Say that when recording Hunger for a Way Out, Lira Mondal and Caufield Schnug, of the post-punk duo Sweeping Promises, almost threw in the towel. You can hear it in the recording, even believes Caufield, who describes it as the “album of poverty.” But at the same time, I felt completely free while recording, in this studio where we weren’t even supposed to be, at a time in our career when we had accepted that we were a total failure. ” Surprise ! The rock world has finally listened to them, and another excellent album later, they will be in concert at the Sala Rossa, as part of the Taverne Tour.
Really, was the end of music after this first album? “We knew it was over. But we were wrong! » says Caufield at the end of the camera, sitting next to Lira, who bursts out laughing. “We had been making music for a dozen years,” says Caufield. We were at what, nine bands Already ? “Something like that, yes,” Lira assesses. I think Lira and I always wanted to make music, but no one understood it. »
“When we got there, our only goal was to make the music that we liked at that moment,” says Lira, remembering that time, late 2019, early 2020, when the couple moved to Boston. Caufield: “We were making music between us and for us, quite simply. »
Caufield was then trying to finish his doctorate in the history and practice of art criticism at Harvard (where he also took some French classes, but Lira speaks it even better), and Lira was studying music: “I remember that while finishing writing an essay for my classes or finishing my shift at the restaurant, we would meet at the local café for a cold brew, then we would walk to the studio to bang out a song. Afterwards, we went home by bus, in the cold…”
That said, we listen Hunger for a Way Out (2020), then Good Living Is Coming for You (released last summer), and we can’t help but believe that Caufield and Lira had never stopped dreaming (note the change of attitude in the titles of the two albums). Sweeping Promises has this gift of composing songs full of pep and hope: it’s rock, garage-ish, post-punk in its rhythm, aesthetically lo-fi, but the melodies and choruses fool no one : it’s some damn good pop, as we’ll say that the Ramones also had this flair for catchy choruses.
Lira exclaims: “The other day, in the car on the way home, Caufield put My Brain Is Hanging Upside Down (Bonzo Goes to Bitburg) [des Ramones, tirée d’Animal Boy, 1985] ; She is so glorious! The totally passionate vocals, the harmonies, the message of the song — it’s punk, but also accessible. » Caufield continues: “In my opinion, there is not that big a difference between this la pop and, say, the noize. In fact, I would even say that pop is a subgenre of noize. A hook in a song, a chorus, can change the perception of a song, regardless of its musical genre. »
As for this love of pop, “I think it simply comes from our affection for what sounds good,” replies Lira. We like good melodies, catchy songs, no matter the musical genre.” When you first listen to a Sweeping Promises record, you immediately think of the B-52’s, because of Lira’s voice, the choruses and the velocity of the rhythms. B-52’s energetic, but rough, knowingly corrosive, in the lo-fi spirit, although less raw than on the first album, recorded with a single microphone in this shady Boston studio.
Turn your passion into a profession
Good Living is Coming for You was instead recorded in their new home studio from Lawrence, Kansas, less than an hour from Kansas City, “with 300% more microphones,” laughs Lira. Emerging from poverty thanks to a critically acclaimed first album (just like the second, released by Sub Pop), the couple managed to turn their passion into a profession.
“What changed between the two albums? We’re older, first of all, says Caufield. When we were in our twenties, we were languishing in the bottom of the cellar of buzz bands, crouching in the trenches of indie rock. A few rare times a journalist was interested in us, or we received an invitation to play at a festival. In this context, it is difficult to have a career perspective, since there is nothing to plan. We were getting poorer, it was depressing, music had become a second jobbut at the same time, we were very involved in the rock community” of Boston, a formative period for these two musicians who found in the student town of Lawrence the community spirit and do-it-yourself (DIY) of the Boston scene.
“We’ve been trying so hard to be part of a scene, for so long,” Lira says. Caufield has been playing in bands since he was a teenager, me since middle school; once we got to Boston, we made contacts, we participated in the scene, because that’s how communities develop. I’m happy to have experienced this, in Boston, which I consider the toughest music scene in the country, if only because it’s so expensive to live there. It gave meaning to what we were doing. »
Good Living is Coming for You by Sweeping Promises is sold on the Feel It Records/Sub Pop label; the duo will be in concert Friday evening at Sala Rossa with Feeling Figures and Dana.