In this week’s The Album Story feature, PVRIS' Lyndsey Gunnulfsen opens up about the making of her new album ‘EVERGREEN’ in this extract from the latest edition of Rock Sound.
Want to read the full interview? Pick up your copy of Rock Sound issue 299 along with an exclusive PVRIS t-shirt and green ‘EVERGREEN’ cassette right here.
Read PVRIS, ‘EVERGREEN’ | The Album Story below.
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“Sorry in advance if there is a really loud bird in the background…”
PVRIS’ Lyndsey Gunnulfsen laughs as she wanders through her scenic surroundings, the view from her phone screen enveloped by the trees of a summery Massachusetts as she returns home for a brief period of respite between tour dates ahead of the release of her new album – the equal parts electric and ethereal ‘EVERGREEN’.
This woodland interview setting is certainly appropriate as the whole album campaign, from the headless artwork to the music videos, seems grounded firmly in the natural world, albeit with a somewhat morbid twist; images of death and destruction wrapped in foliage.
This contrast carries over into the record’s musical aims too as the album falls into two clear sides – an impactful opening half of heavy riffs and bouncy bangers followed by a series of more introspective cuts, built on chilled out, electronic soundscapes.
“It’s finding ways to put a fresh spin on a more organic sound with live instruments” Lyndsey explains. “Then doing the opposite with the ‘side B’ of the album which has a lot more natural sounds but is actually a lot more synthesised and processed. It’s putting things in the opposite context and still getting the same type of feeling evoked or sound created.”
“It happened very naturally” she continues. “It wasn’t really a conscious choice. A few people on my team had noticed it and proposed that idea and I was like no, we can’t limit it to that structure. Let’s just keep making the best songs we can. But it naturally just did take that progression and shape. It makes sense because the start of that album is this very sterile, stark feeling. It feels like you are in this kind of machine. But by the end of the album, it frees you of that. Feels like it opens up. It’s these two worlds I feel kind of torn between – and I’m sure a lot of people do to – which is keeping up with the race but then also looking around and noticing it doesn’t feel good and wanting to escape from it.”
As we chat, Lyndsey is fresh from her storming appearance at Slam Dunk Festival, a sort of homecoming for the performer who always keeps that live reaction in mind when writing but was nonetheless taken aback by just how strong the reception has been in this new era.
“Every time we come over I’m like ‘maybe this time it won’t work’. I’m just setting up expectations for anything. But it felt really good and seemed like a good reaction. It’s kind of hard to hear sometimes on stage but I was watching videos back after and I was definitely surprised, in a good way.”
“I’m just always mentally preparing for something to go wrong” she laughs. “I’m just trying to avoid extreme disappointment constantly. I always walk in thinking that if nothing happens, that’s ok too. So when there is a good reaction it is obviously very appreciated and welcomed.”
Previous album ‘Use Me’ saw Lyndsey not only stretch her capabilities as a producer and experiment with further electronic soundscapes, it was also the first PVRIS release to come from a major label, a situation that was not without its challenges.
“We went in with the knowledge and expectation that it could go either way – very well, very bad, somewhere in the middle. I think that entire album process was very much about sticking to our guns and not folding to what a major label wanted, which I think in some ways helped, in some ways didn’t. But it was an interesting test of all branches of PVRIS. There was definitely a lack of support in some departments – it is what it is, it’s fine now. But in this chapter I really wanted to focus on fan connection and the value of that and again just sticking to our guns creatively. Having a team that actually supports that and backs that.”
‘Use Me’ was released back in the summer of 2020, just as the covid outbreak forced artists to find new and creative ways of maintaining that audience connection from afar. For PVRIS, that meant looking back in order to move forward, revisiting their first two albums, 2014’s ‘White Noise’ and 2017’s ‘All We Know Of Heaven, All We Need Of Hell’, in a pair of livestream shows, performing a handful of those albums’ deeper cuts for the very first time. A hit with fans for sure, but how did exploring those older eras once again affect their future plans?
“That’s a great question. I think it was a good check in with where I’m at now, in terms of what I want to communicate lyrically but also sonically and production-wise. It was a good assessment of what is working and what feels good to be doing. Taking those notes and moving forward with them and then making something with that.”
But in moving forward, Lyndsey still took with her the elements of PVRIS that have always resonated, ‘EVERGREEN’ balancing the original sound that made those early records a success with the additional musical exploration seen on ‘Use Me’. The result is a more modern, 2023-led take on what the band has been about all along.
“Thank you for saying that because I’ve always seen that through line and thought it made sense” she agrees. “I felt like I had to defend that for some reason. This album was very much about figuring out how to continue using those elements but just highlight them in different ways. Or find a way to reverse engineer something.”
She points to the track ‘HYPE ZOMBIES’ as a particularly good example of this. “It’s really heavy but initially it started as a synth guitar – not even a real guitar, just on Logic – with a hip hop drum kit. I made it really fast and then we built and put live instruments over it. But the DNA feels very synthetic and processed and it was supposed to stay that way. It still gets that high-energy aggression across. ‘ANIMAL’ is kind of like that too – the first thing you hear is not a guitar, it is a synth but you still get that aggression that you would get from a distorted guitar.”
‘ANIMAL’ also features percussion that sounds like it could have emanated from a processed hip hop kit but was actually created using live drums that were then split up into samples to create this illusion. This attention to detail has always been part of Lyndsey’s process but this time, she focused on “being more intentional with space and each sound that is being used, not just stacking a bunch of sounds on top of each other. Being a bit more restrained with the amount of sounds being used and knowing that sometimes less can be more and more impactful. That was a big thing with a lot of the more high-energy songs – there is actually less than there is in the softer ones.”
“Another focus was on making sure every part of the track has something memorable and hooky to it that you can either sing in the kitchen while you are goofing around or sing live at the show. Something that sticks and that you remember, whether you are conscious of it or not.”
This mission is certainly evident across the album’s singles; ‘GODDESS’ places cooing vocals over a driving bass riff and the meme-ready statement that she is ‘a motherfucking brand’ while ‘GOOD ENEMY’ encourages shouts of ‘hey, hey, hey’ across descending synths and an easy-to-chant central riff. Then there is the album opener, ‘I DON’T WANNA DO THIS ANYMORE’, which immediately hits the listener with an a capella layered vocal before giving way to bubbling beats and that highly relatable title lyric on repeat.
“It came from a place of looking at the world and seeing how we are operating” says Lyndsey on the track’s inspiration. “We move really fast, everything is pretty much instant. We’re expected to create in that same format, whether you are in music or any form of entertainment. That’s just how we are operating now and it doesn’t fell conducive to how we are supposed to work as people. It is really about that – how fast can we keep going until this completely crashes? We are seeing examples of that the older and older we are getting. So it is kind of about not wanting to participate in that. And just being exhausted by the internet and the world and capitalism…and everything.”
“The chorus to me is hilarious. And it’s kind of supposed to be” she adds. “The whole song feels like there is this tension happening so when you get to the chorus you want this big payoff and then it’s just ‘I don’t wanna do this anymore’. It feels like a big sigh.”
As much as the chorus brings some levity to the track, when the song title was revealed you could forgive the fans for any nervous speculation – did ‘EVERGREEN’ ever feel like it could be the final PVRIS release?
“A little bit of that. I wouldn’t say the last PVRIS record ever but this release felt like all or nothing. Again, with the themes of that song, I just didn’t feel like I can keep up with where music is right now and was questioning my space in it and what I wanted to contribute to music. I had to really strip that back and just get to the core of it and realise ‘ok, you are on earth to make music and make something for people to connect to. So just do that the best you can and if it works, it works’ then assess from there. So it felt like a final release in a sense but it was more just that I have to do what feels right and what I feel compelled to make.”
Read the full interview inside issue 299 of Rock Sound, available to order now.
