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Sydney three-piece Little May have been on the grind creating cutting edge folk music. Featuring haunting vocal harmonies, with a perfect balance of percussion, they are most definitely a group to look out for in 2014. GroundSounds recently had the pleasure of catching up with member Annie Hamilton to talk about the bands past, present, and future, check out our exclusive interview below.
For those just discovering Little May, can you tell us about the moment you guys decided to form the band?
We had been jamming together and working on some originals throughout the beginning of 2012 without really taking it seriously, but we had a bit of a break mid-year while Liz went to Europe and I was in Borneo. I can remember sitting on this beautiful beach in Borneo not wanting to leave, but at the same time itching to get home to keep playing. We pretty much started taking it seriously as soon as we returned from our travels.
What inspired the name Little May?
We actually got the name by mixing together our dogs’ names 🙂
We at GroundSounds love your track “Hide”, the mellow acoustic strums contrasting with punches of noise, can you tell us about working on this track, and a little bit about the creative process behind it?
A lot of this contrast came about in the recording process, when we started adding percussion, synth and electric guitars to flesh out the song, as we originally wrote it on acoustic guitars. We were all listening to a lot of Local Natives and Half Moon Run at the time and we knew that the song needed some powerful percussion to really make an impact. Our producer, Sam Thomlinson, came up with the percussion in the chorus, which completely picked up the song. The recording process involved adding heaps of layers of different instruments and percussion, then gradually stripping it back until we had the perfect balance.
You three are all storytellers in your own right; can you shed light on the groups dynamic and how you guys work together?
Our writing process is generally pretty collaborative. Han writes a lot of poetry and lyrics, while Liz & I are constantly coming up with chord progressions and little riffs, which we record on our phones and send to each other. Then we’ll all get together and work on the song structure and harmonies. Sometimes one of us will write a whole song on our own, but then we’ll show the others and work on it together.
For people visiting Sydney for the first time what is one thing they should see, and eat?
Well you can’t beat Sydney’s beaches, especially some of the smaller ones like Gordon’s Bay. I’m going to say fish & chips on the beach.
We are anticipating your forthcoming debut EP, we read that it will be slightly darker and eerier than where it initially started, what is it about this sound that attracts you?
Our sound has naturally progressed in this way over the last few months and I think a lot of that came from spending time in the studio, experimenting with different sounds and instruments in the recording process. When we first started a year ago we were just playing acoustic guitars, whereas now we are playing electric guitars and we have the full band (Catriona Hunter on percussion and Mark Harding on bass) to flesh out the sound on stage. When we first started writing songs, we could only imagine them as acoustic folk songs. Now we know the potential of our sound with the full band, and that is influencing the way we write.
You guys recently worked with McLean Stephenson, what was this day and experience like?
McLean Stephenson is an amazing photographer. He was awesome to work with because he knew exactly what he wanted for each photo and he was very good at directing us. To be honest, we generally struggle with photos; we all feel a bit awkward in front of the camera. I find it really hard to stop smiling… The number of times he had to tell me to ‘relax my face’ was ridiculous. That said, we’re really happy with the photos.
You guys are planning an east coast tour, unfortunately for the U.S. it’s the Australian east coast…..with that said do you guys plan on touring in the states anytime soon? Also, what do you all enjoy most about being on the road?
At this stage we don’t have any concrete plans but we would love to go to the states sometime next year! One of my favourite things about touring is the road-tripping because we all have a pretty silly sense of humour… We’ve just been up in Brisbane for the first gig of the tour so we had a 13-hour drive home yesterday, and my stomach is in so much pain from laughing so much. We passed the time by making silly videos and telling each other silly stories. I have not laughed that hard in a long time.
Who would you guys like to collaborate with in the future?
This is probably a really cliche answer but I’m going to say Flume. I think it would be really cool to work with an electronic artist who could bring a lot to the table in terms of production, and Flume is pretty awesome.
When you guys are on stage performing, what are thinking about? What are you feeling?
For me it’s about getting in the zone of the music, where I don’t have to think about what I’m doing and I can really get into it. Sometimes that happens really naturally, while other times I find myself getting distracted by other things.
After the EP release what’s next? Is there a full length in the works?
At this stage it’s all a bit up in the air. We’re going to start recording again early next year after the tour, but we haven’t decided yet whether to do another EP or a full album.
Photos by: Mclean Stephenson
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