Love of Lesbian – V.E.H.N.

By starrymag | June 9, 2021

By: Alejandra Gil M

 

 

Q) Your new album V.E.H.N. is out now, it was teased with a few releases like “Cosmos,” “El Mundo” and “El Sur,” which features Bunbury. What would you say is the main theme?

 

A) The main idea that runs throughout this album is that of the crossing (“el paso” in Spanish). Of movement as a base to generate borders. Of the courage it takes to change your life, to make decisions, even to commit suicide, as it happens right on V.E.H.N.’s first song. Travelling to Ciudad Juárez and seeing the border so close was a true revelation to all of us, and it finally made clear we had good reason to piece together a new album.

 

Q) The sound feels like a little bit of 80´s pop/rock. Was that your goal?

 

A) We were looking for an original sound based on preexisting productions. That’s why we resorted to reverb and chorus from the 80’s through the first songs, to create wide spaces where individuals feel small, amplifying desolation. Slowly, the album builds itself up on messages that urge on individual revolution, with more dynamic songs and an out-of-the-box sound search where analog instruments and digital sequencers get mixed.

 

Q) The album includes twelve new songs recorded in La Casamurada and Blind Records with Ricky Falkner and Santos & Fluren producing. What attracted you to work with them?

 

A) Maybe the most exciting part of our relationship is the path we’ve shared along all these years. Producers and band have achieved a degree of mutual understanding and knowledge very difficult to obtain outside such a bond. We’ve grown and learned album after album not only together, but also as individuals outside this common working ground. Each one of us has been able to take his own characteristic traits to the extreme, which makes me feel we’ll keep trying out new ideas on every album no matter how.

 

Q) What was the writing process like for the album, did you have the lyrics or the music first?

 

A) We usually have music first. As we develop the songs, we always talk at great length about the album’s main theme/concept. That provides us a strong ideological framework to work on lyrics, jacket, photographs or design itself.

 

Q) You said that this album feels like the most socially angry, you wrote it before the pandemic, and it now feels perfectly fit for it. Tell me about that process.

 

A) Tension has been a constant for us over the past few years. Catalonia has experienced a social and territorial confrontation with Spain and, as Catalans singing in Spanish, we have been through some exhausting moments. Anyone can snap on social media, there are more obstacles than supports on the streets, and any idiot becomes a moral policeman. This constant clash, occurring as well on a global level, has armed us with plenty of reasons to write. The odd thing about this process is that the pandemic has provided more significance to our lyrics’ meaning despite the fact it had nothing to do with it in the first place.

 

Q) Are there any artists that have influenced your sound through twenty years of trajectory?

 

A) There are plenty of sounds and artists influencing our work both conscious and unconsciously. I’ve always been attracted to artists that look for something different within his own style. We could talk about David Byrne, Blur, The Divine Comedy, Bowie, The Cure, Baxter Dury, Depeche Mode, Broken Social Scene, Bon Iver…

 

Q) Who would you most like to collaborate with on a song in the future?

 

A) We could make quite a list, of course, but for a starter I’d name Roger Hodgson, Kendrick Lamar, Camilo Lara, Diamante Eléctrico, Mon Laferte, Matt Berninger, Damon Albarn or TV on the Radio.

 

Q) You gave a concert during the pandemic with over five thousand spectators, what was that experience like?

 

A) It was as if we had been travelling through outer space for a long time, hibernating, and we suddenly landed on Earth to regain our lives. The previous weeks were pretty intense, full of doubts and pressure. We spent many hours side by side with the scientific community to be a part of a solution instead of staying home, waiting. The best thing about it all is that we were part of a big team that worked hard and thoroughly, and the results have finally turned upside down European live music for 2021.

 

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

 

A) I’d like to emphasize the idea of going to a concert hall and experience life music as an act bordering on activism right now. In the same way going to a music shop is an act of commitment with culture. As any other sector, music has suffered a lot over the past year, and I keep thinking of all the support that new and young bands, with a lesser trajectory than ours, currently need.

 

 

All Questions Answered By Julian Saldarriaga