This year Last.fm will be heading to San Francisco to mark the 25th anniversary of the city's biggest independent arts festival, Noise Pop. As part of the festival's extensive program of events, we're teaming up with Noise Pop to bring you 'An Acoustic Evening with Joy Formidable' on 24th February, which will feature the Welsh trio performing a stripped-back set of their biggest hits, alongside Emily Jane White, Everyone is Dirty, and Split Single.
Ahead of their show at Noise Pop, we caught up with lead vocalist/guitarist Rhiannon "Ritzy" Bryan about marking their tenth year as a band, their plans for 2017, and what's in store for their set at this year's festival.
1.) 2017 marks ten years since the formation of The Joy Formidable. What would you say has changed the most in the last ten years - both in terms of the band itself, and the experience of being in a band in today's music industry?
It feels like there are almost two sides to this answer. On the one hand, you could say WE personally have changed the most. We have been through so much, have grown, learnt and evolved as people and creatively as you should. And yet our love and passion for writing and performing music together hasn't wavered one bit. In fact, it has been the solace, the key thing in keeping us sane. I'm constantly surprised at how powerful music is and that is a huge factor in what drives this band.
As for the industry...even though the Internet has been great in opening the field to all artists, I also feel that it's in many ways tougher than ever for aspiring artists and bands - certainly in terms of sustainability, maybe because of saturation. Being your own business and marketing powerhouse has become more and more important, which for me is a shame. I have seen some amazing artists unable to sustain themselves because they aren't that way inclined or they don't have the reserves or the bank of mum and dad to fall back on. This has always been there of course, but it seems even more prevalent now. There are some people who are part of the clique and know how to 'play the game' which has nothing to do with music. That is why I always urge people to bypass any kind of trend machine or bullshit, really make your own mind up and support artists directly. There is some great stuff out there. We need a revolution, in more ways than one ha ha!
2.) Your top three most popular tracks on Last.fm are 'Whirring', 'Austere' and 'The Last Thing On My Mind'. Would you agree with these as being your favorite Joy Formidable tracks, and if not then which three would you pick?
We always find this hard to answer. We don't have favorite tracks. They all tell a different story and hold different memories which are equally important. Today I was laughing at Matt's giggling fit during the drum takes for 'Running Hands With The Night'. All these things are precious. We'll take all the memories...the hard as well as the easy. We like to write, be in the moment, then move on.
3.) What can we expect from The Joy Formidable in 2017?
We are of course embarking on our first acoustic tour as we speak which is really exciting for us. We love realizing the songs in different contexts, especially ones that draw out the emotional core. There are more Welsh songs (on our label Aruthrol) to come. We want to expand our 'C'mon Let's Drift' label and get behind the great artists out there in any way we can. We have some new side projects and collaborations on the horizon, as well as a range of artwork, books and graphic novels - and we would love to follow up our short film score 'Floating' with a full-length piece, but our main focus this year is working on our next record which we are completely fired up about. This year needs some firing up eh! So expect a whole bunch of fired up dates later on in the year!
4.) Finally, your show at Noise Pop will be 'An Acoustic Evening with The Joy Formidable'. What made you decide to go acoustic for this show, and how does an acoustic set present different challenges to a full electric set?
We've wanted to do it for a while now. We recorded an acoustic EP 'Sleep is Day' recently and we really enjoyed the process. We have always had stripped down songs on our releases and we've enjoyed doing acoustic sets and sessions so we saw this as a chance to expand on that and flesh out something bigger. As mentioned earlier, we love to experiment with songs, our own as well as others (we covered Bowie, Misfits, the 'Twin Peaks' theme and Kongos this past year). I suppose we can't keep still for long!
I think the 'Leave No Trace' tour will be a chance to get even more intimate with our audience; something important to us, and we also thought it was a great opportunity for them to hear a whole range of material, including some songs we've never even played before. We wanted to make it really special and let the lyrics and songs soar in a different way.
An acoustic set does present different challenges to the full electric experience, yes but I think we are used to that being a three-piece, especially as some songs are very multilayered. We enjoy the challenge of capturing the essence and features of a song with such little instrumentation.
Restrictions make you think out of the box. As long as you have your eye on the 'song' then it is just a change in palette and we embrace that. Our songs have a heavy melodic and lyrical underpinning so we feel it is also well suited to an acoustic environment anyway. People have experienced, amongst other elements, musically intense and loud shows from us electrically, but there is also a lot of emotion in the lyrics so we are actually looking forward to also drawing people's attention to the 'other' intense elements. Watch out for Matt's percussion solo on pots and pans though...it's not for the faint hearted!
The Joy Formidable play The Swedish American Hall in San Francisco on 24th February as part of Noise Pop Festival. Tickets are available here.
