Clockenflap darlings Sleep Party People lighten up on new album Lingering
Brian Batz, multi-instrumentalist and producer for Danish band with a strong Hong Kong following, talks about how much fun they had playing Clockenflap and how he ‘tried to write happier songs’ for fourth album Lingering
Clockenflap 2015 Sunday: the people, the performances, the party, the big rock finish
Eighteen months since his first appearance at the Hong Kong music festival, Batz has just released his fourth album, Lingering, and is busy locking down dates for a fresh batch of live shows. Performing live has never come easily to the shy artist, whose song Fainting Spells, from the new record, was inspired by stage fright and childhood social anxiety. But thanks to constant encouragement of his fans and the reception at shows, like the enthusiastic crowd that turned up to witness his Hong Kong debut, he’s looking forward to touring again.
“It was so much fun to play and we had a really nice energy onstage,” the musician says of his Clockenflap set. Mired in sound problems, the day got off to an uncertain start, yet culminated in Batz crowdsurfing for the first time and getting mobbed by fans in bunny masks after leaving the stage. “It was the best concert on that Asian tour,” he adds.
[The band is] always allowed to interpret what I’ve written in the studio. It’s important to include them in the process
Compared to his previous album, 2014’s Floating, which was recorded “during an intense period in San Francisco”, Batz took longer on Lingering, stripping away the synthetic sounds and focusing on a more “organic feel, with no computers or electronic beats”.
Full of sensuous soundscapes and transfixing melodies, the resulting record is airier, warmer and less introspective than Batz’s previous works. It contains some of his strongest songs to date, including the poppy The Sun Will Open Its Core, the delicate Lingering Eyes and the achingly beautiful Odd Forms.
The eerie-sounding vocal manipulation of his previous recordings is pared down too.
“Playing a lot of concerts has made me a better singer and I feel more confident singing in front of people now than I did seven years ago,” he explains.
As well as clearer vocals, Batz also introduced live drumming instead of synthetic beats on Lingering. His aim is to have no backing track during shows – even for older songs – something Batz hopes will bring more freedom and experimentation to gigs.
So far, Sleep Party People’s recorded sound and live experience have been two distinct entities. Batz writes and produces all the music from his studio, before teaching the music to the band – an assortment of friends from the Copenhagen scene. Pulling apart the songs into separate sections for each musician might have been daunting after such an introspective creative process, but it’s actually “very easy”, says Batz.
