- 2020-10-17
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Donate to support families affected by the crisis in Ukraine ➔ The Vamps Releases New Album “Cherry Blossom”: Streaming
British pop rock band The Vamps released their fifth studio album “Cherry Blossom” on October 16, 2020. It is their first album in two years.
The album contains 11-track, including preceding singles “Married in Vegas”, “Chemicals” and “Better”.
The Vamps shared on social media, “Cherry Blossom represents the transience, fragility, and brilliance of life. The album stands for rebirth and new beginnings while being proud of what has been. Its about letting go of inhibitions and immersing yourself in something new. We've poured our hearts into these songs and we want them to be therapy and elation for you all, just like they have been for us.”
The album features rock and pop sound by their performing with instrument, unlike EDM and digital audio workstation. “There was a bar set with this album,” Brad Simpson (vocals, guitar) told Apple Music. “We were like, 'We want this to be the best album that we've written.' I think the speed of it, the reimagination of the band that we want to be, is relevant as well. We wanted to take it back to what The Vamps always was in our minds, which at the core of it is a conventional instrument band. That's what's important for us.”- The Vamps explained track by track for the album below. (via Apple Music)
“Glory Days (Intro)”
Brad Simpson: “At the beginning of [2020], me and Tristan went to LA and got an Airbnb. We went in and there was an upright piano in there. We were like, 'We've got to put this piano on the album, man. It's meant to be.' We recorded the melody on the piano as a voice note off one of our phones.”
Tristan Evans: “We loved that hook and we wanted to just create a little intro to kind of explain the sonics of the album early on.”
“Glory Days”
Brad Simpson: “We were all in a really good place as a band. I just remember there being a really positive energy, and I had my mates from home in my head as well, and it was this idea of just being like, 'Fuck, I'm in a really good place, I want to write a really positive song.' It was like that moment of 'Put your phone down, chill out with the people that you love and that you're happy with, and surround yourself with positive people.' It's overarchingly quite a positive and uplifting album, and 'Glory Days' sets the tone of that straight from the off.”
“Better”
Brad Simpson: “A lot of the things that are on the album is either just us or working with people that are friends first, collaborators later. So these two guys we've known for years called [songwriter/producers] Jack & Coke were in London. We went and had two days with them, and 'Better' was one of the songs that was written. It's written in the context of a relationship and set in the tone of, like, 'Oh, OK, we fell in love, now we've fallen apart, but do you even notice?' It's about that idea of going, 'I can be confident and do those things that I want to do from within.' You've got that ability to pull yourself out of a negative place.”
“Married in Vegas”
James McVey: “We really wanted to come back with a statement, and this song was completely written, produced, and released during lockdown. We love all the songs on the album, but we really felt like we needed something punchy. We handed in the album and literally that night I got a FaceTime from Brad. I think he was barely clothed. He was really drunk and he'd just written a song. It genuinely was that moment where we were like, 'OK. This is the single.' It just made sense immediately, and from that one night, the entire campaign changed. We sent the song to the record label that night and I think by the next evening, we'd all agreed that was the single coming out in a few weeks. Just a bizarre turn of events with this song.”
Brad Simpson: “I think 'Married in Vegas' is like the most grand, extroverted version of the songs on the album. It's like the fun uncle of the album.”
“Chemicals”
Brad Simpson: “'Chemicals' was the first song that we did. We wanted to work with [UK producer] Lostboy for ages, and he's helped a lot on this album. He's a really talented guy. It was him and Tom Mann. A lot of these songs started from guitar riffs. I think this is the one that set the tone of the production and the sonics of the album down to the vocal production—saturated, gritty, wide-open automated reverbs. That was really something that came around after 'Chemicals.' It's a really important song for the album.” -
“Would You”
James McVey: “I think 'Would You' was really interesting for me because I'm a big fan of John Mayer and the very early demo that Brad first put together made me think of John Mayer.”
Brad Simpson: “It started off on the Rhodes and then I knew that I wanted to have the verse and the pre-chorus really wide '80s atmospheric, and that's where the Rhodes and the electric really do it. I got the production to a place and then Tris dropped his sauce on top of it.”
Tristan Evans: “Little bit of seasoning, a little bit of spice.”
Brad Simpson: “I think we could do another album in a similar style to this. I wanted it to sound like Ryan Gosling in Drive. Really, really proud of this one.”
“Bitter”
Tristan Evans: “We were in LA and we were actually hanging out with [singer-songwriter] JHart. We were recording vocals for a song called 'Protocol' and we were kind of doing other odd bits and he came up and then I remember [we] just started jamming out 'Bitter.' I think it just came together really naturally and we kind of went back and forth.”
Brad Simpson: “'Bitter' was really, really close for ages, but it always was missing something, and then the four of us just went to the studio and were like, 'Should we just do gang vocals?' That was literally the thing that made it go from 90% to 100% finished.”
“Part of Me”
James McVey: “Even though it wasn't one of the first songs that was written for the album, it was one of the first times that we wrote something together that really helped steer us in a slightly different direction. I think this song is really important because of that, but also it captures a moment of bonding during this album cycle that I think we really needed. We rented a few Airbnbs and it was a case of turning up with all the equipment, shutting the door for a week, and not having anyone else involved in the music. It was the only real song that came from that.”
Brad Simpson: “I was listening to a lot of HAIM in like the six months leading up to the album, and this is just trying to rip off HAIM, basically.”
“Protocol”
James McVey: “I'm really into country music, so most of what I write on my own sort of skews to that genre. And we put a demo together that sounded slightly country. And then we went in just before the album needed to be submitted. Tristan booked a day at Metropolis just drumming on every single song, and he put live drums on 'Protocol.' And I think his take reinvented the whole song so much that we actually took everything out of the production. It's always amazing putting a song into the pot and seeing what you get on the other side.”
“Nothing But You”
Brad Simpson: “I went in to finish something with Lostboy and then just started working on something and had kind of the beginning of the chorus, which is like, 'Break into my new apartment and take the damn keys.' Having a super rhythmic melody means that you don't need to do that much because it carries through the song for us. And it's fun. It's just about giving your all to someone or giving someone everything and saying you can do as you wish, that feeling of falling in love and going like, 'You can take from me everything that you want.'”
“Treading Water”
Brad Simpson: “We went out to LA for a string of sessions but none of the songs ended up being right for us. I wrote it at the Standard Hotel in Hollywood, which we've had so many good memories at. I got back after a session and felt quite negative about a few things. It can be quite lonely being out there on your own. And then going into session day in and day out and not feeling like you're getting the songs that you want to get can be quite a demotivating thing. So this was just a moment of sitting in the hotel room, writing a song on acoustic, stripping it right back. It feels like the perfect end to the album because the last lyric is 'First off I'll work on me.' It's ending on that idea of not using that feeling as a negative one, not sitting in that negative space, but going, 'I've got to just work on this, not only for me, but for the people around me.' The album starts with 'Glory Days' and this really positive thing, and it ends similarly on a positive slant.” - source : Apple Music
