Take a dash of wit, add a couple of weird anecdotes, set to music andyou get Happyness – both band and feeling, judging by the music. Ramona Depares catches up with the band members ahead of their performance in Malta as part of Nil By Mouth.
Who are Happyness? And why Happyness?
So, we’re Benji, Jon EE and Ash from London, and our name is inspired half by a brand of English convenience products that started in the 1970s and half from a song by the wonderful New Jersey singer and performer, Brute Force, called ‘Hello Moscow’.
How did you guys get together?
Benji was working at the local public swimming pool and met Ash and Jon EE, who were regulars at the establishment. We discovered we were into the same kind of bands and thought it would be a nice way to spend our time if we made records together.
How do you describe your sound?
Easy-listening, teenage wedding-band.
Lyrics play a big part in your music and you’re known for your wit. How does that come about? Do you set out to inject humour into your music or does it just happen?
I think we just keep ourselves entertained and amused by creating these little stories, or images and ideas that we find funny – and then they naturally find their way into our songs. I don’t think we’ve ever considered ourselves a comedy band, and we’ve had to steer ourselves away from becoming one once or twice. Being able to laugh both at and with yourself is important, we believe.
Any literary influences for the lyrics?
Yeah. Around the first album we got particularly into a bunch of modern American writers – people like Pinckney Benedict, Breece DJ Pancake, Kurt Vonnegut, etc. I think we were into a few of those kind of writers by getting into bands like Sparklehorse, and then we kind of ran with it from there. I’ve recently got into China Mieville and his particular spin on science fiction.
What are some of your inspirations?
Terry Gilliam, Elliott Smith, Andre Khrzhanovsky and Barton Springs. And let’s not forget tardigrades and condiments, please.
Being able to laugh both at, and with, yourself is important
What are your thoughts about the music industry today? What is good and what needs to be fixed?
It’s kind of hard to talk about the music industry when you’re a band, because as a band you can feel both paradoxically inside and outside of ‘the music industry’ in some ways – and that’s both a helpful and an unhelpful thing. It’s helpful because that way you can feel a bit more liberated to do your own thing. But it can also be frustrating at times, because it can feel like you’re at the mercy of ‘the way things are’ and ‘the way things are done’. We sometimes wish the industry looked a little further ahead than it does. Sure, that’s easier said than done at a time when everything has to be so immediate – but it feels like there’s not a huge amount of patient development going on these days.
Has the digital revolution helped or hindered?
Probably both.
What is your creative process like? Who does what?
Until recently we had our own studio about an hour north of London, which had all our gear in it and where we made Weird Little Birthday and Write In. We couldn’t really play live there, so a lot of our creative process revolved around the studio and the recording process. That being said, we probably enjoy nothing more than just playing live together in a rehearsal room – that’s kind of how we wrote the first album. Benji or Jon EE usually bring an idea to the table and then we work on it together from there.
What’s next for Happyness?
Apart from a couple more festivals this year and a headline show in London in October, we’re probably spending the rest of the year starting to think about writing and the future. It’s been a busy year for us so far, so it’ll be nice to have a little more time to think and work on some new music.
What can we expect from your Malta performance?
A carnival float of nerdy English boys covered in feathers and all-out glam.
Nil By Mouth, featuring The Wedding Present, Happyness, Weval and Pional, takes place on September 30 at The Dome, San Ġwann. The event is being organised by Hairyamp Promotions and Trackage Scheme. Tickets are available online.
https://shop.trackagescheme.com/event/nil-mouth-sessions/