Alt-J transgressed from student-songwriters to mercury prize-winning mavericks in the glorious mist of their debut album An Awesome Wave. A decade on the band has fine-tuned their eccentricities and constructed a mature new sound.
Ahead of the release of their fourth album, The Dream, I sit down with the band’s drummer, Thom Sonny Green, to talk album making in the midst of a pandemic and what the future has in store for the Leeds-based outfit.
The Indiependent: Hi Thom, Alt J’s new album The Dream is coming out February 11. How are you feeling about it? Excited? Anxious?
Thom: I’m pretty excited, to be honest. It’s been long enough since we finished it. We’ve been promoting it for a little bit now and rehearsed it for the live show. Basically, there’s been a long enough gap for us to start appreciating it again. It’s weird when you’re making an album, there’s certain stages you go through, I start to get a bit bored of it, to be honest. You hear it so much and you hear everything single part of it a million times.
The Indiependent: What a cruel way to kill creativity. Now that you’ve had a bit of space from it. How do you think it compares to other albums you’ve made?
Thom: I think we’re really proud of it. Joe was saying yesterday, there isn’t a track on there that we couldn’t have worked on more, you know? I don’t think we’ve overworked anything… with the amount of time we’ve had, we could have easily ended up ruining it all. But I think we’ve given everything to each track. There have been tracks on other albums that I think we probably would have had more time on… or not put on or something like that. All of the tracks on here are really complete, we’re all so happy with it. It’s a funny thing because it’s never really been like that. The first album was unique because we’d never done anything like that before, it was all so novel and we weren’t so introspective back then. We were younger and more spontaneous. Now we’re a bit more cynical. You see things differently. We’re just really proud of the work we’ve done and anything else is a bonus.
The Indiependent: Talking about your first album. It’s approaching the tenth anniversary of An Awesome Wave. In regards to your approach to album making, how have things changed during this decade?
Thom: I’ve become more aware that we are a part of a bigger thing. In the beginning, we were just students. We played now and again at pubs. We weren’t part of any music scene. We weren’t signed and we didn’t have to think about that stuff. Nowadays the judgement is unavoidable. Personally, I’m quite a private person and a little bit skeptical of the industry, ya know?. I don’t want to find myself in a position where I have to jeopardise the values and beliefs in my art.
In terms of album making, it’s not changed a great deal. We use the same producer. We’ve done it in different places but it’s always been in London. One thing that’s changed, is that I tend to record a lot of stuff on my laptop as we’re writing and we end up making demos that way. We started doing it on RELAXER and now every track on the album has been through that process of going into Ableton. I do a bit of production which usually starts with Joe’s guitar. It’s a nice brainstorming sketch. I’m not a trained producer, which I think aids the process. I’ll do stuff that’s not conventional.
The Indiependent: Are there any plans in place surrounding the tenth anniversary that fans might want to get excited about?
Thom: There are plans in place, I can’t confirm anything just yet but we will be doing certain things. We’d like to be able to play the whole thing from start to finish. It depends. It’s hard to find time to rehearse. Other people might say, “what do you mean? It’s your job to be in a band?” But we’re always pretty full-on. There are tracks on there that we’ve never actually played live… and we’re aware of how important the album is to everyone. So hopefully, we’re able to do that alongside a few reissues and remixes.
The Independent: That sounds like a great idea. Turning our attention back to the new album – it’s a unique record, insofar as it was made during a global pandemic… what was that experience like?
Thom: So, we started the album in 2020, just before the pandemic started, and then when it came in we all went to isolate at home and didn’t go back to the studio. We decided not to work remotely, like over zoom or anything… it just sounded like the worst thing ever. We’re quite spoilt in the way we write, ya know? We have certain conditions like we don’t write on tour together and we need to be somewhere that looks like a living room. If we ever go to a big studio, there needs to be carpets and rugs on the floor. Our manager suggested we do it over zoom and I was dreading that the other two would be up for it… thankfully they weren’t. We all still worked individually and brought stuff in when we were able to.
The Indiependent: I bet there was a cathartic burst of creativity when you were all able to get back into the studio together.
Thom: Right! We work quite quickly actually. We always have. The more we work together, the more efficient we become at writing. We’re not the kind of band that jams for 2 hours and then chops and screws it. We’re pretty militant and efficient in the way we write. Creatively, it felt like we were in a really good place with no restrictions. The amount of time that we had in the end, meant that we recorded too many songs for the first time. There are two that didn’t make the cut because of complications with the vinyl pressing and we really wanted them on the album. I’m sure they’ll be released at some point… or we’ll sell them for a ton of money. We’ll see. Maybe get a f****** Apple TV ad or something with McDonald’s.
The Indiependent: I think it’s time to go back to the drawing board and get a pitch together.
Thom: Yeah! We’ll hit up Nestle.
The Indiependent: Wouldn’t a more modern, environmentally conscious brand look better?
Thom: Fine… Greenpeace it is.
The Indiependent: Are there any horror stories that come to mind during the making of this album?
Thom: Definitely. I have a kidney transplant that I’ve had for 13 years. So I was and still am pretty vulnerable. I had to shield at the start of this year for three months and we didn’t go to the studio at all during that time. I didn’t ask anyone not to go in, but I would have felt pretty terrible if the guys had to go in and record and I couldn’t be there. As I said, we don’t work remotely. There’s nothing I could have done. Just after we’d finally gone back into the studio, around the time things were getting crazy again, I was becoming so nervous about going in and felt so much pressure to shield again. We were in such a good place with the record and I didn’t want to turn around and stop that progress and say, “Hey guys, don’t go in…” It wasn’t my place. Finally, the advice from the government came and I had to shield.
But it was a really difficult time, my mental health takes a massive hit in the winter anyway but not being able to go in and be with everyone else, I just felt like s***. I dwelled on it and kept thinking about it and it just got worse and worse.
The Indiependent: I’m sorry to hear that. Unfortunately, it looks like COVID is starting to make a return… will that affect your upcoming tour?
Thom: I don’t know man… we’re supposed to be flying out to the US on 23rd but I’m super stressed on whether they’ll close the borders again. At the moment it’s planned and it’s going ahead. We’ve just got our visas sorted. I just hope it doesn’t affect the tour, ya know? We’re really excited about it and keen to just do that. It’s been a while. Being on stage in these huge venues, there’s nothing like it.
The Indiependent: Fingers crossed for you guys. Is there a song from The Dream that you’re most proud of?
Thom: ‘Walk A Mile’. I think it’s one of our most complete and coherent songs yet. It feels kinda flawless, ya know? Like, it’s a very mature-sounding track. To me, It sounds like a classic. It’s not really us. It’s not quirky or anything like that, it’s just good songwriting and sonically – it’s awesome.
The Indiependent: When it comes to songwriting. Does Alt-J prefer writing drunk, stoned, or straight?
Thom: Uhh… sober. We don’t ever really write drunk. We smoked a lot of weed when making This Is All Yours, which was kinda nice, ya know? It did have its effects. On RELAXER we had a few cans in the studio. I mean we were in Shoreditch so…
This time there was no party. Most of that had to do with the global pandemic.
The Indiependent: Finally, what does the future have in store for Alt-J, post The Dream?
Thom: I think we are getting older. My bandmates both have babies now, ya know? And I might do in the future. In reality, we’ll tour this album and take a break as we’re usually pretty burnt out. In terms of our songwriting, I don’t see us getting worse, I only see us getting stronger. We’re aware of what we are. We’re not chasing anything or trying to stay relevant… that’s the worst thing you can do.
You have to stay authentic and that’s our goal. People can see through phoney stuff and I think an audience relates to authenticity more than anything.
The Dream is due for release February 11. Pre order the album here.
Read our track review for U&ME here
Words by W.P Millar
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