LAURA COLWELL & STEPHEN SALIBURY OF SUN JUNE
Hi Laura and Stephen, thanks for taking the time out to speak with us at Musicology.
Firstly congratulations on your debut record Years.
In terms of the writing and lyrical content, was there an overarching narrative tying the album together or an assortment of topics and inspirations that zig zag throughout the record?
Thank you! We wrote each song individually, not thinking about theme or narrative. But when we started putting together different song combinations for the album, we felt narratives emerge. The patterns we saw determined which songs belonged on the record and which didn’t. So maybe it’s an arch formed by zig zags?
What were some of the challenges in putting this LP together and conversely what were some of the greatest surprises you experienced through the writing / recording process for Years?
Time and money constraints are boring but real. Besides that it was pretty easy. We had most of the songs arranged before we entered the studio, but the two best surprises became our favorite parts: Michael, our guitarist, added some piano at the end of Apartments, and Justin, our bassist, surprised us with a three part saxophone bed on Homes. The other pleasantly surprising thing was recording all instruments live to tape, including vocals. We got to use a lot of those takes. Evan Kaspar, our engineer and co-producer, was so great to work with (although we weren’t surprised by that).
It was around about 12 months in the making for Years and during that time how much re-working was involved with the tracks on the record. That is to say, were the original sentiments that went into the songs exactly the same at the end of the journey as it was to begin with?
Most of the stuff we talk about in the lyrics happened long ago, so while we’ve evolved some (we hope) most of the sentiments stand. Musically though, we did a lot of reworking on a few of the songs. Homes, Records, and Underneath probably went through the most changes. We’ve also already started to play the songs live a bit differently. I’m sure we will look back and regret some decisions. We’re pretty good at that.
Sun June as we now know it is a fully fledged 5 piece outfit but wasn’t always the case. Can you elaborate a little on how you all came together and how what the dynamic changed with the expansion of band members?
Stephen and I started writing songs together as a way to blow off some steam around the office. We performed some joke songs at parties, but we kept demoing stuff together in hopes we’d be able to get other musicians involved. Earlier on we were called “Jeff.” We worked with very talented pals Ignacio Guerrero (After Hours) and Caity Shaffer (Olden Yolk) and Anna Mullis. We were trying for a velvet underground/doowop vibe. When we began working with our guitarist Michael Bain we started to find our current sound. He writes all those guitar melodies. After Sarah Schultz joined on drums and Justin Harris on bass we became “Sun June.” We had been writing new songs and the two of them helped push them in a different direction.
Your single from the record Discotheque features not only footage of your home town in Austin but also personal footage from old VHS tapes. In blending the two, was it a case on reconciling the here and now to the past or more of an example of the disparity between the old and new?
We like both of those takes on it! The visuals felt right, but we aren’t sure exactly why they felt right. So we hope that people come away with their own opinions, feelings, interpretations, etc.
Ready to take to the road for your East Coast tour in July, is being on the road something that inspires you and fuels further creativity by taking in new experiences that ultimately find their way into new tracks or is not your preferred method of writing and formulating new material?
We hope so! We have written and demoed some of our favorite songs on road trips, although tour is likely a lot tougher than vacation. Experiences of all kinds can find their way into tracks though. Hopefully the time we spend daydreaming in the tour van will help fix some new songs. Sometimes a song has a problem area or has something that isn’t working, and it just needs time.
In terms of your own live sets, what elements have you incorporated from watching countless other acts and how they perform to what you exclusively bring to the table that makes a Sun June show uniquely your own?
We love sets that naturally flow from song to song, so we try to play sets that have some sort of arch. We’ve been really impressed with bands who can give an entire performance without any talking or stage banter between songs. Karima Walker, for example. It can be such a pleasant experience just watching them focused throughout their set. That said, we are equally impressed with bands who actively engage with the crowd. Musically, it’s been fun to try to rework songs for a live performance. We’ve been doing both bigger and more stripped down versions of album songs to see what works. I’m not sure what makes us unique just yet. We hope touring will help us find it.
Photo By Bryan C. Parker
