Luke Branch from Asylums about what influenced him when writing their new album 'Alien Human Emotions'
“At the start of the second album writing cycle we all wanted to move in a different direction musically, ‘Killer Brain Waves’ (2016) is a very cohesive album and the world didn’t need a carbon copy of it.”
MEDITATION
In a very real way we all experienced some kind of existential crisis late 2016 / early 2017 which affected us in different ways emotionally. The world was changing around us and for many months I watched news reports with my mouth hanging open in disbelief, I began practicing transcendental meditation to soothe stress and depression in my personal life and for the first time I felt something was helping me gain perspective.
SPACE
In dreams I became obsessed with leaving the planet to live on a space station…….to watch the world from afar….…I had Nasa live streams on while writing songs and that subsequently re ignited a passion for some science fiction films I love. 2001 Space Odyssey, Moon, Alien, Gravity.
JAZZ
For the first half of 2017 I wrote constantly, songs of all shapes and sizes…..Jazz would pop over often and develop and refine ideas, something was emerging but we were not sure what it was sure what it was.
INFLUENCES & RECORDING
After Reading Festival 2017 we destroyed our equipment and returned home full of rage. I moved my studio up into the attic of my house and made a mood board of influences that had been lurking in my subconscious.
………Bowie, Nasa, Space, Isolation, Depression, Spirituality, KLF, Sci Fi, Nomophobia, Social & Political Implosion, Barbara Kruger, The Moon, Hawkwind, The Flaming Lips, The Earth as an implanted memory…
Two weeks later the album was demoed. Two months later it was recorded.
Killer Brain Waves was for our minds, Alien Human Emotions is for our souls
