Brighton experimentalists Moon > Sun have just released their excellent sophomore effort “Mixtape #1”, a beautiful sprawling record compiled in a mixtape format for you to enjoy. After being absolutely floored by the un-rivalled command of the wonky pop vibe we decided to sit down and have a chat with them about the new record, Brighton and their music.
UC: “Mixtape #1 is your sophomore release and your first release operating as a three piece.
Could you tell us a bit about the release?
Isaac Ashby: Sure! The release is a collection of songs, sketches and ideas blended together as a single, long-running mixtape. We tend to churn out a great deal of ideas for our music whether thats entire songs, random noises, beats – anything we feel like! Although we’re usually total perfectionists with the music we release so it was super liberating to put out something like this. I feel like it gives off a sense of imperfection, it’s real rough around the edges, like you can hear we were just chilling in my room making ridiculous noises. Although I’m a sucker for great production value I really love the idea of releasing something that can seem personal to listeners.
UC: Mixtape #1 goes expands on the groundwork of your debut release “Extended Play”, seeing you explore more avant-garde modular-synth-esque breaks and even further out their technicolour-pop tunes. What was the process of recording the tape like?
IA: I mean, when a great deal of the tracks were made we were totally unaware that we’d compile it all into a hot fire mixtape, which again I think makes it super personal. They’re all sounds and songs we had no intention of releasing to the public. The idea of it actually came from beginning to play shows as we found ourselves being asked a great deal if we had any CD’s/music to give away. Obviously you can point someone to your Bandcamp, but I didn’t feel that anything on there represented our current state so well.
We burned the mixtape onto a load of plain white CD’s, and splattered them in paint and stickers. I guess you could say the mixtape was released secretly months ago! Well, to anyone who was lucky enough to grab one of the mystery CDs.
All the tracks on the tape probably span the course of about a year and a half I’d say. For us it represents our growth as musicians, it’s fun to hear ourselves become more confident with experimenting and doing what we do.
I guess you could say there wasn’t really a strict process we followed when creating it, everything was an experiment or learning curve that followed a new set of guidelines.
UC: What were some of your main influences when producing the record?
IA: Definitely going to have to drop Micachu as the first influence. She was one of the first people I witnessed releasing mixtapes that weren’t strictly hip hop. Listening to her 30/40 min mixtapes for the first time years ago felt better than just listening to song after song on an album. I feel like all of the transitions and attention to detail showed a great deal of care had been taken to ensure the piece worked as a whole. It was all so raw and upfront, like, the music was totally exposed.
I guess for a couple songs you could say we channeled PC Music a little. I feel like some bands take themselves far too seriously, after listening to the PC music back catalogue for 210398348109 years I think we wanted to add a super light hearted element.
UC: Why did you choose the format of a mixtape to release this body of work?
IA: It’s slightly different. We wanted the challenge of making an albums worth of ideas work as a cohesive piece of music.
Also the visuals, lets not forget them. It’s nice to tie a big ol’ bow around the concept of art and try to get as many different platforms as possible working together. Jack Waghorn has been a good friend of mine for ages so i felt like he was the best guy to visually interpret our music.
UC: You hail from sunny and lovely Brighton, how’s the scene there? Is it all BIMM kids (tongue in cheek of course)?
IA: I’ll be honest, we’ve got it really good in Brighton. Even after a few months of playing shows as a three-piece we’ve met a tonne of nice people and bands, all really interested in what we’re doing. BIMM kids? A lot of the students have had their final hand-ins this last week and its been amazing to witness the brains of every song-writing student silently implode on Facebook amidst a stunning display of ironic memes. A futile attempt at procrastinating.
There’s also a tonne of beef between bands. Like, theres ‘fake beef’ which is kinda funny and then there’s fake beef that eventually becomes genuine beef which is lush. Mainly bands arguing about who sounds the most like Oasis. It’s all super bitchy – I love it lol
UC: Do you vibe to Oasis?
*Sofia chimes in*
Sofia Hughes: ‘yeah, all the time mate. i eat oasis for breakfast. whenever I’m feeling down’
We definitely vibe and or gurn to Oasis, Joel Gallagher, if you’re out there please give us permission to release a trap remix of Wonderwall.
UC: What’s on the cards for Moon > Sun in the near future?
IA: EVERYTHING!!
We got plans for a new single/vid super duper soon, followed by maybe a new record & UK/EU tours with our fave Brighton bands in the works.
UC: Thanks for taking the time to chat to us! Any parting words?
IA: Shout outs to DITZ / Mother Me / Fur / Penelope Isles and all our rockstar mates!
HI MUM X
“Mixtape #1” is out now via Little L Records on spray-painted cassettes with a fold-out insert poster, available to purchase and download for free here. You can keep up with all things Moon > Sun on Facebook here.