Sometimes things just work.
Arthur Delaney, Lotti Benardout and Dom Goldsmith have made music separately for years, but when they first stepped into the studio together the trio could feel that something was, somehow, innately different to what they'd done before. HAELOS was born.
“It felt really natural,” explains Arthur. “It felt like the whole writing process, as a three piece, was natural, quite quick and just sort of easily fell into place. Which was really refreshing.”
“The perfect amount of complimentary-ness and, I suppose, conflict,” adds Lotti, before Dom chimes in: “We sort of cancel out each other's grey areas and enhance each other's grey areas.”
Electronic music with real emotional impact, early cuts recall the intensity of Portishead, say, but with a sense of style, personality and – especially – subtlety which is all their own. “If you're making emotional music, I don't think emotions are ever one thing, explicitly one thing or another,” Dom explains. “It reaches each extreme. It's a combination of two things. Sometimes when you're at your most euphoric you're also reflecting on your darkest things. I think great music, from what we can see, there's a tension between euphoria and pain. And I think we're trying to humbly achieve that.”
Snapped up by Matador, the three piece have spent the summer on the road, taking their introverted, intimate music into open spaces. “We wanted it to be this studio project, electronic music that you're kind of in the room with,” insists Arthur. “So it's not that kind of claustrophobic, usually American producer thing. Which is hard, essentially. You want to feel like you're in the room, essentially. Live, taking that and just really doing it live is really, really important. And hopefully we're starting to achieve that.”
The intensity of the group's material seems to come from their songwriting process – ruthless editors, each track is condensed down to make the supreme emotional impact. “Sometimes there's like a journeying quality while we're going through it,” says Lotti. “When it feels right, that's it. It's distilling.”
“I suppose that our sound design has been quite a long time in the making,” adds Dom. “Lots of different synth settings that collect over the years, really. It's working within those limitations, constraints. We only use a few synths and then a couple of multi-mode filters but that's it and everything gets made out of that.” “It's always weighed against how we feel about it,” states Arthur.
“I think it's pure feeling music. If it feels good then we're all into it.”
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