One-To-One with Little One ahead of new single 'The Habit'

There’s a number of influences that are all really apparent in your music - from folk to more modern electronica and post rock sounds, with a really nice ambient feel. Do you each bring a different element individually, or is this a pool that you are all collectively interested in?

Sean: It’s hard to say, we are all influenced by similar artists, we all love Radiohead for example, and Alt-J. Me and Sam really, really like folk music. Because some of our songs are written by different people, they all have a slight bit of a different flavour to them but I think when we all combine we all know each others role and we tend to play off each other which leads to a really collaborative piece that comes out.

Zach: Yeah, it doesn't matter which one of us writes the bones of it or whatever, when you bring it to the lads its always gonna go to places that you weren't expecting. Usually it’s for the better - no, it’s always for the better. 

John: We all bring our own individual elements, I bring too much reverb…. Sean will bring too much more reverb, Zach will bring more bass. Nah, just kidding, there’s never enough reverb! We’ve been playing for so long together that we understand each other and we’re able to critique each other.

Zach: Oh yeah, we will say if something isn't sounding right! We have our ways of being like ‘that’s not…. the best!’ 

You’ve all been playing together, excluding Rob, for 8 or 9 years now before coming together as Little One last year, so I guess that kind of familiarity is to be expected….

Zach: Yeah me, John, Sean and Sam have been playing together since school, since second year so we would have been about 14.

Sean: We’ve been through every phase you could imagine as a band, we’d be all ‘Aww we LOVE Thin Lizzy, we love rock’, and then one of us got a synth and we just thought synths were the best thing. But, yeah we went thorough every phase as a band you can go through growing up as teenagers. We had a collection of songs - scrapped them, had another collection of songs - scrapped them….. 

Zach: Yeah, we thought we were Gorillaz at one point when we got a synth, then we were like ‘lets start rapping!’ 

John: Yeah, at one stage Sam actually rapped on one of our songs! It was a bit of EVERYTHING. We even tried to pull some Cuban influences on some of the songs. We were the most messed up fusion and of all time. 

Zach: Funnily enough, back in the day we did do a cover of a rap tune mixed with a Strokes Tune. We did ‘Party and Bullsh**t’ by Biggie mixed with ‘Someday’, and yeah… it’s pretty special! Paul McGrath retweeted it!! And Nicky Byrne!! And Albert Hammond Jr.!! The guitar player from The Strokes retweeted it like!! And it was muck! 

Sean: It’s hard to believe that actually happened……

I guess you still carry some of the influences from all of the stages you went through, in some way. Like you were saying you thought you were Gorillaz, but you still have the electronica sound and the synth, you still have the folk and the post rock feels…..

John: Yeah, it’s there, its just more mature.

Sean: I think it was really a sense of trial and error really to see what worked and what didn’t, then eliminating what didn't work and really just getting down to what’s good about what we’re doing, and the melodies. 

Zach: Sometimes you can try and push something out too far, you can try to do something too hard and it just doesn't sound right, or it doesn't sound authentic, and you have to try and strip it back. That was a problem we had for a long time, we used to throw the kitchen sink at every song. But now we’ve learnt, well I hope so, to take it back. ‘L/0’ is very stripped back and, at one stage, that did have a lot more instrumentation to it but it just didn't work. 

It's a gorgeous song. Both of your singles so far are - you’ve had ‘Corner’ back in March with Catherine Smyth from Farah Elle and Vernon Jane, and you just released your second single ‘L/0’ with Faustina Finnerty of Pockets. So they're both collaborations with 2 different vocalists - is that something you plan to continue with? And how does that translate to your live show - or are you gonna do something like The Last Waltz each time with loads of special guests?!

Sean: To be honest, I think we are really influenced by artists like Gorillaz and Bonobo who just have this freedom, and we feel like we can have that freedom as well, to actually write songs in this way. It’s really exciting because we do love recording - it can be kind of tedious for bands, but I think its becoming a lot more of an enjoyable process for us now because we have that option, and it keeps it fresh. Who knows what will happen in the future, I think we’re just having fun, seeing what works and learning. With regards to live shows, we have Faustina as our session singer - the same as Bonobo works with featured artists but has one singer for his live shows. But, yeah, it would be nice to get Cat up singing again at some of our shows.

Zach: Cat used to be in the band actually, she was the original singer but when that didn’t work out and we went our separate ways, we really didn't want to get another full on member into the band. We were really happy to try to go down this road. We didn't know, maybe it wasn't gonna work. Maybe we’d do one or two singles and realise maybe it wasn't the way to go but we’ve a few things lined u now - about 2 or 3 new singles with different featured artists so we’re gonna stick with it for a while anyway. 

Well you're obviously doing something right, I mean, you just played at Glastonbury and you’re playing at Electric Picnic. How does it feel to get that level of recognition and to be playing such prominent festivals at such an early stage in your career? 

Sean: its obviously a childhood dream to get to do something like that, to play Glastonbury - it’s so so cool, it really is. It’s funny cos when people ask us about it we’re just like ‘Aww its amazing, its such a crazy festival’ and, not that I forget we were playing, cos obviously that was really really good fun but I think the whole experience of it was what I took from it, not just the playing.

Zach: Yeah, playing obviously is a huge thing, but everyone should experience Glastonbury. It’s really similar to Electric Picnic in so many ways but times 10 - its HUGE. Like, at Radiohead there was 95,000 people. 95,000!! Alone like! At one stage! Not even counting all the girlos who were at Major Lazer. I was tempted to sneak off to that actually. 

John: Yeah, Glastonbury is a real display of appreciation, you can see everyone at the crowd is really listening to the music and there was all ages at the gig.

Sean: Yeah ya can really see that in a festival, when the people are all just there to listen to the music. Some festivals, I don't want to drop any names, don't seem like the people are there for the music, so that was very humbling. 

John: And actually, its great playing a gig that none of your friends are at - now that sounds weird, but to see the people who had never heard you before and looking to see if they appreciate the music and seeing their heads bopping and you think ‘hmmm, not doing too bad!’ 

Zach: It is hard to gauge when you're playing a gig and 70%, if not more is made up of your friends and family! Ya get the obligatory ‘Great set lads, that was amazing, well done’ 

Well, you did play your first gig in London as well with Faustina, and I’m gonna presume all of your friends and family didn't fly over to see you so it must have been the same kinda vibe there?

Zach: Yeah, that was her first ever gig with us, it was great to have her over. It was a great weekend actually. We had a few cousins over there and stuff!!

Sean: Yeah, it was great though. I think that’s one of the greatest times in a band when you do something that’s completely new because a lot of your life growing as a band is just playing to your friends and so that fish out of water type of thing where you're put somewhere new is really exciting and it really motivates us. 

Well, I mean, we just heard your music as it came out, and that’s the first we heard of you at all! It’s not like we’re not friends of yours or anything and we were blown away, we loved it, so you’ve definitely got something special and you're more than capable of impressing a new audience! 

Sean: That’s the beauty of social media now, and it keeps getting bigger. It’s funny because you can actually see the stats on YouTube on where most listeners are and a lot the people are in Thailand!! For whatever reason that is! 

Zach: Yeah, ‘L/0’ is huge in Thailand!! We’ll have to do a world tour!! Or at least go over and play a few Thailand shows. In the first week it got 3,000 odd views and over 1,000 of them were from Thailand. Sam is actually French and he’s got a lot of connections in Paris so I think that’s where we’d love to go next. That would be awesome, I’d love to just get out into Europe and get away from the Dublin scene a little bit - which is great, but you do end up playing the same venues over and over again and to the same audience - or the same friends and family! - Over and over again!

We think that bit might change a little bit for yas, you’ll be garnering a much bigger audience now, I mean you played Glastonbury! I’m sure your mates weren't just ringing up going ‘Hello Glastonbury? Little One are deadly, will you put them on’! 

John: Haha yeah true! Thanks very much - it does seem to be going somewhere. 

Sean: I think we’re just really enjoying it now, every time we get a chance to release something it just motivates us so much. I think ‘L/0’ is really nice because of the video as well; we had a lot of fun making it. 

John: Also - a nice thing about it - do you want a little maths lesson now?! - It’s called L over Zero because the whole point of the song is that love is undefined and, in maths, anything that’s divided by zero is undefined. 

Zach: The background there is that John is a physicist and Sam is a computer linguist and they’re both doing PHD’s in UCD…. We don't sit around looking all this stuff up…. the rest of us are all just ‘ah yeah, grand!’ 

John: It was the happiest moment of my Little One life with this song! That’s when I decided I’d never leave the band - where’s the line? Where do I sign? 

You released 2 singles in very quick succession this year, and I believe you have a few more in the pipeline already – “The Habit” is coming out later this month. Tell us a bit about that….

Zach: Yeah, we’ve another single, ‘The Habit’ coming out later this month – on the 23rd – so we’re excited for that. There’s a pretty cool video to go with it as well, which was produced Sal Stapleton of Bad Bones, and who’s really blowing up at the min. We’re having a launch night for it then on November 3rd in Tramline, which we’re really looking forward to as well -it’s a super cool venue and the sound system is SICK!! Things are gonna get messy that night! We have SYLK and Susie-Blue supporting us as well, which is going to be unreal. Susie-Blue are coming all the way from Derry so that’s class! It’s nice for us because “The Habit” is actually the first song we ever recorded as a band. It kinda shaped the future direction then for us, as it was the first time we had wanted to work with a female vocalist, and to collaborate with an artist out side of the band at all. Alannah Hewitt sings on it and she’s incredible. She’s been on the road as part of James Vincent McMorrow’s band – and she was on Later… With Jools Holland with that.

So are you going to keep banging out the singles or can we hold out any hope for an album in the future?

Sean: It’s funny because, the thing about it is, as we just record in Sam's garage, the recording equipment is always there so it’s always an option for us to record. The cost and tediousness of trudging out to a studio is eliminated. I think we’re looking now to start writing some more songs, because the songs we’ve been recording have been there for a while. I think we’ll grow more as long as we keep writing. Recording of course at the same time, but I think it would be cool if some of these were just taken for an album maybe in the future.

We’ll keep an eye out for one in the future so! And finally, where can we keep up to date with all things Little One?

Facebook is probably the best place - or Instagram. Twitter isn't as strong but its there. Spotify as well! And Bandcamp!! We’re everywhere!! 

Little One release their new single “The Habit” on October 23rd with a launch in Tramline, Dublin Nov 3rd. Admission €5 and it’s over 18’s.