Amelia’s Magazine | An interview with Cave Painting and review of debut EP You’ll be Running Soon

Cave Painting by Barb Royal
Cave Painting by Barb Royal.

Brighton’s Cave Painting released debut EP You’ll be Running Soon with Hideout Recordings yesterday. It’s a magical slice of ambient indie pop, the dramatic backdrop a perfect foil for vocalist Adam Kane‘s hypnotic vocals. You can listen to the EP in full on soundcloud at the bottom of this interview, but before you get there let’s find out more about this exciting new band…

Cave Painting by Mateusz Napieralski
Cave Painting by Mateusz Napieralski.

You were feted before you’ve even played a second live show, how are you coping with the pressure of such hype?
Feted! Ha that’s really nice to hear, to get such positive feedback at such an early stage is brilliant for us, there are certain pressures that go along with “hype” and expectation, we try to take things with a pinch of salt and try not to get absorbed in it, in reality we know were at an early stage and there’s a lot of hard work to be done.

Forest Natives by Sarah Austin
Forest Natives by Sarah Austin
Forest Natives by Sarah Austin.

How did Hideout recordings find you – where were you and can you remember what you were doing when they got in touch to make the offer?
Hideout were at the first show we played in London at the Social, and then we met each other down here in Brighton, where they told us their ideas, their whole ethos matched our’s as a band, we were in the rehearsal space when the offer was made, I can remember exactly as we’d been in the same place each day for almost a year!

Cave Painting
How did the band get together, and how long have you known each other?
Rich, Sam and Harry all knew each other from generally being in and around Brighton they make up the southern contingent of the band then Jon and I ventured down from the north to study, we met the others and wrote music together in various forms before forming what is now Cave Painting back last October, I’m going to guess around 4-5 years.

Cave Painting by Barb Royal
Cave Painting by Barb Royal.

Your sound has been described as very woozy which I think is very apt – why do you think this is?
The great thing about a band is the varied influences that each individual brings, Jon is massively into rap and hip-hop and he has an interesting drumming style which I think reflects this, then at the other extreme you’ll find Rich listening to Fleetwood Mac, I’m not sure how much they’ve influenced him to be fair, I actually think we’ve found our sound by experimenting when recording and having freedom, my singing is actually heavily influenced from listening to Sam and the melodies he creates.

Cave Painting by Sam Parr
Cave Painting as imagined by Sam Parr. ‘curled up toes for walking on rocks and sand. blessed by the sun. calmed by waving. the stone you take home. tan lines fade. a summer was made. me and four (you’s). the shark. the lark. island. forever. being a spectrum. a sunbeam. a collective. the water after dark.(kilo)metres apart. those calming palms. say yeah palms, leaving our markings, footprints behind. CAVE PAINTING.’

Drummer Jonathan McCawley and keyboard player Sam Simon are responsible for all your artwork – how did this come about?
Jon studied art back in Leeds some of the things I’ve seen him draw are quite frightening but interesting, and Sam seems to be able to lend his hand to anything he is unbelievably creative, I came home one day to find a giant portrait of Daniel Day Lewis on the wall which he’d felt the urge to paint (we had been watching Gangs of New York excessively at this point in time) It’s still there! We’ll have to show you.

Why did you decide to make the video for Midnight Love? It’s extremely abstract and quite filmic. Have you got any plans for new videos that you can share with us?
We wanted something visual for our first release, but we were wary of creating a standard music video, we wanted to create something a little different, there’s a strong theme of escapism in our music, and this was our visual representation of that, the video was filmed and based on the song, and we then scored the music to run alongside it, an interesting process, we are in the middle of making the next one, I won’t say any more than that.

Cave Painting
Cave Painting by Barb Royal.

How is Brighton these days? What is the music scene like in general and are there any other up and coming bands that you recommend we listen out for?
We do love Brighton, it’s a little different now the sun has disappeared but lately our grasp of the local music scene is pretty poor as we’ve been away for quite a while, but saying that our recommendations would be Tigercub and Blanc, very promising.

Cave Painting by Barb Royal

What next? Can we expect a debut album next year, and where will you next be playing live?
We are leaving Brighton again this week the same day as our EP release, to start work on the album, with a release date hopefully in the early part of next year which should be coupled by some more live dates.

Categories ,Adam Kane, ,Barb Royal, ,Blanc, ,brighton, ,Cave Painting, ,Daniel Day Lewis, ,ep, ,fleetwood mac, ,Gangs of New York, ,Harry Smallwood, ,Hideout Recordings, ,interview, ,Jonathan McCawley, ,Mateusz Napieralski, ,Midnight Love, ,Rich Snabel, ,Sam Parr, ,Sam Simon, ,Sarah Austin, ,Tigercub, ,You’ll be Running Soon

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