melodylane

MELODY LANE: First of all, also if it can sound a bit expected…Can you tell us where does the name Lucy In Blue come from?
LUCY IN BLUE: It was before we had played anywhere, still jamming over Em and A for hours on end, getting to know each other musically for the first time, properly. A lovely old lady lived next to Arnaldur‘s house, where we practiced, in his dad‘s old office, and she would sometimes pay a visit when we were practicing. She was of a most generous kind, and would come to listen to our half-formed songs before she left, and give us newly baked pastries and praise.In the youthful summer, the warm days would run past us like syrup running down an ill-balanced stack of pancakes. The old lady, who we won‘t name here but shall be referred to as Hveragerður for the purposes of this interview, kept coming to visit and loved to listen to us play while she bathed in the boiling sun. But one day, while Kolbeinn (drums) was on vacation in Vestmannaeyjar, she came to the house with distressing news. Her cat, Lucy, was lost. We gave her our condolonces and told her we‘d go out after rehearsal to look for the dear cat, but unexpectedly, Kolbeinn returned early and when he started playing his blue drumset, the little kitten suddenly jumped out of the drumset!

MELODY LANE: The line-up of the band is confirmed, is it the same from the beginning of the band…or have you had changes in the last years? Can you tell us something about the roots of Lucy In Blue? And where the band was born?
LUCY IN BLUE: The idea of forming a band started forming when Matthías and Arnaldur met at the start of Icelandic high-school/college and discovered their shared interests in music. They were keen on all sorts of vintage rock and pop music like Deep Purple, the Beatles and Black Sabbath, but were then introduced to the world of prog when Steinþór joined the fold. Steini and Matti knew each other from primary school, and the jams that unfolded in their practice space at Arnaldur‘s place, in 104, Reykjavík, had them desperately on the lookout for a drummer. Soon, Kolbeinn was found, actually playing with Arnaldur in a pop band called Unmusical Smooch Depot, and the line-up has stayed the same since then.

MELODY LANE: Can you list us 3 songs, from Lucy In Blue discography (including new material), that can define the sound of the band … 3 songs that can help our readers to know Lucy In Blue at the best.
LUCY IN BLUE:Well, to date we‘ve only released 14 songs, but with many stylistic directions. But the ones that give the clearest picture are probably Respire, Matricide and In Flight.

MELODY LANE: Tell us something about the creative process of your music. Is there a main composer or we can talk about a team work? The songs come from ideas of a single member and then the band works on these ideas in the studio jamming together, or your songs are written in the studio and all the members compose together?
LUCY IN BLUE: We generally work each song together, so that each member contributes something, but there are exceptions to this. Melodies and progressions are often written individually, away from practice, but then the mood and the groove of a song are constructed as a joint effort.

MELODY LANE: Who writes lyrics and words in Lucy In Blue? Can you tell us something about contents and messages of the lyrics of your songs?
LUCY IN BLUE: The one who writes the lyrics will remain anonymous for the time being. The lyrics deal with many things, fools and kings, but generally, love is the message.

MELODY LANE:  After time, are you totally satisfied with your choices about the sound and the writing of your old album Lucy In Blue? If you could… would you change anything?
LUCY IN BLUE: We are never totally satisfied, that‘s why we keep making music. We could change a thousand little details, but we‘d rather leave it as it is and use our time to write something new.

MELODY LANE:  Apart from the date you’re doing around Europe already scheduled, any chance for us to see Lucy In Blue playing live here in Italy in the next months/year? Maybe summer festivals? Have you ever played here in Italy? If yes could you talk about it…
LUCY IN BLUE: We haven‘t got anything planned, but we love Italy; pasta and passion, so if anyone wants to invite us over for a gig, we‘d be very interested.

MELODY LANE: Could you tell us two bands, from the actual international scene, you’d like Lucy In Blue  to tour with?... Two bands that would represent a perfect line-up for Lucy In Blue to play with. And why these bands?
LUCY IN BLUE: Kikagaku Moyo has the most interesting and captivating twist on psychedelic rock, so we‘d definitely tour with them. They can have a very hard edge when they want to, as well as hypnotizing the audience with softer songs, so their versatility could compliment us well. And Kruanghbin really cool too. They‘re all mellow yellow, while fantastically tight and exotic so together I think we could create a very dynamic and fun show with these two.

MELODY LANE: We know that ‘to define is to limit’… but how do you define Lucy In Blue sound? Are you a psychedelic  rock band…a prog band… a post rock band or…?
LUCY IN BLUE: We are a band, first and foremost, four young men creating something bigger than themselves. But the best categorization for the bulk of our material is psychedelic rock, though that might change.

MELODY LANE: Which musicians are/have been your main musical inspirations? And which are your favorite bands nowadays? 
LUCY IN BLUE: To begin with, we were heavily inspired by Pink Floyd and the prog giants of the ´70s. Gentle Giant, Genesis, King Crimson and Emerson, Lake and Palmer to name most of them, but also various acts from that era, like Black Sabbath, Frank Zappa and The Doors. These artists continue to inspire us but nowadays our favorites are wide-ranging; Kruanghbin, Mehldau/Guilana, Mac Demarco and Jonathan Wilson. But these are just our shared tastes, we have varied individual tastes, ranging from early 20th century impressionist and modern styles, many styles of extreme metal, folk and pop, modern electronic and house, bedroom pop, jazz and the list goes on and on. 

MELODY LANE: As a musician, what has been your biggest achievement to date and what do you want to achieve in the near future? 
LUCY IN BLUE: Out of all the things we‘ve accomplished together, which aren‘t many, they don‘t seem like anything compared to our constantly evolving musical bond. In the future we would like to be super rich and famous.

MELODY LANE: In the end…A message from you to all MELODY LANE readers.
LUCY IN BLUE: The moments that pass you by, night and day, and will continue to unfold to the collective unconscious, could be, in theory, infinitely richer. Not by increasing the consumption of external stimuli and material things, and not by chasing the words that chime in your head every day. Reality will not reach its full potential by spending the little time we have distracting ourselves, but by seeing the world for what it is, a boundless mystery, rich with ineffable love and beauty and forces unseen by the man who looks the world with ambivalence and contents himself with idleness. Thus, consciousness can be enriched, and so, the world.