Genre-Bending Band, easy life Discusses Creating, Inspiration, and their New Album
UK-based quintet, easy life, has been paving their own way in the music realm. The indie-funk band is bending genre barriers, creating introspective lyrics that juxtapose the wildly exciting rhythms and beats. Front man, Murray Matravers, spoke about influences behind their music, the inspiration during the writing process, and the production of easy life’s new album, life’s a beach, in a recent press conference hosted by 1824.
In discussing his journey with creating songs, Murray began a chat on the heavy influences of music within his family and his everyday life growing up. Having a family in love with art, Murray explained, “I’ve always been surrounded by music. My mom and dad would always play music in the house, my older brother was a music producer, so I would always look up to him and be like, ‘I want to be just like my cooler, older brother, and hangout with him and make music.’” He considers creating music to be one of the most “therapeutic art forms ever.” Murray discussed the beauty of music and its diversity, how it can be enjoyed casually or listened to more analytically and with a deeper understanding. He is nothing shy of having a deep connection and appreciation for all things music, stating, “Music is just the best thing, the greatest luxury of them all.”
Growing up on a fairly secluded farm, Murray describes his start into producing music as finding his own form of fun, playing different instruments like piano and drums. Creating music began just as a hobby, in which he never truly thought “it was something I’d do to this extent really.” In forming easy life, he mentioned the small proximity of musicians in Leicester, and how it was a chain reaction of establishing different members of the band, connecting through each other. “About 6 months later, we got signed and we couldn’t believe it, because all of a sudden we had to start taking ourselves seriously. We formed kind of on a bit of a whim.”
“Music is just a given, it’s just a fact of life. It is something that is all encompassing all the time.”
In easy life’s latest album, life’s a beach, there is a strong juxtaposition between the overall tone of the sounds and the meaning behind the lyrics. Many of the songs revolve around an upbeat production representing the sounds of summer, but have in-depth lyrics such as, “We're wildflowers in the rain again, and my sun's in the shade again,” and “I hang myself from the ceiling, it's a real pretty art installation.” Murray, in discussing the lyrics, is trying to convey the feelings of hard times with a mixture of unification amongst everyone going through similar experiences. He spoke, “there’s some kind of collective uselessness that we can all get from easy life, which I think is quite reassuring.”
The different songs throughout the album have a feeling of universal struggle and understanding, but also a lot of fun sounds and production moments. One of the songs, “skeletons,” has a funky beat and a ton of interesting background sounds thrown in, mixed with harmonies that create a consistently entertaining song. Other songs such as “ocean view” and “nightmares” establish this almost old-school type of vibe with the different instruments and overlays, eliciting some feelings of nostalgia. The production of the album as explained by Murray was a form of escapism. With such a diverse album, Murray opened up discussion on the band not wanting to be labeled for a specific genre. “The way music is digested nowadays with Spotify, there’s inspiration so readily available. There’s songs on the album, which are inspired by things from loads of different artists from all over the world.. Something we’ve always been so keen to do as a band is shake the genre thing.”
“I think part of it is just coming to terms with the way things are. You should only worry about the things you can influence, and things you can’t influence, are just a distraction from the things that you can.”
With a humorous yet down to earth personality, Murray has an extremely elaborate, grounded, and positive outlook on life that above inspirational to hear and digest. Easy life’s new album, life’s a beach, definitely represents these aspects, and is music everyone needs to listen and delve into.
Easy life’s new album, life’s a beach, is available on all platforms now.