“In music, you must go with everything at 100%, because otherwise there are a gazillion people in the waiting line, especially in an industry like this.”
Published on the 1st of April, 2023
Caleb, Eric, Seth, Will, and Guy from left to right.
The Moontown Project is a band from Leeds. It all started as a duo that Will Swain-Smith and Guy Molony created. Will’s upbringing was centered around words and poetry as opposed to sound, as his mom was a writer. Guy had a more music-centered childhood as his mom sang and his dad played the piano. The music that these two fellas created could be categorized as experimental Indie Rock from the outer space. Three years later, The Moontown Project is no longer a duo. Seth Oraeki brings the soulful voice, Caleb Flood plays the drums like a bastard, and Eric Dimmack provides the infinite grooves. With these recent additions to the band their sound has evolved.
Eric, Will, Guy, Seth, and Caleb from left to right.
On the 13th of May 2022, we had the chance to talk with the boys and spend a whole day with them at the Bookhouse studios in London, whilst they were recording their new songs using live tracking technology. It was a day well spent and we had a blast. A big thank you to The Moontown Project and Stogey Records team. We hope you enjoy reading this interview.
We recommend you have The Moontown Project’s Spotify open by your side while reading the interview so that you can listen to any of the songs mentioned if wanted.
Guy.
Hey Guy and Will. How did you meet and form the duo?
Guy: We used to play in a band when we were in school called Lily and The Caves, which was our introduction to doing gigs and performing. In a certain way, Will and I complemented each other skills and abilities. After the old band broke up, we went to the New Forest and did a bit of soul-searching while on loads of mushrooms. We just walked around the forest and looked at the moon. It looked like there was a town on the moon, so that is how the name came to us.
Will: Adding to that, once our old band terminated, we had no plan, no alias, and no name. The beautiful thing about The Moontown Project is that Guy and I had an infinite amount of time to sit down and think about what sound we wanted to make.
When did music get into your life?
Seth: Music has always been a very big part of my life. My father was a worship leader in our local church. That is where I first got introduced to musical instruments and to singing in the choir. I remember I would wake up every single morning at 7 am and mad jazz music was playing downstairs, while my father was just getting ready for the day.
Caleb: Music got into my life when I was around 4 years old. My dad is a drummer, and he had an electronic drum kit. I used to go up at night and have a go at it. He saw that I took an interest in it, so he got me some lessons with this hippie guy called Mick who taught me drums. From a young age, I knew music was what I wanted to do. Since I saw the drum kit, I never really wanted to do anything else. My dad was always the one that willingly pushed me into it.
Eric: As a kid, I spent a lot of time at live events because my father is a backline technician. So, I spend a lot of time at festivals, outside of the stage watching people playing.
What are your musical influences?
Will: We love Air and Jungle. When we first discovered them, they hadn’t revealed their identities yet. Jungle didn’t reveal who they were until they were huge. Sometimes it is easy to fall in love with that side of it and forget that what you are doing is music. I see a lot of people forgetting that it is not you that you are plugging. It is your business, your paintings, or your music. Air was the same. Who knows who the fuck they are. But their music is incredible.
Guy and Will from left to right.
Guy.
Will and Guy, you used to live in London. Why did you choose Leeds over London?
Guy: London was just crazy because we were working so much, it didn’t give us enough time to do creative stuff. By the time we finished working, all the creativity had been sucked up. So, we decided to make the move up to Leeds. There, we were studying for three years, while we were getting paid for it.
Will: We don’t write about conceptual stuff. We write about things that happened to us. In London, we were working so much, that we hardly got to spend any time with each other, and nothing was happening in our lives that was interesting enough to write about. We wanted to pick somewhere where we could have a quality of life that would give us ammunition to sort of write songs about our experiences.
Your first EP was a collaboration with Bone Slim. How did you find the Mask On The Moon sound?
Guy: We didn’t think too much. I think I had got a new synthesizer. We made a lot of those beats on a Native Instruments Maschine. So, we fired those to Bone Slim, who then jumped onto them. After that, he brought us into the studio where he recorded with Robbie Barlow, who is now our engineer and almost the 6th member of the band.
Will: I think a lot of it stems from mutual respect. Usually, as a producer if you work with a rapper there is always a dominant voice. It is either the rapper being like: “You do this way for me” or the producer being like: “I have put this track and you do this my way for me”. And I think because we mutually respected each other as artists, we respected our differences. It is easy to respect the similarities and respect where it is cohesive. We left him to do his thing, in his way, in what was relevant to him in the creative process, and vice versa. The last thing we wanted to do was to put any sort of restraints on Bone because he is such a creative. Watching him in the creative space with us, made me respect Bone even more.
Will, Caleb, Eric, Seth, and Guy from left to right.
How was producing this record with Bone Slim?
Guy: Bone Slim understands how you structure a song in terms of the arrangement, how-to section it, and how to build up the energy. He knows how to make a song. And even if you haven’t necessarily got the knowledge of the actual settings to go to, your compressors, your hardware, stuff like that, he will know the sort of sound. He can very easily describe what he wants in a way that a producer can understand, and that is why he can work with so many different producers.
Will: I think that as an artist, the more people you work with, the better you are as a musician. It is a bit like football. As a footballer, if you play for one club your whole career and you got a certain set of ideas and you play with certain players and you learn with those players, but as a footballer, when you move clubs, and you work for a different manager, you learn a new set of ideas, you play with different players, and you take different things from different players. That is how you become a complete player. Music is kind of similar.
How do you manage to work and have this project?
Guy: We always say we have two jobs. And most people that we know that make music these days also work two jobs. I work in theatre. I put sets together and do carpentry work in theaters. Now, I sort of have three/four days a week where I will be working, and the other ones will be dedicated to music. We will get home from shifts late at night, maybe midnight, work until five in the morning and then wake at nine and go to work. Sometimes it is a lot and you do burn yourself out, but it doesn’t feel like work.
Will: I think we prefer to be busy, me personally. I work in a venue with Eric. I am the best cocktail bartender in the whole of Leeds, possibly Europe. At this stage, having another job and another responsibility helps you motivate yourself to not give up on music. In music, you must go with everything at 100%, because otherwise there are a gazillion people in the waiting line, especially in an industry like this.
In 2020 you did an Archives Collection Session with Bone Slim. What do you think would suit The Moontown Project the best: a COLORS SHOW or an NPR Tiny Desk Concert?
Eric: I would rather do a COLORS SHOW because I would like to see Seth in front of a nice mic, just singing to the track. Because the thing is I feel like Seth doesn’t get as much focus on just his voice sometimes. I would love to see him, just do a COLORS where is just Seth on Will and Guy, where he can shine and be the focus.
Archive Collection Session.
“Yellow Walls” by Bone Slim and The Moontown Project.
Your single “Moon Honey” featured Archie Weir’s production. What is so special about this track?
Will: What is so special about “Moon Honey” is that it is the closest that we got to the perfect sound. We are proud of everything that we have made, but it was the first example of something we were proud of, and that we knew the world would like. For “Moon Honey” I was like: “I know that the world is going to love it”.
With “Mademoiselle” you had a more disco and funky approach. It got me dancing.
Will: It is important to hear you say that because that was the objective. With “Moon Honey” we got feedback saying: “It is groovy, we like it, it is more dancy”. Right, how can we make the next one dancy categorically? Part of our aim is to bring the fun back into gigs. We feel like the gigs are too controlled. You go into the gig, you pay too much money. You go there, you get rinsed by security at the door, drinks are very expensive, and everybody goes out after the gig. Back in the day, you go out to the gig, and you came home late from the gig. We wanted to make it like that again. Part of that process was us looking at our potential set and thinking that we wanted a song where everybody dances, goes crazy, and loses their inhibitions.
You worked with a marketing company to release “Moon Honey” and “Mademoiselle”. Was it worth it?
Guy: It is crazy. There is so much music, that you can make what I think is such a good song and it still doesn’t get to the right audience. But when it does people are very receptive. So, we found that when we have stuff pushed, especially with “Moon Honey”, the engagement was really good, considering the people it got to. They gave us sort of a reinforcement that if we get the song to the right people, which marketing helps with, it just allows you to get the results you want.
How did the current band get together?
Seth: Guy and Will’s communication skills are crazy. I have never seen two boys that are so good at networking. These boys will go to a random bunch of people, not know who they are and just have a full 50-minute conversation with them. Caleb studied with Guy at Leeds Conservatoire, where Eric and I are also studying. They had done some stuff beforehand, but Caleb wasn’t necessarily part of The Moontown Project. Then I came into the picture. When we wanted to start performing and doing live shows it meant that we needed an established drummer and bassist. When Will met Eric, as they work in the same venue, the band was all set. That is when the entire thing of Caleb, Eric and me came to life.
Eric.
Where do you think The Moontown Project sound is heading?
Seth: I think that Moontown has now gone into a new age, with a new sound. It means that Moontown can now collab, and do stuff with different artists, that maybe Will and Guy couldn’t have collaborated with beforehand, purely just because they didn’t have an RnB and Neo-Soul type sound. Because my voice is in that category, it now opens up a lot more doors.
Today and yesterday, you were recording new music in a studio in London. Why did you decide to live-track your music?
Will: Our engineer Robbie said that live there is a certain sound that we couldn’t capture as of yet in a studio. We want to find a way and a means of recording to capture what we would manage to sound in a live show. That is why we were live-tracking a lot of stuff today and yesterday.
Do you think The Moontown Project sounds the best on digital tracks or live concerts?
Eric: I would say that is a funny question. The digital stuff we record is good. At the end of the day, I want a product that I am proud of and that I can take pride in the work of it. The live gigs sound great because we have all our little things to tell. And it is so different from the recorded digital stuff. Especially playing bass, brings a different feel to the song. I could even switch up some of the notes, and if there is a different note underneath, I can completely transform the song. I have done a lot of that with the live set. So yeah, I think I prefer the live set.
Caleb.
Seth.
Will and Guy, what are the things that you missed when you were a duo, that Eric, Caleb, and Seth brought onto the group?
Will: Seth is an exceptional singer. Me being a songwriter, what Seth gives me is the option to write an RnB song, a Soul song, or any type of song and he gives me the means to make that song legitimate. Seth brings me endless possibilities within the songwriting process.
Eric brings a whole new dimension not only musically but also in terms of production. All these new tracks are based on the groove which primarily comes from Eric. What I am excited about is that Guy used to be our producer along with Robbie. Now we have Eric, who is an amazing producer. He and Guy are going to have musical babies. He is always working with different musicians, so he knows when to click record and says he hasn’t clicked record. It is a skill of its own.
Caleb is passionate about the drums. We came in this morning to the studio at 11 AM, we are all knackered, and Caleb just goes straight on to the drums killing it. He loves the drums. You can’t replace someone who is completely passionate about the instrument he plays.
What were you trying to pursue with your latest single “Just Call”?
Seth: The idea behind “Just Call” is very different for every member of the band. Overall, I would say it is to remind people that communication is not as far as we think it is. It is purely just a phone call away. The song is a celebration of love. “Just call” is just reminding people that even though we have had a very tricky time in being able to communicate with loved ones and friends, especially in the last two years, it is the simplest thing as just calling someone.
Seth.
Caleb, Eric, Seth, Will, and Guy from left to right.
Stogey Records is the label with whom you release. How important was Stogey for your development?
Will: What they have done is that they provided us with a platform. We have got access to a certain studio time in Leeds, and they have given us the option of coming to a studio in London, which we are comfortable with, with an engineer who we love, who knows us, to record new songs with live tracking. They have given us so much help with funding, PR, and support for our projects. We can’t thank them enough for that.
Guy: Leon was our best mate for years. He started getting into the business side of music at a time we were starting to understand what we were doing as well, which helped so much. And Olive who is a recent addition to the team knows styling and the fashion aspect as well. It is such a close-knit team. We work so well together.
You talk a lot about your sound engineer, Robbie. How has he helped you in the last few years?
Eric: I met him for the first time yesterday, so I haven’t worked with him before. Seeing his workflow, in the past couple of days has been cool. He gets how it needs to sound and how it should be. His calls are the perfect shot every time. On the flip side, if you got a bad idea, he is going to tell you had a shit idea. He is like that.
Seth: It is also a blessing to have someone who is very talented with their ears and who is from an outside point of view. When we are in Guy’s bedroom we will listen to our demos on repeat. Once you listen to a song so many times it is difficult to hear the wrong stuff. Robbie will be able to listen to it instantly.
Eric, Guy, Seth, Caleb, and Robbie from left to right. Will (on the floor).
Seth.
What is the thing that you love the most about your group?
Eric: I think it is the mixture of styles and influences because Guy has quite an electronic background and he is great with synths and technical stuff. I love that he brings that to the table, it completely changes up songs. Seth’s voice is absolutely the cherry on the cake man. The feels that Caleb whips up are unbelievable, and Will’s songwriting is crazy. Everything that comes together is what I love about this group. The way everybody works with each other.
Caleb: It is great to play in a band with people that you can hang around with. We are just good friends. This is kind of the first band I have been in, where we can all hang out aside from doing music. Once we finish working, we will go and hang out together and just do things that aren’t related to music, and it is just really easy.
I would now like to ask you to describe with one word the thing you like the best about the band member on your left.
Seth: I am going to use the word effortless. I am going to explain why. I have never seen a musician such as Guy who can quickly change between instruments so smoothly and make it look effortless.
Guy: Eric is just the grooviest. I play bass but he just comes up with so much groovy stuff that sums up tracks perfectly. He just has the vibe.
Caleb: Eric, you have only known me for about two weeks, let’s see what you have to say about me.
Eric: I am going to say power. This motherfucker can play drums that are like BANG.
Caleb: Will? Idiot. No, I am joking. Will is a lovely man. He is a very positive guy. I would say uplifting. He motivates you. You all make me feel wanted. Will tries to bring out the best out of everyone and is always smiling.
Will: I will say Seth is enigmatic. He is one of the few people I have ever met that is as much of a showoff as me. I see lots of similarities in myself and Seth in terms of how we like to perform and in the way he will pretend not to enjoy it when, inside, he loves it.
Eric, Guy, Will, Seth, and Caleb from left to right.
Since the 13th of May 2022, The Moontown Project released three singles: “Recently”, “Deep Sea Diver” and “Elevator”. “Elevator” is out since the 24th of March 2023 and was the first song ever that this band recorded using the technology of live tracking.
Recently they have played live in Leeds, in Hootananny in Brixton while supporting Sidders, and in Old Street, London, in Jodie Bryant’s monthly showcase.
These five guys have been rocking it and have been working on lots of new music that will be out in a near future. Stay tuned.
You can find The Moontown Project on Instagram.