Swim Deep discuss the music that inspired ‘There’s A Big Star Outside’
It feels like all change for Swim Deep on their new album, There’s A Big Star Outside. As they stripped back the distractions and delivered their simplest yet most magnetic release to date, the band let us into the music that inspired the move.
The Birmingham-born outfit have never been shy about evolution, and on their fourth album, they’re a long way from where they started. They first burst to notoriety as part of the 2013 scene of new indie royalty, being one of the most defining acts at a moment when it felt like the absolute heyday of the genre. From then on, they’ve played around with synths and sonics with each new release. But on their latest release, Swim Deep seem to have recentered themselves.
“We kept coming back to the core of the song, the emotion of it. It was all about finding the song first, then going from there,” their keys player James Balmont told Far Out, discussing how the power of a good song led them right. For this release, they wanted to cut through the noise and keep things simple, leading to their most emotive and impactful album yet.
But in terms of inspiration, there are always a lot of different elements that go into a sound. Even the simplest songs don’t come from nowhere. Instead, the band took influence from a whole wealth of music history, either in the form of albums they’ve loved forever or music lessons passed along by their producer and honourary new member of the “brotherhood”, Bill Ryder Jones.
The music that inspired Swim Deep:
Red House Painters – Red House Painters II
The task of picking a Red House Painters album to highlight was a tough one for frontman Austin Williams, who would happily credit every one for having an impact. But it’s the emotional life of their 1993 one that stands out.
“It’s very raw,” he said. Both in lyrics and style, the record seems fully dedicated to the feelings involved. “It’s recorded in such a beautiful way that you can hear every instrument. There’s no compression and nothing too hectic,” Williams continues, “He sounds so emotional and so in pain as well, but at the same time, really beautiful.” It’s easy to hear the impact of that more stripped-back, emotion-led sound on their own album.
As a vital piece of the puzzle for their new album, the album was a connecting thread between Williams and their producer, Bill Ryder-Jones, as the frontman said, “That’s where me and Bill really bonded.”
Dionne Warwick – ‘Anyone Who Had A Heart’
Another influence credited to their producer was the impact of one of the most legendary songwriters in history. As they discussed the ways in which Bill Ryder-Jones guided them back to a more traditional and fuss-free approach to crafting songs, one of his icons became a major influence. “He’s really into more classical songwriting, so we talked a lot about Burt Bacharach,” Balmont said.
This Dionne Warwick track written by Bacharach stands out to him. “It just kind of sums up the power of classic 1960s songwriting,” he said. It’s so emotional, and I love the instrumentation with the strings.”
From the nostalgic look and feel of the 1960s to the timelessness of some of the era’s best songs, the musical ethos of that decade became a key pillar of influence. “It really summed up the aesthetic going forward,” Balmont explained.
My Morning Jacket – ‘Dondante’
Throughout There’s A Big Star Outside, each song is pinned down by a solid rock drumline and tips plenty of the tracks over into the arena of the anthemic. Even while the songs are undeniably more stripped back and tender than on their previous releases, drummer Thomas Fiquet still took influence from some big rock moments.
“I always go back to this one song in terms of how sensitive music can be when it comes to dynamics,” Fiquet said. As ‘Dondante’ builds to a climax, the drums get bigger and bigger as if carrying emotion along. But they never crowd the rest of the track, allowing the whole song to work as one powerful unit, much like Swim Deep’s own.
Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci – Barafundle
While Bill Ryder-Jones inspired frontman Austin Williams to embrace the power of simple, stripped back and emotional songwriting, he was inspiring the rest of the band to wander further afield from their own zones of influence and try out something new.
For guitarist Robbie Wood, he wandered into the world of Welsh psychedelic folk with Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci. “When I first met Bill and we went up to the Wirral, we bonded over the instrumentation of this record,” he said. As a band, the Welsh troupe’s journey seems to mirror Swim Deep’s own. “It’s very different from their earlier records, which were very out there,” Wood explained.
Much like their own new one he added, “This one is more stripped back but with really good melodies.” But mostly, he thinks it’s an album more people should hear; “It’s very beautiful, very underrated.”
The Verve – A Storm in Heaven
While their sound was changing, certain influences have always stuck around. From their earliest days as a band, The Verve have been on the playlist.
“The first Verve album before they were a Britpop band is an album we’ve all liked for a long time,” Balmont said, with the whole band nodding in agreement. It was an album that even caused a slightly little spat over who would get to talk about it, clearly all holding it dear.
But the 1993 release feels like a major point of influence, opening up the big picture of the band. “If the sort of classical Burt Bacharach songwriting was one end of the spectrum, then maybe this more druggy, shoegazey sound is on the other end,” Balmont explained, with the woozy sound being the other, essential side of their coin.
