L.A-via-U.K. band Lowlives have been making serious inroads into the European consciousness with their debut album Freaking Out (reviewed here), but that’s no surprise as their wonderfully grungy sound is more English rain-soaked than Californian sun-kissed. Having tore up the Avalanche Stage at a mud-splattered Download, we just had to talk to vocalist/guitarist Lee Downer and guitarist Jaxon Moore to get the Lowlives low-down.
It doesn’t sound as if living in the sunny climes of California has altered your sound very much?
Lee: This is the music we grew up on and I don’t think you can ignore it. Every time I pick up a guitar that’s the stuff I want to play, rather than forcing it in any one direction and make it sound a certain way. I think that’s the way it is because it became ingrained within our DNA as children and that shines through. People tell us Lowlives sounds really ‘90s, and we don’t deny it because that’s what we grew up on.
Where do you think your sound will veer next?
Jaxon: The new album is still being written, but we can promise it’ll have heavy ass guitars and big old drums, catchy hooks. It’s going to sound great, but it might be a bit riffier this time.
Lee: Our first release that came out, but not as a record, that was slightly more riffy. There’s a few songs on the new album that are slightly more poppy and at first we felt a bit uncomfortable but it turns out that those are the songs people like the best…as we found out today.
Jaxon: We’re guitarists so our whole world is centred around riffs! We want ‘em and we need ‘em!
Lee: People seem to want the fourth chord…but we don’t want to give it to them! [laughs] So we’ll have to make some fourth chords on the next record because all the songs thus far are not four chords.
The band formed in the States where there’s a plethora of great bands, whereas in the UK a new band has a rarity value. Were you worried about getting lost in the melee?
Jaxon: I think in America there’s an overwhelming amount of music, I think it is easy to get lost in that but we are carving our way through because we are very unique in our own way. We are definitely more well known here in England than in America and that’s the path we are naturally progressing towards. We love our fans in England and the fanbase we are growing in Germany and that’s where we thrive.
Lee: That’s our two biggest places. The States is weird because we are an American band that nobody knows. It’s kind of odd which is why we come here a lot. Also it is hard in America because of the saturation of bands, it’s hard to comprehend why some bands are big and it is tempting to lean into that style, but we think “fuck that!” and we do what we want to do. Me and Luke are a little bit older and we just want to make music that we want to hear. You could copy other bands to gain popularity, but the whole purpose of forming this band was to play the music we love. We don’t want to fit into a scene. We tried, but in Los Angeles it is a very shoegazey scene, what they would class as grunge but they’re not, they’re shoegaze and we don’t fit into that scene at all.
Jaxon: We lean into the heavier side of grunge for sure. We’ve got a very punk rock mentality about it. We’re just like: “Here’s what we do and if you don’t like it…fuck off!”.
Lee: And we’ll carry on doing it, even if no one cares.
I wonder about the aesthetic of the band. How involved are you with that? For example, the album cover is very striking.
Lee: That’s good to hear because we had a nightmare with the album artwork. We had about 30 covers and we were just going round in circles, we couldn’t choose, and one day randomly an artist came along who is super famous and people can’t believe we got him to do our artwork. We sent it to our A&R guy and he reached out and he said he’d love to do our record. He did the album and all the singles too with all their different variations. So we were so happy, especially with the disaster of trying to get the right cover, we are really happy with the cover. I have friends who do not give a fuck about our music but they all want to buy a poster of the album sleeve.
Jaxon: We were very much of the mindset of let’s find something that is going to represent the music on the inside the best. When I was a kid I was buying albums purely on the strength of the cover. I would see it and it gave the impression that the music was going to be amazing and we wanted our sleeve to have a similar effect. I think we all focused on that strongly and I’m really happy with what we came out with. It is very much a representation of what we sound like.
Lee: I’m not a massive Iron Maiden fan, but when I was a kid I’d walk into HMV and I’d want to buy it because that skull is fucking sick! I hope this will do the same thing.
Would you consider using the same artist? Because a Maiden album is instantly recognisable.
Jaxon: Exactly. It’s awesome when bands find that missing link. This sleeve has a look that just resonates with us so although we’ve never talked about it, I think it’s something we’d do again. This interview has really influenced us!
Lee: You’ve really helped us out!
Finally, it’s magic wand time. What wish can I make come true for Lowlives?
Lee: To open for Foo Fighters, that’s the whole aim! Once that happens we can quit, we’re done.
Jaxon: If I could wish for one thing now it would probably be boots because I’m wearing Converse with holes in and I’m drowning out here in the mud. Or opening for Green Day would be good.
