The Inspiration That Drives Red Vanilla to Create Unforgettable Sound
By. Alicia Zamora
Alicia’s Studio gets on Zoom with the band Red Vanilla to talk about their latest EP, their passion for music, and future work
A Conversation with Red Vanilla
Red Vanilla(Anna) : We are Anna And George from Red Vanilla We’re an alternative rock band from Dundee in Scotland, uh.. We’re very new to the scene but we just released our first single from our debut EP, uh.. It’s very exciting times. [Red Vanilla(George) : Absolutely.]
Alicia : Okay, and what made you start this band?
Red Vanilla(Anna) : I think just.. A proper passion for music. We’ve always loved rock bands ourself. We grew up on that kind of music, and we watched tour diaries and you know documentaries about your favorite bands, and you think I just wanna do that. It’s- It’s really great.
Alicia : And then the name Red Vanilla, is that something you guys always had in mind? Or did you guys just- Got that out of like the blue?
Red Vanilla(Anna) : It was kinda just um.. A random- We needed a name, we were panicking about it. We were like let's think of “what sounds nice” and we just came with Red Vanilla and that’s us.
Alicia : Okay, cool. And then like the type of music you guys make, how would you describe it?
Red Vanilla(George) : I would say it’s uh.. It’s Alternative Rock, and it’s uh.. 90’s inspired for sure. But, uh..the production side of things when we went in, to record the EP, um.. The- Our producer.. uh.. produced his own band, To Kill Achilles, so he um..He does like modern metal stuff, it’s what he specializes in, and um.. He said to us “Do you want me to produce this like a 90’s um- album?” We were like “No, um..we want you to produce this like a modern metal EP.” So, even though the songs are 90’s stuff, the production side of things is like that modern metal. With the huge drums and stuff like that, so- But, obviously it’s not a lot of metal because of the pop songs themselves [Anna: Yeah.] But, the production side of things is just- Is uh- Yeah, something we’re quite proud of.
Alicia : Okay, and speaking on the creative process..How does that look like for you guys?
Red Vanilla(Anna) : Um.. It typically start off with- We’re- The- Kind of- W- We start the songs, we write the guitar parts; I write all the lyrics and melodies and then once we have a fully structured song, that’s when we take it to the other guys and they put drums and the base parts over them. It’s kinda the same every time really. It works pretty well.
Alicia : And do you guys take inspiration from any artist?
Red Vanilla(Anna) : Uh.. Yeah, for sure. I mean I myself grew up listening to Paramore, so they’re always a massive one for me, um.. Also Will Fallece I think [George : Will Fallece, yeah.] *inaudible* band, um.. I’m quite into my *inaudible* band, so I take a lot of inspo from- Yeah. These two in particular, but also like Foo Fighters, Nirvana, Pixies, style. You know?
Alicia : And if it wasn’t for music right now, what would you guys think you would be doing?
Red Vanilla(George) : Nothing. I- I-
Red Vanilla(Anna) : Yeah.. It would probably be awful. *laughs*
Red Vanilla(George) : Yeah. I can’t- I can’t imagine life without doing the music stuff to be honest.
Red Vanilla(Anna) : Yeah. It’s- It’s genuinely the only thing in life that we’re focused on, and that we care about, and we go to work to make money, to fund it. But, other than that this is- This is definitely it for us. *chuckles*
Alicia : Nice. And opening shows..Do you guys have any artist that you guys would like to open for in the future?
Red Vanilla(Anna) : My answer is always, Will Fallece [George (overlapping) : Yeah. Yeah. For sure.] for this. That’s like for sure. Um, there’s a band in- From Edinburgh called Swim School and they’re totally up and coming. They’ve done some amazing stuff throughout the past couple years. And, we’ve loved them from ages and ages.. Very much inspired by them; would love to open for Swim School one day as well.
Alicia : Okay. And do you guys plan on doing any showcases soon?
Red Vanilla : (George) :Yeah (Anna) : Uh, yeah. (George) : We’ve got a headliner booked.
Red Vanilla(Anna) : We do, um.. Yeah we’re hopefully gonna have some shows around the summer. We’re kinda looking into sorting that out just now. Um- Closer to Ep release time but, yeah the big one’s gonna be our Dundee headliner. Our hometown show, it’ll be June the 8th [(George) : Yup.] Yeah, the day after EP release.
Alicia : *chuckles* And then for the new release of the single.. How long did that take you guys to create?
Rede Vanilla (George) : So we.. The- The EP itself is uh.. (Asking Anna) I think we can say how many tracks are on it can’t we? [Anna : Yeah.] Yeah. The uh.. There’s uh..seven songs on it. So it’s quite a long EP um.. So we spent like- We spent maybe a couple of months recording it, um..And then it just- It was probably about- A total of a year when it really came back to back and forth with mixing.. And sorting out various different things so it’s been- It’s been really really hard work, Um..but- We’ve- We think we finally reached a level with it where- We- We think it’s perfect- With- Yeah, we worked so hard on it so…
Alicia : Okay. Looking forward to that *chuckles* And then for inspiration wise.. What was the inspiration behind All These Better Things?
Red Vanilla (Anna) : Um.. Lyrically it’s pretty much about..The negative affect unwanted opinions have on you, um.. Being a new band, and trying to just find our way and- And- Figure out how to do this; there’s so many people that come up to you and tell you that “you’re not doing something right” or “If I were you I would do this” or “I would do that.” It’s so frustrating people giving me their opinions about your song, about your lifestyle, and it’s people that- They don’t know half as much as you do, they’ve never been in a band, or you know if they have, they’ve never gone anywhere with it. And it’s- It really gets to us um.. I mean we don’t- We don’t let it get us down. We don’t let it stop us from doing anything, but the song is basically just me talking about that; the frustration that comes along with that. Um..yeah.
Alicia : And, what would you guys say is the most difficult thing while being in a band?
Red Vanilla : (George) : I would say.. Like, the vast majority of bands don’t fail, they breakup. Um..And like, there’s- There’s some bands we can think of um.. That have broken up recently and it’s really sad. It still makes me sad thinking about it. So, it's not difficult for us to be honest, like we get on so well uh.. Which is fantastic, but that’s- That’s gotta be the biggest thing in a band, it’s like you have to be able to get on. [Anna : Yeah.] Uh..And you..You just need certain people like; Anna and I sorta lead stuff, and then we have fantastic band members who are like, up for anything and they’re like “Yeah we’re happy to go with that.” Were as you just can’t have..everybody wanting to lead. It just doesn’t work like that cause otherwise it doesn’t go anywhere.
Red Vanilla (Anna) : I think as well there’s um.. Like a lot of..frustration. Sometimes it kinda gets you down a bit when you're really trying your best to do what you know you’re good at. And- Like- But people make you feel like you can’t talk about that. So it’s like if you say “oh I feel like I’m a really good musician; I feel like my band is really great.” It’s like that’s a bit cringe, that’s a bit embarrassing. And people will ask you about your work situation and it’s like; I work in hospitality, I don’t care about my job. But they think your work defines you, rather than what your passion is, you know. So I would say that, that’s sometimes tough; that you’re not maybe taken seriously when you’re trying..really hard on something.
Alicia : Yeah no, I get that. *chuckles* Do you guys have any advice for.. Like upcom- Like new artist or people who are trying to form bands, like anything you wanna say?
Red Vanilla (George) : I would say.. Like the most important thing before anything, I mean it’s not- It’s not- It depends what the person wants to do. Like it they wanna have fun, then just write some songs, meet up with some people, find them online; nowadays it’s the best way of doing that, you don’t have to find them in person. And just have fun with it, but if you’re wanting to be serious and actually make it, then uh.. Obviously that’s what we’re trying to do, then the first thing that has to happen is the songs have to be good. Like the music itself has to be good, and then the rest will come pretty easily after that um.. But yea, if the songs aren’t good, the band’s just not going anywhere. There’s no getting around that. creating
Alicia : Okay, and then going back to like creating- The creative process, when you guys are creating a song, have you guys ever made a song that just doesn’t really fit with what you’re looking for, and just throw the whole track away? *chuckles*
Red Vanilla : Yeah definitely we’ve had that. (Anna) : Um.. Yeah there’s times that we’ll work on something and we’ll spend months coming back to rehearsal like “oh should we- should we give the song another go?” and then it just doesn’t- It just doesn’t work. [George : Yeah it just doesn’t work.] But- Yeah. I think- I think every band experiences that throughout their entire life in music.
Alicia : Okay, and then, with the interview coming to end.. I wanted to say Thank You and Congrats for your new single. Can we expect any new single, can we expect any new projects, any new releases or maybe anything dropping any time soon?
Red Vanilla (Anna) : Yeah, absolutely. So we’re spacing the single releases out, there's six months- Six weeks. Sorry. Between each one um.. So April 9th I believe we’ve got our second single coming out um.. And then we’ll have the third one.. And then the EP on June the 7th like we say, uh.. We’ll have a couple music videos and various different types of content, and hopefully some gigs as well centered around those so yeah, Thank You so much. George : Yeah Thank You so much! Anna : Congrats.
Alicia : Thank You guys. I’m gonna go ahead and send it to you guys when I’m done editing and formatting it. And yeah that would be- *chuckles* Thank You so much.
Red Vanilla : (George) : Thank You very much! (Anna) : Thank You! Appreciate it! (George) : Thank You for your time. (Anna) : Take Care! (George) : Thank You.