Far Out Meets: The Feens on the modern indie scene and their new EP
The music industry is not a very welcoming place right now. Huge acts like Sam Fender and indie stalwarts like Santigold have recently cancelled tour dates citing the post-pandemic stresses on the trade. However, The Feens are stripping things back to basics and illuminating the balm of a simple rock ‘n’ roll weekend knees-up. They are hopeful starlets proving that the independent music scene is still an equitable and buoyant place nurturing emerging talent.
We caught up with them ahead of the release of their new EP to discuss where they are headed as a band, their sound and the inspirations behind it, and everything else in between, as the journey of The Feens unfurls. With their new EP, Step Outside, already making waves, they are an original talent proving that not all is doom and gloom at the moment.
“I’ve been in the band nearly my whole adult life,” Freddie Schmuck tells me, “I’d just turned 19. We just started off doing covers in the local bars because there’s no real independent venues, so you play what you get paid to play.” They cut their teeth in the covers world for a few months before the urge to push out their own tunes came to the fore.
After all, it was original music that spawned the band in the first place. Having met as friends from the local area, “the story goes that we were all attending The Last Shadow Puppets gig at The Spa in 2016, and I bumped into the lads. I’d just done a little solo thing, a sort of acoustic set for the local radio station, and Sam had heard it, and he said, ‘Well, should we have a little jam’. So the three of us started jamming, then Perry joined on the drums, and it just went from there in my mum’s garage.”
From then on, it’s been the classic tale of a band slowly pushing out of town and broadening their horizons in every sense. The way they have been received so far has propelled them to this point. And it’s a scene that they want to give back to. “The nights we do with This Feeling, you get so much bang for your buck. There will be like four acts on one night and it’s £7. There is so much value for money there it is unreal. That’s when you know that Mike at This Feeling and all the other bands are only purely doing it for the love.” This benevolent, looking out for each other tenet is something that the band themselves hold dear and want to bring to the public too.
Beyond this outlook, their sound is one that has plenty swirling in the welter. As Freddie explains: “We’ve all got pretty similar music tastes, but each person has a slightly different twist that they bring. Like some Motown, aside from the usual suspects I also quite like some pop like ABBA and stuff, and then Adam likes all sorts, he was even playing some throat metal band the other day. Perry also likes heavier music a bit.”
This has created an eclectic sound within the band and that’s noticeable on their new EP. Part of the joy of the four tracks is that they’re all slightly divergent. Speaking of ‘Sunset’, Freddie explains, “I’m a massive Blossoms fan. ‘Sunsets’ is probably the only song that has stayed the same throughout all the writing. It came out exactly as I pitched it in my head. And the initial idea came from wanting to get a slide guitar on the record like some of The Blossoms’ tracks.”
When it comes to ‘Step Outside’ things were equally simple. “I just liked the way those two words sit together,” Freddie begins, “the imagery of it. To me, it has hidden meaning. If there is anything you’re unsure of in life, then you’ve got to puff out your chest, face the music, and step out in front of people. You’ve got to be confident. That is something that a lot of people can relate to, so we really liked the meaning of that.”
As for the sound, it typifies what The Feens are gunning for. “It’s got a good melody and big, driving chorus. Especially when we play it live it sounds really big and driving. It’s really fun to play as well.” Part of that oomph comes from the songwriting backbone of “speaking lyrically from the heart and being honest. It’s honest songwriting. I think that’s what we’re best at. Then trying to trap people with a big chorus is what we’re hoping to do.”
The next track is the brooding ‘Eye Open’. “This is one that Adam wrote,” Freddie explains. “It kind of shows off his range in terms of his voice and his songwriting too. He really likes poppy music. Anything with a bit of groove. So, I think that is a really good song because I think it can show off how diverse we can sound. It’s a bit of a left turn.”
However, it’s not just left turns that they’re proficient at, they also have an eye for being ahead of the trends. As ‘Freddie’ explains, ‘All Worked Out’ had a rather convenient inspiration. “This one we ripped off ‘Running Up That Hill’ by Kate Bush, and this was pre-Stranger Things, so we were ahead of the curve.” Adding: “We wanted to get the drum sound exactly as it is in that track, and also the beat too. But again, this is just built around a massive sing-along chorus.” Concluding: “It’s hard to pick a favourite on the EP, but if I had to, it would be that one.”
