Sunflower Bean

The Sweet Taste of Success

Interview by Alice Jones-Rodgers Photography by Driely Carter.

“... everyone is competing for attention, especially in such a digital way; it’s hard to just be a human.”

As they were for many, the lockdowns of 2020/21 were a time of self-discovery for New York’s Sunflower Bean. Shortly before the pandemic put paid to touring plans for what must have felt like a lifetime for a band who had rarely been off the road since 2015, the three-piece consisting of vocalist and bassist Julia Cumming (she/her); guitarist and vocalist Nick Kivlen (he/him) and drummer Olive Faber (she/they) had been revelling in the critical and commercial success of their second album, 2019’s ‘Twentytwo in Blue’, and the glowing reviews for its accompanying live dates. However, the restrictions imposed on the world gave Cumming, Kivlen and Faber the opportunity to assess where to take Sunflower Bean next and work soon began on their third album, with Faber having used the downtime to acquire the relevant skills to act as the band’s co-engineer alongside UMO’s Jacob Portrait, who having worked on ‘Twentytwo in Blue’, also provided production and mixing. The result is the Psychedelic headrush ‘Headful of Sugar’, released on 6th May via Lucky Number.

Whereas Sunflower Bean described ‘Twentytwo in Blue’ as an “ode to the fleeting innocence of youth”, ‘Headful of Sugar’ is an album inspired by the lived experience of late capitalism. And with such weighty subject matter explored across their growing catalogue, it is no surprise that the band caught the attention of Manic Street Preachers, who recently called upon Cumming to add her vocal talents to ‘The Secret He Had Missed’, the second single to be lifted from their latest chart-topping latest album, last

year’s ‘The Ultra Vivid Lament’.

To discuss ‘Headful of Sugar’ and the excitement of getting back out on the road for its current supporting tour, which reached the UK for eleven dates on 30th March, as well as Sunflower Bean’s rise to becoming one of the most talked about Rock bands in the world today, Cumming recently joined us via Zoom from a hotel room in Dallas for the following interview.

Hello Julia and thank you for agreeing to our interview, it is lovely to speak to you. Firstly, congratulations on your great new album, ‘Headful of Sugar’, which is released via Lucky Number on 6th May. Could you tell us about the writing and recording process of this album, because this is the first album you recorded in a home environment (at Sunflower Bean Studios) and, alongside UMO’s Jacob Portrait on production and mixing duties, the first time your drummer, Olive Faber, acted as engineer on one of your records, isn’t it?

Yeah, so, I mean, our drummer, Olive [Faber], spent a lot of time learning about engineering in the past couple of years, which she did in order to really give us the chance to have more control over our music and be able to demo and do a lot more stuff and, you know, during the pandemic, that really, really came in handy and because of her skills, we were really able to write a lot. We wrote a lot of songs, we wrote the whole time and we worked with our producer, Jacob Portrait, and he was kind of like our coach, just saying like ‘Keep going!’ and ‘Keep trying!’, you know, and I think it’s really cool that the album stayed really between us four. I think that there’s a lot of pressure these days for artists to collaborate with a ton of people and, you know, to go to LA and do all this crazy stuff, but I think that our record got to really stay close to the source because of how small the team around it has been. I mean, we did work with Shamir, who I really love and another friend of mine, Suzy Shinn [both

Shamir and Shinn receive co-writing credits on ‘Stand By Me’], but those are the only two people besides Jacob Portrait and us that are involved with the record.

So, this is your third album, following 2016’s ‘Human Ceremony’ and 2018’s ‘Twentytwo in Blue’. Having recorded it in such a different way to the first two albums, did you find that working in this way, without being constrained by such things as studio costs, gave you more time to be able to experiment and to do something a bit different?

Yeah, definitely. I mean, and I think, you know, when you think about the word ‘experimenting’, like, usually in a studio, that means, you know, mic placement, that means, you know, you get out all this gear and plug things in and you try things and like, it’s really, really fun, but because of these circumstances, the way that we experimented was really more about ‘What’s the most extreme way that we can say this?’; ‘What’s the clearest way we can say this?’; ‘What’s the loudest way we can say this?’ You know, and we really tried to work in what we call ‘primary colours’. You know, big vocals, big bass, big drums, you know, which we’ve really felt is kind of really the modern sound. But, you know, a lot of the tracks, they took place over such a period of time that there are these little things and parts of them and layers that are on them that could never be recreated in one studio, so I really like that, you know. I really feel like my favourite music that has ever been created is like music that doesn’t fit into one box; it kind of has like an unplaceable magical feeling and that was what I was really trying to put into this album. Yeah, just something that felt different and felt unique.

You described ‘Twentytwo in Blue’ as an “ode to the fleeting innocence of youth”, but what was making you tick as songwriters when you were working towards what eventually became ‘Headful of Sugar’?

I think that when we did ‘Twentytwo in

Blue’, it was really trying to grapple with that power of young adulthood, the almost clumsy rebellious power that comes with being that age and, you know, we have always used writing as a way to, yeah, just try and make sense of our circumstances and I think with ‘Headful of Sugar’ we were able to, yeah, be more confident and kind of sit and say what we needed to say, rather than try to say it. I think with this album, we were, without wanting it to be a pandemic record, we were very, very affected by the way that we all do have to live right now, digitally and, you know, with the rapidity of information and entertainment and all of that became this sort of cultural sugar that was kind of swirling around in our heads and we sort of used the ways that we like to write, sometimes Poppier, sometimes harder, sometimes more Psychedelic, to try to create a lot of duality in the songs, whether it’s lyrically, sonically ... you know, a lot of the songs are about what they’re about, while also using this sound to add a layer to it. Even with ‘Roll the Dice’, which is our most recent single, you know, it’s a very abrasive song and it does kind of bring up this element of discomfort that we accept in order to survive, you know, the kind of gambles and risks that we need to take with our future, especially financially and then, also that element of, you know, ‘I just wanna win, win, win!’, you know, that is ingrained in all of us and it’s something that we have to accept in ourselves, when you look in the mirror, that we can post all day about this, or we can be angry about that, or we can know that something’s wrong, but at the end of the day, we’re all alone on this big rock trying to fight for our survival. You know, on the record, we get really personal and we also get bigger and we try to tell that full journey through the whole thing.

There is a very sort of rebellious streak running through ‘Headful of Sugar’, in that it might have quite deep subject matter relating to disillusionment with the modern world and the lived experience of late capitalism, but there is a very joyful and euphoric feeling to the record.

Did you go into making ‘Headful of Sugar’ with the sound that you wanted the record to have in mind or was it more something that became apparent as you were working on it?

It definitely became apparent as we were working on it, but we did have a lot of ideas that we wanted to stay true to and a lot of that was, you know, we wanted ourselves and the record to be very tangible ... yeah, to kind of not feel like a university sort of record, to not feel like we were like these superheroes coming down and trying to save us, just because, in this time as well, everyone is competing for attention, especially in such a digital way; it’s hard to just be a human. So we really wanted to keep everything with the record, like, kind of grounded in reality and when it came to its sound, we wanted it to be loud and powerful and punchy, even when we were being more subtle, or even when we were being euphoric. You know, so, whether it was kind of more like a ballad, or more like a festival rager, or like a heavier Rock moment, we just tried to keep an ethos of what we thought was important in the song, which was really that rhythm and that vocal, and keep that really loud.

In the last two years or so, the world has obviously been massively affected by the pandemic and its various lockdowns and previous to this, you were revelling in the aftermath of having released a massively critically acclaimed album, ‘Twentytwo in Blue’. Do you feel that, in a way, the pandemic, although it was hard work for everybody, might have given you a bit of breathing space to be able to contemplate which direction to take the sound of Sunflower Bean in for ‘Headful of Sugar’?

Yeah, I think that the pandemic gave everybody a lot of space to consider everything about their lives and everything about they want to make work and I do think that it was good for us, ultimately, even though we could never have seen it coming, to get a little bit of space from kind of the typical

Indie cycle of two years on, six months to make a record, go back. So, I do think that was good. I mean, I think everyone has lost so much, you know, that it’s hard to ... it’s hard, it’s just hard, it’s hard for everyone, but I do think the fact that we got a little space and time to develop as writers is also priceless, in a way, because, you know, I do think we are very different writer-wise than when we started, which is cool.

The pandemic was also a time in which you collaborated with Manic Street Preachers on ‘The Secret He Had Missed’, the second single from their fourteenth album ‘The Ultra Vivid Lament’ (2021). You have previously supported the band, but how did you come to collaborate with them and how did you find the experience of working alongside James Dean Bradfield, Nicky Wire and Sean Moore on that track?

Yeah, well, that relationship started around ‘Twentytwo Blue’ and they were really supportive of that record and that was kind of how we learned about them. We had heard of them, but definitely, the place that they hold culturally around the UK and in Wales is really exceptional and yeah, we’ve just always found them to be incredibly kind and generous and supportive of new music, which I think is the hardest thing to do as you get older. So many people get so bitter, or get so discouraged, and I think it is really cool to see anyone with that sort of status really try to share it with other artists and I think that is really cool. And, yeah, they basically reached out to me and about the song [‘The Secret He Had Missed’] and the record [‘The Ultra Vivid Lament’] and we talked about it and, you know, what it was really about and kind of the sounds and the sonic inspiration. At first, I heard the piano, which I knew was not always the biggest element of the Manics’ sound, and I knew that they were developing that during the pandemic and I was kind of like, ‘Is this like a Billy Joel kind of thing?’ and they were like, ‘No, it’s more like an ABBA kind of thing’ and I was like, ‘Oh!’ You

know, so, it was really fun to play with that part of my voice and, yeah, get to be a part of their history. And also, you know, the record went to number one and that’s my first time being part of a number one record in the UK. So, yeah, I feel really proud of that song and to be able to work with them on that.

Prior to the pandemic, to say that you toured extensively since your formation would be something of an understatement, wouldn’t it, because you have had basically been out on the road since 2013, was it?

Yeah, I would say 2015/16 onward.

We know that you have had the new album to work on, but how did you find the experience of having the ability to get out on the road taken away from you and how have you found being able to get back out on the road following the lifting of restrictions?

Yeah, you know, it was definitely a real loss of sense of self. You know, I don’t think that I realised how important it was, which is kind of silly, because I should have known, but I think it really is the last step. You know, you can make these records and you can talk about the records and people can listen to them and tell you what they think, but there is nothing as special as going to a venue with your friends, you know, dancing, screaming, jumping and hearing these songs that you care about and there’s nothing more magical than to create these songs and play them for people live with instruments. You know, it’s worth fighting for and it is worth doing all the time, even when it’s a hardship or even when it’s a hard circumstance. So, you know, I think I really did lose part of my soul, you know, and there are still different restrictions state to state here, but it’s just great to be with the fans again and yeah, every night has a very special privileged feeling to just be there and do it. So, you know, I would say I’m still getting my sea legs back, but in some ways, they never left.

Talking of gigging, the end of this month sees you coming over to the UK to play eleven dates, starting at Junction 2 in Cambridge on 30th March. Are there any dates that you are particularly looking forward to playing or places that you are looking forward to visiting whilst you are over here?

Yeah, I mean, we’re super-excited for the whole tour. The UK is like a second home for us and I think that, you know, it’s just going to be great to be back. Yeah, Camden [Electric Ballroom, 7th April], I think is going to be great; Manchester is obviously going to be awesome, we’re playing Strange Waves [1st April], which seems like a really cool festival and every time I see the line-up and everything about it, I’m just really excited and I always like Glasgow [Stereo, 2nd April]. My grandmother was from Glasgow. She grew in the slums there and she always wanted to be a singer. She made some demos and it was not possible for her to be a singer, so she raised a beautiful family instead and that’s great, but, you know, I think every time I’m there, I feel a certain, you know, feeling like I’m carrying on her dream in a way. So, yeah, I always give her a shout-out when I’m there.

Finally, what do you feel that you have taken from the experience of recording ‘Headful of Sugar’ that you might carry over to following records?

I would say to never settle, it’s not done ‘til it’s done, you know, and that you should always keep trying. I think that was the experience of ‘Headful of Sugar’, you know. There were a lot of circumstances that could have gotten in the way, but everyone really believed in it and fought for it and came together for it. And, yeah, I think I learned a lot about perseverance with this record and, you know, that’s what life is about. So, yeah, it taught me a lot.

Thank you for a wonderful interview, it has been really, really lovely to talk to you. We wish you all the best with ‘Headful of Sugar’, your current tour and for the future.

‘Headful of Sugar’ is released on 6th May via Lucky Number. Meanwhile, Sunflower Bean are currently touring the UK. For all upcoming dates, visit the links below:

www.sunflowerbeanband.com

www.facebook.com/SunflowerBean