Colatura – And Then I’ll Be Happy

By starrymag | April 25, 2022

By: Jennifer Vintzileos

 

 

Q) How would you best describe your sound?

 

A) We called it the surf dream pop of your nightmares because we like to take pop leaning melodic structures and pair it with unsettling lyrics and noisy layered guitars.

 

Q) Who are your top musical influences?

 

A) Phil Spector, Brian Wilson, Sonic Youth, Mazzy Star, Slowdive, Cocteau Twins

 

Q) Tell us the story behind your current single “R U Content.”

 

Digo: It’s about dealing with the constant pressure to create content online, and to turn your art and emotions into something that can be consumed alongside clickbait.

Q) You also recently released a music video for “R U Content.” How did you come up with the concept for the music video?

 

Digo: Jennica (Bass/Vocals) came up with a cool idea to layer all of the different music videos we made on top of each other and then have us cut out and placed on top playing the song. It’s a cool way to point to how much content we have all created in the last year and in some ways how much it has consumed us.

Q) What has been the reception to your prior single “Kids Like Us?”

 

Meredith: People seem to really like it. [smiles] And particularly they seem drawn to the music video which collages us and some footage from our childhood into a sort of live family scrapbook. It seems like almost everyone can relate to having family baggage that they don’t want to pass down to their kids.

 

Q) You’re about to release your debut album And Then I’ll Be Happy. Where did you get the inspiration for the album title?

 

Jennica: A lot of the songs and themes on the album deal with not being satisfied with how things are going or how things have turned out and trying to look towards some fleeting external solution to save you. It’s so easy to fall into the trap of thinking that if you just had or did X, Y or Z that then magically you’ll be happy and all the songs sort of come at that idea from different ways.

 

Q) Which song was your favorite to record for And Then I’ll Be Happy and why?

 

Digo: “Fighting Weight” because I really loved recording a song that we knew was going to be the last song on the album. As a way to highlight the meaninglessness of always looking for something external to make you feel satisfied. We took the outro and fucked it up by distorting it and running it through a tape machine that we slowed down until it became unrecognizable.

Jennica: Probably the intro of the album. When we went to do vocals at carriage house, we knew we wanted to do an intro but had kept putting off working on it and didn’t have anything figured out before we got to the studio. So, it was a real collaborative, spur of the moment thing figuring it out together. We ended up setting up a bunch of mics in the live room and recording all of us at the same time, spaced out in different corners and distances from the mics, singing with Meredith playing piano as well. Our producer Charles [Mueller] ran it all through a ton of pieces of hardware (including the eventide h3000 harmonizer) and made it really wonky. I also love that you can hear our friend Justin (from the band Sharkswimmer) at the beginning. He was in there documenting the weekend – and you can hear him promising he won’t make a sound, followed by the creak of the chair he was on and the click of his camera echoing.

Meredith: I enjoyed “Homecoming” because it turned out so different than the way it sounded when we originally wrote it. It was so cool to see the evolution.

Q) What do you hope fans will take away from listening to the new album?

 

Jennica: I hope they will feel seen. As humans we share a lot of the same experiences that can often be hard to communicate in real time. I hope these songs act as a way to explore those emotions.

Q) With the release of And Then I’ll Be Happy, you are also performing a hometown show in Brooklyn, NY at The Sultan Room. Why did you decide on The Sultan Room for your album release and are there any plans for an upcoming tour to promote the new album?

 

A) We chose the Sultan Room because we wanted the 50% discount on kebabs since they are really good. We will be touring the east coast in June and the West Coast in August in support of the new album.

Q) Which songs are your favorites to perform live and why?

 

Digo: I like “R U Content” because it has a really noisy outro that, depending on my mood, I can really get carried away with if I please.

Jennica: Same. The outro is one of the longest stretches in the set where I don’t sing, so I love that I can wander away from the mic without having to scramble and run back when I realize my part is coming up.

Meredith: I like “We Run on Empty” because I get to do some fun synth stuff.

 

Q) Who are you currently listening to?

 

Digo: Two bands I saw at SXSW Wednesday and Pom Poko. They both rock in completely different ways.

Jennica: At SXSW we met a band called Letting Up Despite Great Faults, who also just released an album (IV) that I’ve been loving. Also, I have been revisiting Souvlaki (Slowdive) recently, which is honestly a perfect album.

Meredith: I’ve been loving the new Oso Oso album and found this band Ten Pound Snail while I was doing some tour booking that’s really awesome.

 

Q) What would you like to say to your fans and supporters of your music?

 

Band: That we would never pander, but that they are the most intelligent, cool, badass people we have ever had the pleasure to meet.