A Quick Chat With Morning Mood

What was the inspiration behind your new single ‘BLUE’?

The song came from, I think, the universal desire from the band to branch out. I'd say right now we are going through a ‘teething’ process, exploring various avenues to see what we want our sound to be - which requires a lot messing about. The inspiration came from listening to a lot of dance, house and even prog music, which is something we all enjoy, and doing our best to incorporate aspects of those genres; but also shine through with something that is inherently ‘us’. In terms of the lyrics, they dance around the common issue of trying to understand the nuances of communication, particularly in the sense of getting to know someone when you are in a romantic partnership with. It’s about trying to gain an understanding of the person you are attracted to, about trying to negotiate the right and wrong times - when to say yes, when to say no, when to dive in head first and when to show restraint. It’s a complex issue and Lucy did an amazing job at capturing that feeling in the track. 

When writing music, how do you start the process of creation?

The process tends to be one of elimination, I’d love to say I treat song writing like gardening, with patience and care. But frankly, I tend to embody the saying “throw shit at the wall and see what sticks”. More often than not it will start with me trying to emulate tracks that inspire me, miss the mark, then bring it to the rest of the band, from there we tend to throw out a lot of tracks until we find something that fits. The joy of this process is the collaboration. I’m not a drummer, bass player or singer, so it's amazing to see what everyone does with the frankenstein I bring to them. From there, everyone tends to modify and tweak their parts until we come to something that we feel as a whole represents us. Overall, it’s an easy going process - The hardest part is trying to stop Adam and Jordan from adding Tool references into their parts. 

What are your influences and how do they affect your songwriting?

Influences in the band vary between two fields - Lucy and I share a pretty similar music taste (House, disco, soul, anything that touches the heart and makes you want to move really). Whereas Jordan and Adam are both prog and metal fans. I would say the influences definitely shine through in our music, particularly in how everyone interprets their parts. For ‘Blue’ in particular, I think there is a bit of contrast, it starts off quite mellow and dancey but pushes through with some near rock energy towards the end - I think that transition showcases the array of influences that are coming through in our music. I think the hardest part about it is just trying to find balance in which everyone feels that they (and their influences) are captured in the song, whilst also doing what is required to make the song the best it can possibly be. 

If you could collaborate with any artist, who would it be and why?

Honestly, I think the band as a whole could probably agree that Hiatus Kaiyote would be on the top of the list - I think their music is a big inspiration to everyone. But I feel this answer would vary significantly between each band member. I’ve been really digging Andy Bull recently. It's funny, because there isn’t a similarity between his music and ours, but I feel like anything he touches turns to gold and I would love to work alongside him on a track. 

What does 2024 look like for Morning Mood?

Our aim this year is pretty simple, create work that we can reflect on and be proud of and play as many gigs as we can! We were very fortunate to play with some incredible acts last year, so we are doing our best to keep along that path. We also intend on releasing a string of singles, we’ve been pretty quiet on the release front so we are excited to show everyone what we’ve been working on!