Sons Of Sevilla deliver psychedelic soul from the mountains of Southern Spain to the plains of Austin Texas
“We made our first record in a shed,” explains Reuben Smith when talking about how he and his brother Henry came together to create the psychedelic soul band, Sons Of Sevilla, in there hometown of Featherstone, Yorkshire.
“We don’t sing about where we’re from,” says Henry. “The music escapes it. We’re trying very hard not to be an English indie rock band, because the world already has a lot of those. Instead, we’re trying to step into something else… and somewhere else.”
It’s pretty clear to see that they’ve achieved that goal when you listen to their music. Their sound is transportive — you’re carried away on a current of psychedelic instrumentals and atmospheric melodies. Whether it’s Henry using a glass bottle on his slide guitar or Rueben drawing inspiration from the reverb soaked sounds of the American South, Sons Of Sevilla create a sound that is both tropical and soulful.
Henry and Reuben spent countless hours in their parents’ family-owned pub in Britain. All that time indoors was a musical education for the brothers. It introduced them to songs by Buena Vista Social Club, Bob Dylan, Terry Reid, Neil Young, Gene Clark and others. In the summer, the family traveled to Spain and the city of Sevilla which opened the boys up to a new style of music. Years later, when they began recording their debut album, the brothers nodded to those summertime vacations abroad by naming the project “Sons of Sevilla.”
For their latest album, Street Light Moon, draw inspiration from the mountains of Southern Spain and steep it in the soul of Austin, Texas. Henry explains how the title of the album came about saying: “there was an old streetlight that was glowing in the rain through the window of my living room in our hometown of Featherstone. It was mistaken for a full moon after one too many.”
After that night, he shared the new title with Reuben who was composing their new single. When Henry learned that the opening line of the new single was “you’re outside the window,” they both new that the title fit and it was meant to be. With a name for lead single on the new album agreed, the brothers got to work writing the rest of the song on the sun on an old fishing trawler called ‘Albany’ of the coast of Gibraltar.
Head over to the Sons Of Sevilla Bandcamp page to pre-order Street Light Moon on vinyl (available in September).
