sway' is out now.
