London cinematic metal quartet The Ever Living have just released their new album Herephemine – we caught up with Chris Bevan Lee from the band to chat about the record and the importance of cinematography…not forgetting his super cute cats!
You have a new album coming out soon but first things first let’s get the most important stuff out of the way, we hear you love cats. What are your cats names and can we see a picture please?
I sure do – well, at least our cats anyway. My wife and I got them as kittens and it was the best thing we’ve ever done. This is Charlie (ginger) and Cora (brown/silver).
Ok, back on topic. How did The Ever Living come to be The Ever Living – when did you meet and how long ago?
Andrei and I had known each other through mutual friends for a couple of years and it took for him to leave his previous band and then some random chats on nights out to realise we both wanted the same thing. That was back in 2015. I thought I was done with the music industry, having been in a touring band around 10 years ago and having gone through all the struggling band bullshit already.But, we both felt somewhat uninspired by a lot of the music that was out there, and this encouraged us to start doing our own thing. I have a habit of taking the hard path in life!
Tell us a bit about your forthcoming album Herephemine. Are there any themes running throughout the album?
The main theme is consumer excess – through technology, love, drugs and anything we can get our hands on that can lead to self-destruction mentally or physically. I’m at that point in my life where I’m married and should be having kids, becoming more responsible and growing up – essentially doing what my parents we were doing at my age (early thirties). Instead, I’m still very much enjoying the fun side of life and I guess that fear of still feeling incorrigible mixed with the fact the world is quite a scary place right now manifested itself as a theme in the music for this album.
How have you found the response from press so far?
From what I’ve seen so far it’s been really great. I’m looking forward to seeing reviews (good or bad) so I can really get an idea of whether or not our music is connecting with people. We recorded the album last summer and have already spent a lot of time with the tracks and they have been protected from critique until now. Quite exciting.
Quite a lot of thought, time and execution has gone into the first two videos for the album. Is cinematography important to the band? Can you tell us a bit about the narrative behind the videos?
Image is as important to me as music. A lot of bands do themselves a huge disservice by making a music video on the cheap or without any idea or concept when they’ve clearly spent a lot of time on the music. Both things should work with each other or you may as well put up the audio only and leave the rest to the listeners’ imagination.
There are four music videos which are connected through a hyperreality system called ‘Herephemine’. Not virtual reality, which is essentially a game, but something based in the real world. Users get to experience other people’s lives through their point of view as well as using it to watch existing content like YouTube. Think of an immersive, sensory version of Periscope and you’re getting there. Once the videos have all been released the concept should be clearer but I wanted each video to work on its own as well as within the concept. I also used each video as a creative experiment for myself as well as bringing the ideas to life through our press campaign which was very satisfying as a filmmaker.
What’s next for The Ever Living? Any shows or videos coming up?
We have two more videos to release and will play our album launch show on May 17th at Boston Music Room in London. After that we will tour the UK which we are working on right now.
Finally, if you had to spend the rest of your life on a desert island, but were allowed to take the entire works of five different bands/musicians with you to keep you from losing your mind, whose would you choose?
Depeche Mode, The National, Mogwai, Deftones, Fleetwood Mac
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Herephemine is out now via Chromism Records, available in digital and physical formats.
