Why You Should "Aimlessly Wander" Through Different Sounds

"I’ve always been slightly put off by the whole rock’n’roll thing – it’s so passé now, and all that shit just winds me up."

There’s been very little time for the young quartet to stand back and properly assess where they’re at for the last year or so, let alone relax, since releasing their first single Powder in October, then bursting into the spotlight with She’s A Witch. “We’ve had no respite at all, really — we’ve been going next show after next, and when we haven’t been playing shows we’ve been recording and writing. We haven’t concerned ourselves with anything that’s really gone on, we’ve kept ourselves busy and that’s given us our edge this year.”

A prominent contribution to the band’s seemingly immediate success actually stems from a lot of trial and error, with Gengahr hoping to master their best sound through the process of elimination, trying their hand at an armoury of different styles through the development phase. “The way [the album] sounds is us spending a year aimlessly wandering through different sounds. We didn’t really know what we were doing when we first started out … We went through phases of using samplers and synths and exploring the more electronic side of stuff, then trying out power ballads for a while, you know, just seeing what we thought worked. In the end we went full circle and picked up guitars and went ‘Ok, we know how to play these, we’ll try it and see what happens.’”

Despite their recent soar in popularity, the boys are not going to let it get into their heads — the music always comes first. “Whether I’ve liked a band’s music or not, I’ve always been slightly put off by the whole rock’n’roll thing — it’s so passé now, and all that shit just winds me up, so we’ve never really been good at that thing, the whole ‘representing yourselves’.”

Similar ideals were upheld with the album. “I think it’s a very honest first album and that’s what I’m most proud of. There was no one helping us or trying to influence how we put things together; we called the shots on it and that’s something I think all bands should do. It’s a shame in this day and age where there’s so much pressure to sell records that that’s not always the case.”